Harriet C. Long, RS 89\/1\/27<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nThe importance of her work was reflected in Long\u2019s interactions with a colonel stationed at Fort Brown at Brownville, Texas. The colonel, with a reputation for being harsh, demonstrated the desire for books by his men when he spoke to Long. Long wrote of the interaction, \u201cWhen I said that I came out to find out how things were going, and what we could do more he immediately said \u2018Don\u2019t ever send any fewer; we need them all.\u2019\u201d [2]<\/p>\n
However, the books that were so desperately wanted by soldiers sometimes encountered mishaps, creating trouble for Long. She noted in one letter that six of 350 books she sent to Fort McIntosh reached the fort and the rest ended up in the town library. Long wrote, “I had to get on my knees and explain to the town librarians, and take those books back to the fort, and start over again. But these two months I thought Fort McIntosh well care for, and here I was sadly disillussioned [sic].” [3]<\/p>\n
One of Long’s letters also described the bookmobile the library was using and the process of manning the truck. Her letter provides an insight on how the ALA was reaching soldiers in remote corners of the country during the war that were otherwise unnoticed:<\/p>\n
The Library Ford Truck has been equipped with book cases on each side, and several hundred books can thus be taken over the field, for the men to choose from. It takes one person to discharge the books as the men return them, and one person on either side of the truck at the book shelves to help the men select them and to charge the books. Usually they circulate 200 books in less than two hours. [4]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Long stayed in El Paso until 1919, when she transferred over to Europe. By then there were over 150 library stations along the Mexican border. [5] In a 1919 report to the Association, the work of Long and her colleague, Ethel McCollough, along with many others who helped them, were briefly summarized in two sentences, \u201cNor were the men doing monotonous guard duty on the Mexican border forgotten. To them traveling libraries from the Association headquarters at El Paso and San Antonio came as a great boon.\u201d [6] While the report provides no substance to the library work done along the Mexican border, Long’s letters in the American Library Association Archives provide a clearer picture and evidence of her and her colleagues’ efforts.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no frigate like a book
\nTo take you leagues away
\nNor any courser like a page
\nOf prancing poetry.
\nThis solace may the poorest take
\nWithout oppress or toll
\nHow frugal is the chariot
\nThat drives the human soul.\u201d [7]<\/p>\n
\n- “Mexican Border,” War Library Bulletin, pg. 7, April 1918, vol. 1, no. 6<\/li>\n
- Harriet C. Long to Family, July 28, 1918, Harriet C. Long Papers, Record Series 89\/1\/27, Box 1, Folder: Correspondence – Texas, 1918, American Library Association Archives at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.<\/li>\n
- Harriet C. Long to Family, August 18, 1918, Folder: Correspondence \u2013 Texas, 1918, RS 89\/1\/27-1.<\/li>\n
- Harriet C. Long to Family, August 5, 1918, Folder: Correspondence \u2013 Texas, 1918, RS 89\/1\/27-1.<\/li>\n
- “Summary of Library War Service,” War Library Bulletin, May 1919, vol 1, no. 9, pg. 3.<\/li>\n
- A. H. Shearer, “Historical Sketch of the Library War Servce,” Papers and Proceedings of the Forty-First Annual Meeting of the American Library Association (Chicago, 1919), pg. 230, Record Series 5\/1\/2,\u00a0American Library Association Archives at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.<\/li>\n
- Manual for use in Branch Libraries of American Library Association Mexican Border Traveling Library Service, Harriet C. Long, September 1918, Folder – Harriet C. Long Papers, 1918-1920, RS 89\/1\/27-1.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
While most of the American Library Association Library War Service\u2019s efforts were concentrated in camps and hospitals in the United States and Europe, there was also a need for books for the soldiers stationed along the Mexican border. Chalmers Hadley, the librarian of the Denver Public Library, surveyed the desire for books among soldiers at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":706,"featured_media":4390,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,9],"tags":[109,212,214],"class_list":["post-4383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ala-history","category-librarian-spotlight","tag-harriet-c-long","tag-women-librarians","tag-world-war-i"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/706"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4383\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/ala\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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