12/10/2017 new and old kay documents assembled since 2011 Contonned lecture File 1909: Version 2 ot 3 (Early Version) and Fuller The Jesup Memorial Library had its origin as a thought in a collection of books on gardening I was gathering together to give the Bar Harbor Horti- cultural Society, which I had been instrumental in founding a few years before and which was doing ex- cellent work in organizing flower shows, held at the Building of Arts, in holding meetings for discussion, arranging lectures and promoting generally good horti- culture on the Island. I had a number of valuable books, old and re- cent, which I was ready to turn over to the Society when it should have a place to keep them, means to care for them, and opportunity for their use. These, I thought, a good library would provide. The old library, known as the Village Library, fur- nished merely an opportunity, on paying a certain fee, for taking out books for summer reading of the lighter kind. It had been organized in the time of the big hotels by a group of summer visitors, coming annually, and was all the village needed at that time, but utter- ly inadequate for Bar Harbor in its development of a later day. I thought that if a good site could be secured the building would come later. Looking the opportunity over, I found that there was one site which seemed to me ideal, the one where today the Jesup Memorial Lib- rary stands, opposite the churches and near the Village Green. There was no building on the site and it could be bought, I found, for The site selected, the next step was to find someone to purchase it for the new Library and I wrote to Mr. Philip Livingston, whose wife had recently died, and who, I thought, might like to give it in her memory, to be held for a future building. This I did in the early spring of 1909. After some weeks' delay I got an answer from Mr. Livingston in Florence, Italy, telling me that I had been right in thinking he would like to do something in memory of his wife but that he had already taken steps to do it in the purchase, in Florence, of a fountain for the Village Green. The fountain arrived that spring, was unpacked in the town barn for the selectmen and ministers of the town to see and pass upon, it being surmounted by the figure of a naked boy; and, being approved by them, after much dis- cussion, it was erected and is still there. Toward the end of the following summer I took the matter up again, this time with Mrs. Morris K. Jesup, whose husband had been prominent in various ac- tivities in Bar Harbor - the Y. M. C. A., the V. I. A., and others - and who had died the year before, asking her only to buy the land and give it in his memory for the site of a future building. The idea appealed to her and I bought the land that afternoon. Mrs. Jesup then offered to build a library upon it, in her husband's memory, setting a limit of $20,000 on its cost, and William Adams Delano, of the Delano and Aldrich architectural firm in New York, was sent for to make plans. Mrs. Delano stayed with Mrs. Jesup, who told him what she wanted for material to give the building distinction in honor to her husband; I told him what I wanted for the town in space and arrangement, which was substantially what now exists in the ample reading room with central table lighted from above; in the opportunity for students in the quiet windowed alcoves; in the wide balconies and generous book stacks. On either side the entrance from the street I planned for two spacious rooms, the one on the right for a horticultural room and a special horticultural library; the one on the left, overlooked by the Librarian's desk, for children and a children's lib- rary. The horticultural room, before it could be devoted to its intended use, WAS taken over for art exhibition purposes to which it lends itself admir- ablys the children's room has served its purpose well and is still so doing. A feature I had looked on as favorable in the site was that it lent itself to building on two levels, the ground sloping rapidly toward the south and giving opportunity for a room beneath the reading room which, though low-studded and pillared, would stand out in the open with full light and sun and with opportunity around it for a sheltered garden with separate entrance from the street, This opportunity, easily secured, was lost by the architect, who, making his plans in New York, after we had separated at Bar Harbor, had designed a too ponderous and massive basement wall, built of cut stone and sloping outward, not called for by the single story of the reading room above, with small, high windows, where windows of larger size and lower, looking out on the garden planned around it, would have served emply for support and provided a delight- ful, pillared reading room and special stack. But the rooms above were all that could be asked and a pleasure to read in. After Mr. Delano had been some days at Bar Harbor, making preliminary studies, he came to me and said: "What Mrs. Jesup wants in material and you in space and arrangement is going to cost more than Mrs. Jesup has planned to give. What shall I do? Shall I cut in the quality of material or in the space you wantt" I said, "Cut in neither. Let Mrs. Jesup do the cutting when she has seen your plans." When we met that autumn in Mr. Delano's office in New York, Mrs. Jesup, Mr. Delano and I, with the successful bidder on the plans as drawn, the bid amounted to seventy-seven thousand dollars and some hundreds, and Mrs. Jesup signed the contract without questioning its amount. Mrs. Jesup asking me to