what new story heard
agreeable for telling
in conversation
Back in the day, Benjamin Franklin put together a club known as The Junto.
According to Wikipedia, The Junto, also known as the Leather Apron Club, was a club for mutual improvement established in 1727 by Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia. The Leather Apron Club’s purpose was to debate questions of morals, politics, and natural philosophy, and to exchange knowledge of business affairs.
They Junto met on Friday nights and to get the debate started, Dr. Franklin put together a list of 24 starter questions.
Question number 2 asked, “What new story have you lately heard agreeable for telling in conversation?”
As this question asked about new stories, it should be no surprise that the Junto members realized they would need access to new books which led to the creation of the The Library Company of Philadelphia and libraries were established in America.
The Library Company of Philadelphia occupied the 2nd floor of what was called Carpenters Hall in Philadelphia.
In a room on the 1st floor of this building, the Continental Congress met and in 1776, signed the Declaration of Independence.
The Library Association is older than the United States.
Libraries and me have had a long association.
At Crestview Elementary School in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where I grew up, the library was where I had to spend ‘time-outs’ when my behavior in class made it desirable for the teacher for me to be someone where else.
In agreement with the Principal, I would spend 15 minutes or so by myself in the library.
Not a punishment and really, a bit of rewarding bad behavior, but it worked out for all those involved.
When I was 6 or so I got my first library card at the Creston Branch of the Grand Rapids Public Library.
But it was the summer of 1970, when I turned 10 that I got a new bike and the main branch of the Grand Rapids Public Library became available to me.
I would ride a route of back streets that required me to cross several busy streets and then navigate downtown Grand Rapids but I made it.
I would park my bike in the bike racks, didn’t need a lock back then and walk to the main entrance of the magnificent Grand Rapids Public Library Main Building.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but this building was pretty much brand new, having been opened in 1967.
Walking into the lobby in 1970, it still had that ‘new building’ smell.
The first thing that would hit was the air conditioning which, after my ride downtown, felt great.
It is hard to describe, but after getting downtown on my own, when I walked into that library I felt it was MY library.
Anyone else in the library was there at my sufferance.
Once in the library, there was a wall of double glass doors with the sign ADULT SECTION.
It would be a couple of years before I dared go through those doors if my Dad wasn’t with me.
When I could badger my Dad enough to take me downtown, he would go through those doors and then head upstairs to the Newspaper Room and read out of town newspapers while I looked at books.
When I had my books from the Youth Section, I felt confident enough to go into the Adult Section as I knew if someone challenged me, I could say I was getting my Dad.
BTW the Newspaper Room was in the original Main Building that had been built in 1904 and despite all their efforts, modern architects were not able to line up the floors of the new and old buildings.
To get to the old building, you took the stairs and then took a door off the landing to another inner kinda secret flight of stairs.
Just to know these stairs were there was pretty cool.
If you took the elevator, you would press the buttons with an R or 2R for the 2nd floor of the Ryerson Building, the original name of the main building and magically the elevator doors would open behind you.
As an aside, Mr. Ryerson of Chicago offered to build the library as a gift to City of Grand Rapids in memory of his pleasant memories of visiting family in Grand Rapids.
No one knows how much the building cost as Mr. Ryerson had all, and I mean ALL, the bills sent direct to him.
The day the Library opened, the Public Schools were closed for the day and all the kids and citizens of the city went to the Library where Mr. and Mrs. Ryerson received guests on the landing of the main marble staircase.
That’s my kind of rich benefactor.
It was always fun to get on the elevator, press 2R and then turn your back to the doors and watch the other patrons wonder what in the world you were doing.
But that was when I was there with my Dad.
It was years before I dared enter the Adult Section on my own and the first time I did, I waited to get nabbed and ordered out.
There was another sign over the doorway that said YOUTH SECTION with an arrow to the right.
That was my world.
I might walk in and start looking at the new titles.
Or I might walk back to the Civil War books to find something I hadn’t read.
I would greet the Librarian on staff who would often recognize and ask about my ride.
I walked through those aisles with seven league boots and took no prisoners and admitted no faults.
And I looked and looked at all those books and I wondered just what new stories they might contain that would be agreeable for telling in conversation.
And I did my best to find them all.
BTW – Was paging through old New Yorker Magazines when I came across this cartoon that appeared on December 12, 1932.
No Haiku For You 