WATERTOWN FREE PUBLIC LIBRARY MISSION STATEMENT

ABOUT THE LIBRARY

Watertown Free Public Library has been community based from its earliest days. Solon Whitney was named our first librarian in 1867. Throughout his 50 year career he publicly stated his firm belief that the library belonged to the citizens. This is still our basic belief today. During Whitney’s tenure our 1884 building was constructed. Now that building has been completely renovated with an addition that provides service for the 21st. century.

In 2005, a community based committee completed a Long Range Plan for the Library.
Central to this plan is the concept of Watertown Free Public Library as a Commons where all come to meet and connect in a welcoming, supportive environment. With the opening of our new building on August 6, 2006, Watertown citizens now have a library where they can pursue interests of all kinds—informational, recreational and educational.

History of the Watertown Free Public Library

Early History

In the earliest days of the town, prominent citizens held personal libraries and treasured books. In 1779 sixty-three of these citizens formed “The Union Library Society” and pledged three dollar shares to purchase books for the society’s use.  This subscription library became a collection of 235 volumes housed at Jonathan Bird’s tavern. Members could borrow books on the second Monday of the month between 6 pm and 8 pm. The name was later changed to “The Union Social Library”.

In 1842, Joseph Bird, Jonathan’s descendant, voted with a town committee to merge the social library and the North District School. Half of this collection eventually became part of the first Watertown Free Public Library collection.

By 1866 Joseph Bird established a high school subscription Teachers’ Library, later added to the public library collection. Due to his fund raising success and the popularity of this library the school committee appointed a committee to study the feasibility of a public library for Watertown. In 1868 a special Town Meeting elected the first Board of Trustees of the Watertown Free Public Library. Citizens pledged to raise privately $6000 for books with the understanding that town funds would support the library and provide housing for the collection.

Watertown Free Public Library opened on March 31, 1869 in Joel Barnard’s former dry goods store on the ground floor of Town Hall, at the corner of Main and Church Streets. High School principal Solon F. Whitney had spent the previous seven months acquiring and processing the 2250 volume opening collection and he served the town as librarian for almost half a century. The library was open Wednesdays and Saturdays for four hours each day. The Town Meeting voted against Sunday opening.

In the late 1860’s Watertown’s 4000 souls made up a country town of small farms, businesses and factories and large country estates. Its new library was popular and soon reported cramped, uncomfortable space, concerns about buying popular fiction, and issues with loitering youth. There were 3500 library cardholders, 16 years or older, among the 5000 residents in 1882. There were close to 13,000 books and 12,000 pamphlets and papers.

In 1881 the town agreed to appropriate $20,000 for a library building if an equal amount could be raised privately.  Horatio Hollis Hunnewell pledged $10,000 in honor of his father, Dr. Walter Hunnewell who practiced medicine for many years in the town. Samuel Walker pledged $4200 if the library were located on Main Street. It was thought that Walker wanted to preserve the view from his house on the hill above the proposed library and offered this lot and a park to the town. Other citizens quickly offered the remainder and the town appropriation followed. Architects Shaw and Hunnewell of Boston designed the French Renaissance building which Boston contractor David Perkins finished constructing during the winter of 1883. The Trustees took possession of the building in 1884.  Even though the town had some electricity then, the library did not have electric lights until 1900.

Charles Pratt gave the new library its first large gift of $5000 in 1888, in honor of his father, Asa Pratt.  The interest from this fund purchased periodicals for the “use of the industrial portion of the community” and a basement reading room was furnished with town funds to house the collection.

Whitney saw further changes in library services during the last decades of his career.

Town Meeting voted morning and Sunday hours and the Trustees approved a proportion of the budget for fiction and juvenile titles. They added a Children’s Department in 1900 and the west side addition funded once again by H. H. Hunnewell.  Whitney could rightfully claim that he had won enough public support so that “supplies for libraries will be voted as for roads, for public lighting, for schools, as a matter of necessity.”

Later History: the 1900s

Lydia Masters, Watertown’s second librarian, was the grand daughter of Joseph Bird who figured so importantly in the organization of Watertown’s first public library. Masters instituted open library stacks, expanded the branch system and moved the Children’s Department to the first floor of the Library.