take charge of the execution of the contract, I employed to supervise it one of the best building inspectors in the State, Roseoe A. Eddy, a carpenter by trade who later became, and remained till be died, Labor Commissioner of Maine. Nothing escaped him and the work was good. The material for the building, both exterior and interior, was the best that could be obtained. The stone for the exterior, a splendid, fine-grained granite, came from Bear Brook quarry at the base of Newport Mountain. The Reading Room was finished in dark oak-panelling, with liberal space between it and the outer wall. The floor was of silent cork. Around the basement on the lower level, reach- ed from the street by steps of granite, like the granite of the basement wall, I had the sub-soil re- moved to a depth of thirty inches and replaced with the best loan I could obtain, and then had it plant- ed, at my own expense, by the Mount Desert Nurseries, that it might be in keeping with the intended horti- cultural room, as a hardy herbaceous garden, sunny and sheltered. Construction commenced at once on Mrs. Jesup's signing the contract. By the beginning of the follow. ing summer, the summer of 1911, the building was near- ing completion and I took up with Mrs. Jesup the question of endowment. It had not occurred to her that an endowment would be needed, but since the building was to be a memorial I told her others could not be counted on to maintain it; for that a fund would be necessary. Light, heat, and the employment of a janitor would need to be provided. The services of a librarien and the purchase of books and magazines could safely be left to those using the library as the years went by. In making this clear to Mrs, Jesup I had a valuable ally in Mrs. Hobson, of Washington, an old friend to both Mr. and Mrs. Jesup, to whom Mr. Jesup had been a wise counsellor in time of need and who was determined that the memorial if built should be a worthy one in every way, I remember sitting in Mrs. Hobson's parler with her and Mrs. Jesup, discussing the endowment need, and Mrs. Jesup plaintively asking, "Would ten thousand dollars be enough?" To which Mrs, Hobson replied firmly: "No, it would not be enough." Finally the day was at hand when the Library was to be dedicated, Mr. Thomas DeWitt Cuyler, Mrs. Jesup's nephew and in great part her heir, was to make the presentation and came on for it from Phila- delphia. The Hon. Luere B. Deesy, later Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, accepted the gift to the public on behalf of the Town. Two days before the ceremony I went to Mr. Fred C. Lynam, local banker, who had been president of the Village Library, and asked him to make me an itemized estimate of what it would cost to run the Memorial Library so far as heating, lighting, in- surance and janitor service were concerned, leaving the salary of the librarian and the purchase of books to the passing generations; and when Mr. Cuyler came I took this estimate to him. It called for an income of twenty-five hundred a year, the interest on fifty thousand. That was in the afternoon before the cere- mony. In the morning Mrs. Jesup handed him her check for twenty-five thousand, for endowment, to be present- ed at the meeting. 10 Mr. Cuyler said: "Don't you think that it would be better to complete the matter now and free your mind of it? "Is it not enough?", she asked. And he replied: "No. Mr. Dorr has brought me an estimate of annual expenses, drawn up by Mr. Fred C. Lynem, which calls for the interest on fifty thousand." Mrs. Jesup took back the check, tore it up and wrote another for fifty thousand, which Mr. Cuyler included in his offer to the Town. The meeting, held in the Reading Room of the completed Library, went with great distinction. Judge Deasy's speech of acceptance on the Town's be- half was elequent, and the gift was received with enthusiasm. Mrs. Jesup, who died but a few years after- ward, was well content. After I had bought the land for the Library, one piece still remained in the hands of the owner, Mrs. Kavanaugh. This Mrs. Kennedy bought and on it built, next the Library, a home for the Young Women's Christian Association of Bar Harbor. Like the Library, it was far more expensive to run than funds of the Association would permit; but, unlike the Library, no endowment was provided. Mrs. William B. Rice, of New York, a trustee of the Russell Sage Foundation, interested in public work and an old-time summer resident of Bar Harbor, and greatly interested in the Association, went to Mrs. Kennedy and told her frankly of the need; whereat, she told me with humor, that Mrs. Kennedy wept and said she wished she could endow it but that her whole income for some years ahead was pleaged for world-wide Presbyterian church missionary work which she had undertaken, under the influence of her brother-in-Isw, the Rev. Dr. Schauffler, Sec- 12 retary of the Presbyterian Missionary Society of New York, who with her eister, his wife, made their home with Mrs. Kennedy, winter and summer, after Mr. Kennedy's death. Mr. Kennedy left a vast fortune I some sixty million dollars - made in larger part through coming into association at an early stage with James J. Hill in railroad consolidations and construction, of which he left one-half, with generous public spirit, to various institutions in New York, religious and char. itable. The rest he divided equally between his wife and their various relatives. His nephew, Robert Todd, speaking to me of Mrs. Kennedy's desire to endow the Y. W. C. A. build- ing she had given I of which he