Wisconsin Library Heritage Center
The Wisconsin Library Heritage Center is a program of the Wisconsin Library Association Foundation promoting understanding and appreciation of the history of libraries and librarianship in Wisconsin.
As reported previously the Wisconsin Historical Society is rennovating parts of its main building on State Street including it magnificent reading room. The Society recently updated information about the rennovation in the “Highlights Archives”
The “On This Day” feature of the Wisconsin Historical Society’s website alerted me to the information that on this day in 1895 the voters of Oshkosh, WI approved the establishment of a free public library.
May is National Preservation Month and this year’s them is “This Place Matters!”. The website for the National Trust for Historic Preservation provides background information on National Preservation Month for 2009. The Wisconsin Historical Society provides the leadership for historic preservation in Wisconsin.
Among the earliest libraries in Wisconsin were the libraries of academies. Academies were basically private high schools and often preceded colleges or universities. Carroll College in Waukesha County was originally incorporated in 1841 as Prairieville Academy in the Town of Prairieville in Milwaukee County.
The Wisconsin Historical Society has many physical and digital resources of interest and value to the library history buff. A fellow library history buff made me aware of an image (Image ID 4293) in the Historical Society’s digital collection that pictured a railroad car library.
The 1901 Conference of the American Library Association took place in Waukesha. In the early Monday morning hours of July 8, 1901 the entire group of attendees went by train to Madison. As reported in the magazine Pulic Libraries,
This postcard shows the public library building for Grand Rapids (now Wisconsin Rapids). It was completed in 1892. The library shared the building with the city council and the fire department initially, but the library took over the entire building in 1900.
Library history buffs and those interested in architecture won’t want to miss a program at the WLA Conference in Middleton on the Wisconsin Carnegie libraries designed by the architectural firm of Claude & Stark. The program is entitled “The Shared Ideal: The Carnegie Libraries of Claude &
On September 10, I posted an entry about the Forest Lodge Library in Cable, Wisconsin which claims to be the oldest log cabin library in the state. That claim has been challenged by the Wabeno Public Library in Forest County which is also located in a log building.
The Forest Lodge Library in Cable, Wisconsin claims to be Wisconsin’s oldest log cabin library. Are there really more? The library was founded in 1925 and has been in the same building throughout its history.