She saw the library through two world wars when fuel was scarce and a depression when budgets were cut and salaries declined.  Library use, as often happens in hard times, increased. She organized book donations for the armed forces in 1917 and again in 1943.  In 1935 the Works Progress Administration funded a small extension to the stack area of the library, a cataloging room and an office for the Librarian.  Masters and the Trustees developed a job classification plan with job descriptions, qualifications and salary ranges.  She served as Massachusetts Library Association president, beginning a tradition of professional involvement by Watertown librarians.

When Helen Hutchinson became Librarian in 1947, Watertown had nearly doubled in size and the library appropriation had reached $80,000. She founded Watertown’s Young Friends of the Library, a girls’ club, which was supervised by the Circulation Librarian and volunteered service to the library. Hutchinson began a library radio program “Leaders are Readers” on station WCRB.

Catherine Yerxa, a life long Watertown resident and originally an East Branch librarian, brought her experience at the Massachusetts Division of Public Libraries to her role as Town Librarian. In 1952 Yerxa and the Trustees began to plan a library improvement project. The town appointed a Building Committee and funds were appropriated and the new addition opened January 29, 1956. During her 14 years as Librarian, Yerxa oversaw discussion of removing the word “Free” from the library name, deliberated over significant salary issues, encouraged the formation of the Watertown Art Association in 1952 and the Friends of the Library in 1961, and established a library music record collection and a Great Books Discussion Group.  She was Massachusetts Library Association president and active in state library legislation initiatives and the beginning of regional library systems in the Commonwealth.

When the Trustees hired Joseph Hopkins in 1963, they recognized the library’s growth and development and deemed the title Library Director more appropriate than Town Librarian.  Hopkins worked diligently on personnel issues.  A new collective bargaining law allowed for town employees to form unions.  In 1969 Town Meeting created a separate classification for library positions.  This allowed for much improved salary levels.  Hopkins developed library collections to reflect customer demands, worked on school/library cooperation, promoted the importance of good public relations, developed the incentive program for library school students and actively supported the regional concept in library services. Long time Trustee Charles Burke wrote a library history in 1968 for the library’s centennial.  Burke had personally known all the Librarians from Whitney to Hopkins.

Sigrid Reddy became the town’s sixth librarian in 1971. She served as Massachusetts Library Association President during her second year in Watertown. She supported staff attendance at professional meetings and suggested the first Staff Day in 1979.  She arranged for additions to the art collection, restoration and appraisal of selected pieces, and loan of items for museum exhibition.  Reddy used grants to fund new library initiatives for pre-schoolers, art print and audio visual collections, conservation of historic materials, metrics information, Bicentennial events, and resources for the visually impaired. The Library began a popular Senior Drop In Center, set up a public dark room, began loaning museum passes, worked with the town’s cable company, reinstated Sunday hours, and started the library’s literacy program.  Proposition 2½ changed the financial picture for all Massachusetts towns in 1980 and library services suffered. The Minuteman Library Network was formed and automated library services for Watertown were a reality by 1986.

Helene Tuchman was named Acting Director upon Reddy’s retirement and became Director in January 1990. As Assistant Director, Tuchman had supervised the automation of Watertown Free Public Library during the formative years of the Minuteman Library Network. 1992 renovations to the building were funded by town appropriations, lasted a year and resulted in more accessible facilities and refurbished public areas. The Library implemented a very successful multicultural grant. Tuchman carried out a major library long range planning process that involved community representatives, Trustees and staff.   She arranged for the gift of two important Hosmer sculptures and supported Lisa Tiemann’s stained glass window project.

In July 1993 Francis MacFarlane became director in the midst of a budget shortfall. The Town requested several budget versions that involved cuts in hours and services.  The Trustees and administration were concerned about falling below the state standards needed for certification. The library made services more accessible with special technology and devices to aid patrons with disabilities. Grant money gave Project Literacy more independence and stability. Regular cable programs and the Library’s 125th. anniversary marked MacFarlane’s directorship.

Soon after the Trustees appointed Leone Cole Director in March 1995, she was already working on new building planning. In July 1995 the Board of Library Commissioners Building Consultant met with the Trustees to advise them on a construction project. Responses to a 1995 community survey suggested areas for improvement in library services and indicated the pressing need for new construction. This process culminated in the opening of the new Watertown Free Public Library in August 2006. Over the decade of her administration Cole realized a technology plan that kept the library and staff up to date.  She increased the overall budget and saw circulation steadily increase to a high of 536,000 in fiscal 2008. Throughout, the staff maintained high standards of customer service and innovation through staff development and evaluation.  The Library today is the place to meet and connect, to learn, to celebrate diversity, history and culture and to explore.