FIFTY MILLION STRONG 



All the states of the Union have state libraries. All the 

 states except a very few have library commissions. Available 

 statistics indicate that Wisconsin spends more money per 

 capita through her state library and library commission than 

 any other state in the Union, and consequently of all the 

 states does most for her people in library matters. One of the 

 many functions of state library commissions is the organiza- 

 tion and management of traveling library systems. Traveling 

 libraries are usually sent in small collections of twenty-five or 

 fifty volumes, and the expenses are paid wholly or in part by 

 the state or altogether by the recipients. Such libraries con- 

 sist of general and special collections. The former are for 

 the most part available for all the people; while the latter 

 consist largely of libraries for children, for foreigners, for the 

 blind, for study clubs, for granges, for public and private 

 schools and for Sunday-schools and churches. Many of the 

 states send out annually over a thousand collections, which in 

 the aggregate contain a large number of books. 



Making the county the unit represents a comparatively new 

 movement in the library history of the country. Yet this 

 movement is making quite rapid progress. There are at 

 present nineteen states that have county library laws, and, 

 as far as can be learned, there are 103 county libraries serving 

 the library interests of their respective counties. The names 

 of the states having county library laws are : Ohio, Wyoming, 

 Wisconsin, Oregon, Nebraska, New York, Iowa, Minnesota, 

 Tennessee, Missouri, California, Maryland, Washington, Ken- 

 tucky, North Carolina, Montana, Texas, West Virginia, and 

 Nevada; and the county libraries by states are: California, 

 26; Wisconsin, 14; Wyoming, 13; Minnesota, 10; Ohio, 8; 

 Oregon, 5; North Carolina, 4; Missouri, 4; New York, 3; 

 Kentucky, 2; Montana, 2; Indiana, 2; Alabama, 2; Colorado, 

 2 ; Washington, i ; Illinois, i ; Maryland, i ; Pennsylvania, I ; 

 Oklahoma, i ; and Tennessee, i. 1 



Many incidents might be given showing the value of the 



Data assembled in 1915. 



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