knew from Mrs. Rice - said: "It's simply an idea Mrs. Kennedy has that capital is in the nature of a sacred trust, not to be invaded. She has fifteen million dollars and has only to take a million from it and do what she wants." When Mrs. Kennedy died, however, fifty thousand dollars was provided in her will for endorment to the building, her sole bequest to Bar Harbor, though it was more a home to her than New York after Mr. Kennedy's death, with her gardens here and her long motor rides over the Island with her sister. She took great interest always in my work and drove almost daily to the Spring, wherever else she went, and once when I was dining with her, with her New York pastor, who secretly wished she might con- tribute toward the Park, ahe said: "Mr. Dorr, you ought to have a million dollars for the Park. You would make the Island one of the most beautiful spots in the world." But I did not take it up and noth- ing came from it. Lottery Version 3 JML. H. 1 Dup 1202 JESUP MEMORIAL LIBRARY 1911 Mount Desert Street, with churches opposite, the Y. W. C. A. building given by Mrs. Kennedy as its THE next neighbor, and an old-fashioned hardy garden, lawns and shrubbery enclosing it. No more fitting JESUP MEMORIAL LIBRARY setting for a Library could well be found. BAR HARBOR, MAINE Within, the main reading room is long and spacious, equipped with a silent floor of cork and panelled in HE Library at Bar Harbor is the outgrowth dark oak, quiet and restful to the eye. A long oak T of over thirty years of devoted labor on table, lighted from above, reaches down the length of the part of summer residents and citizens, the room, for magazine or other reading, while on crowned by Mrs. Jesup's splendid gift of a permanent either side the room is divided into alcoves - still, and fitting home for it. No more delightful place for secluded spots for reading, each with its own win- reading C.I for quiet study exists in America to-day dow opening pleasantly out on lawn and garden, each than the silent, spacious rooms this building offers, with its own chairs and table and open stack of designed for the purpose with the greatest care and books. Easy flights of stairs lead up also from the with wide knowledge of what had been accomplished floor of this main reading room to a gallery - wide elsewhere. That these opportunities- --- for choice of as the alcoves' depth below - extending round the books and for their ready consultation, placed on room upon three sides, where there are further open open shelves; for reading in quiet seclusion, in the stacks from floor to ceiling; and all these stacks, the lower and the upper both, are full of well selected town's midst; and for passing pleasant hours in beau- books. tiful, still rooms and in an atmosphere of books - Two other rooms exist upon this floor. The one should be fully known and appreciated is the purpose of this pamphlet. upon the right on entering was built by Mrs. Jesup The Library, built to endure- of stone and brick, for a special horticultural purpose, to hold a library of valuable and useful books on horticultural sub- and with exceeding thoroughness of workmanship in [ 2 ] all detail - - is situated centrally and pleasantly, on [1] JESUP MEMORIAL LIBRARY a thing of living, stimulating interest to children, as every one who looks back to the companionship of books in his own childhood knows; and it is good, at the right time and season, to see how-well it answers here. The basement of the Library, which opens out most pleasantly upon the lower level of its lawns and garden, contains - accessible from without as well as from the floor above - an admirable room for meetings, and an excellently lighted stack-room, large as the main reading room above, where the books not needed on the open shelves upon the upper floor can be kept in safety and readily got at as they are wanted. The Library is freely open to all visitors and read- - ers, from nine in the morning until nine at night - except on Sundays, when it is open in the afternoon for reading only; an experienced librarian-or libra- rian's assistant - is always there, within these hours, who will assist in finding any books required for read- ing or for study in the Library or who will give out books upon request for reading elsewhere. The books the Library offers represent a long labor of love on the part of the purchasing committee, thoughtful selection stretching over many years and [ 4 ] 1 JESUP MEMORIAL LIBRARY made by men and women of the widest reading. The best of the older literature is there and the best of the new books that each succeeding year has brought, both light and serious. A number of the most valua- ble books of reference in the English language were added also to the shelves of the new building when the older library was moved there, through the generous interest of summer residents, and it can now be truly called a scholar's library as well as one of general liter- ature and popular character The aim of the Directors is to make the Library, with its admirable new equipment and its slow build- ing up from small beginnings through a generation's work and interest. serve now the widest possible ends both in the Town's own life and in that of its sum- mer residents and visitors, to make it useful in the broadest sense, a source of wholesome interest and pleasure, a means of education and an instrument in aid of study: but above all to make it serve as an awakening suggestion of the higher life of thought and feeling into which the world's great literature, both old and new, is - next to inspiring human con- tact - the torch-bearer and single guide GEORGE B. DORR, For the Directors. ] PRESENTATION AND DEDICATION OF JESUP Page 1-0E5 MEMORIAL LIBRARY WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 30, 1911 The beautiful memorial library, built by Mrs. Morris K. Jesup as a memorial of her husband, was dedicated, and ,presented to the library trustees, last Wednesday morning at eleven o'clock. Rt Rev. William Lawrence, Bishop of Masachusetts, who has been a summer resident in Bar Harbor for more than forty Lowrence begins summer rendency @ 1870. years, presided. "The character of Mrs. Jesup," he said when he called the large and representative gathering of summer and town's people to order, that completely filled the building, "is simple and direct, and it is her wish that these exercises be of the same character, simple and direct." Simple and direct as the exercises were, they were very impressive. Rising, the company joined with Bishop Lawrence in the Lord's prayer. followed by the prayer of dedication, offered by Bishop Lawrence. o Almighty God, the fountain of all wisdom from whom com- eth every good and perfect gift, we offer unto Thee, in the happy memory of Thy servant, this library building; we dedicate it tn Thy glory and the service of man. May those who enter its doors have such purity of heart and love of truth that they may gain from the pages of history a THE BAR HARBOR RECORD, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 1911 chivalrous and loving temper. May the annals of today, telling of people in lonely plains and teeming cities, touch those who read them with a sympathetic interest in all sorts and conditions of men. May the beauties of art and the revelations of science interest. The library was established in the house of John Salis- turn their thoughts to the glory of Thy presence. bury which stooa on the Eagle Lake road on or near the site or Grant, we pray. Thee, that Thy spirit may so fill these halls the present "Lookout Cottage." Mrs. Endora Salisbury was the that wisdom and hope, cheer and charity, justice and truth, will first librarian. Two years later it was removed to a building be with Thy children as they pass out, through Jesus Christ our which stood on the site of the present Congregationalist vestry. Lord. The building has been removed and is now used as a Firemen's Pour Thy blessing, we beseech Thee, upon this whole com- Reading Room. About 22 years ago the library was removed to munity. So consecrate the homes of Thy people that parents and its present site and now it is to be established in its final and children may be proud to gather in, happiness and mutual service. permanent home in this beautiful structure. Kindle in each one of us a finer spirit of public service. Vouch- "The value of this splendid. gift is immeasurably enhanced by safe a heart alert to do Thy will. the gracious hand that gives it. I wish to assure you sir and to Enable us so to see the glories of Thy handiwork in moun- assure her whose generosity, public spirit and devotion this gift tain, forest and ,sea, that our lives may be made beautiful in grace is due that Bar Harbor deeply appreciates it, is profoundly grate- and purity. ful for it, that its gratitude will not find its expression alone in We ask this in the name of Him who loved the fields and words but will, I believe, manifest itself in earnest co-operation who gave His life for His people, Christ Jesus our Lord. with the spirit and purpose of the gift to the end that it may lead Almighty and ever-living God we yield unto Thee most high to the establishement of new standards of leading, of thinking and praise and. hearty thanks for the wonderful grace and virtue of living that will be higher and ever higher as the rolling years declared in all thy saints, who have been the choice vessels. of go by." Thy grace and the lights of the world in their several generations, Dr. S. Weir Mitchell's Address especially Thy servant, Morris Ketchem Jesup; most humbly be- seeching Thee to give us grace so to follow the example of their Dr. S. Weir Mitchell of Philadelphia, eminent physician, steadfastness in Thy faith and obedience to Thy holy command- author of high repute, and a Bar Harbor summer resident ments, that at the day of the General Resurrection we, with all of long standing, spoke of the character of Mr. Jesup, gave a those who are of the mystical body of Thy Son may be set on brief historical statement of the Bar Harbor library, expressing His right hand, and hear there His most joyful voice, 'Come Ye a few views as to what he believed should happen in regard to Blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from to the stocking *and maintaining of the .new library. Dr. Mit- the foundation of the world. Grant this, Our Father, for 'Jesus chell said: Christ's sake, our only mediator and advqcate. "I am greatly honored by the opportunity to speak a few May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God words in regard to this library and the circumstances attending and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost be with us all forever more. upon its gift. Bishop Lawrence and Mr. Deasy have so fully Amen. covered the ground that very little is left for me to say. "The village library was started in the year 1875 by three Mr. Cuyler's Presentation Address tadles, Mrs. Linzee, Miss Harriett Minot and Miss Gertrude Weld, In presenting the memorial in behalf of Mrs. Jesup, Mr. Cuy- later Mrs. John Parkinson. Of these Miss Harriet Minot alone survives. To these three ladies and the friends they associated !er said: "The occasion'- which has brought us together must be of with them are due not only the beginings of the library, but its interest not only to the personal friends of Mrs. Jesup, who have support for many years. Money was raised year after year by gathered here today, but to all who have at heart the welfare of fairs held at Miss Minot's house at which fancy articles made Bar Harbor. 