Crandall Library — Second anniversary

The board of the fledgling Crandall Library was increasing its emphasis on literature as the institution approached another anniversary.

“We need to pay more attention to poetry, the drama and general literature,” Secretary James Holden said at a library board meeting the previous evening, The Morning Star of Glens Falls reported on Oct. 17, 1894.

“The library will be two years old the eleventh of next month,” Holden said. “Who can calculate the good it has done to the community or estimate its broadening influence as an established institution, and its popularity is still on the increase among lovers of books.”

The library had 6,619 card holders.

In the three months ending July 16, the library had circulated 9,858.

In the three months ended in Oct. 16, circulation was 7,751.

Circulation dipped in the summer months, when people were busy with other pursuits.

Crandal Library had been ranked in the top 25 libraries in the state, based on circulation.

“This is certainly a credible record for one of the youngest institutions,” Holden said.

In other Crandall Library news collected from historic newspapers of the region:

• Crandall Free Library was not the first public library in Glens Falls.

What distinguished it from its predecessors is that that there was no charge to the public to use it.

“In accordance with a published call, a meeting of citizens to take initial steps for the establishment of a public library in Glens Falls was held in the lecture room of the M.E. (Methodist Episcopal) church Monday evening, Oct. 24th,” The Glen’s Falls Messenger reported on Oct. 29, 1881.

Those in attendance voted unanimously against making membership in the new library free to the general public, and instead set an annual membership fee of $1 — the equivalent of $30.16 in 2023 dollars.

• State Chancellor Anson J. Upson, in a commencement speech at Glens Falls Academy, urged graduates to make good use of Crandall Free Library.

“Continue, I beseech you, the habit of reading which you have found at school,” he was quoted in The Morning Star on June 26, 1894. “I cannot tell you how gratifying it is to notice that the generous gift of Henry Crandall to the town is not only praised but appreciated. The books are read by a multitude of readers. The free library has fulfilled our highest expectations.”

• The Morning Star reported on July 7, 1894 that Crandall Free Library hours of operation were changed to 8:30 to noon and 5:39 to 9 in the evening, and closed in the afternoon, for the summer months.

Afternoon hours were restored in the fall.

• Crandall Library board members, as a group, attended the funeral of library Trustee A.B. Abbott, who was killed in an accidental shooting.

“Mr. Abbott was one of the trustees originally chosen by Mr. Crandall, on founding his free library, to conduct and manage its interests,” The Morning Star reported on Aug. 29, 1894. “Scholarly in his attainments, a close student of books and men, acute in his sensibilities as to the moral and mental hygiene usefulness or advisability of the many literary productions which make up a library.”

Click here to read the most recent previous Crandall Library history post.