4t is Mrs. Jesup's wish that the ceremonies that during the previous winter were sold. mark the formal opening of this beautiful building and its dedi- "The man to whose memory this library building is dedicated, for which it was erected should be as was, in one respect, an exceedingly liberal person. Most men who accumulate large fortunes ourer LOTHING or number nene- task-and also the selection of travel hiogranhv atc A it seems a most niting way 101 MAS Jesup to perpetuate was LU DO generous. re on the other nand, from the time he memory of Mr. Jesup in the minds and hearts of the people of made more than his living expenses, began to give with increas- Bar Harbor. Coming to the island many years ago he was at ing liberality as circumstances enabled him to enlarge his gifts. page Z of once attracted by the beauty of its surroundings, and from that "To say what ground they covered would be only to relate time. Mr. Jesup's striking personality was a familiar sight to what has been better told elsewhere by his biographer. Churches the dwellers upon the island. Whether driving among its beauti- hospitals, christian associations, missions, schools-all had in ful hills and valleys, or wondering in its woods, or still more turn their share in his bounty, and finally judicious expenditure frequently sailing on its waters in the boat he loved so well, the in aid of science completed the splendid round of liberal and El Placita, it was always a pleasure to meet Mr. Jesup and to most thoughtful giving. It is deeply to be regretted that he share with him his visible delight in the enjoyment of the attrac- did not live to see the final success of the Arctic expedition which tions of this beautiful island. But to him it was not enough that owed so much to him. all these gifts were given to the people of the island to enjoy. "Until recently I was under the impression that in this vast Of a serious temperament, the people dwelling amidst these lovely range of benefactions, libraries had no place, but had over- surroundings and their welfare appealed to him greatly, and there looked the fact that one of the latest acts of his life was to give are many here present today who can testify how heartily and to his native town of Westport a large and and well apointed generously he always entered into every movement that would library building as a. memorial of his ancesters, who for many inure to the benefit of Bar Harbor and the uplifting of its people. generations had been identified with the fortunes of the town 'And so it seems a most natural and beautiful gift for Mrs. When it was ready for occupancy in October, 1907, he was too 111 Jesup to make, that the people who permanently dwell upon the to attend the dedication. think therefore that it must be an island may have this building as a place for the edification of additional gratification to Mrs. Jesup to feel that the library their minds and that pleasant recreation which will better fit building here is given in memory of a man who seems in this them for enjoyment of the wondrous surroundings amidst which this one final gift of a library building to have completed in his they live. life the whole round of high-minded expenditure.) "Therefore it is that Mrs. Jesup has so well and wisely built, "How admirably this building is fitted for the various wants and it is her hone, Mr. Deasy, that you will accept this gift, of Bar Harbor you have today an opportunity to observe. It which includes the deeds to the property and a fund for endow- owes much of its completeness and well thought out fitness to the ment purposes from her on behalf of these people whom she care given to its construction by Mr. George Dorr. I offer to loves as did Mr. Jesup and that the library company will pro- him the thanks of this comunity and especially of the library /GBD, tect and maintain it so that many generations of the dwellers corporation, which is to havve in the future the charge of this upon this island may here find rest and improvement of mind and institution. body and hold in loving remembrance Mr. Jesup.", "I reserve to myself the privilege of a few minutes' talk on At the close of his presentation address Mr. Cuyler passed to the uses of libraries, and in this I desire to be long and promise Mr. Deasy \the deeds, signed over to the Bar Harbor Village Li- to be brief. brary corporation, and a check for $50,000 from Mrs. Jesup for "Probably the first library in a small town in Great Britain an endowment for maintenance. was made at the suggestion of Robert Burns, in Dumfries, Scot- Hon. L. B. Deasy's Address of Acceptance land, about the year 1790. Now they are everywhere. The library Hon. L. B. Deasy, chairman of the library trustees, in accept- was at one time considered a luxury; now it is regarded as a necessary part of the equipment of every American community ing the splendid gift for the town spoke very feelingly and im- The libraries of great cities are playgrounds for the many and pressively, with admirable and fitting choice of words and workshops for the few. They are also of course, museums of thought and feeling of the community's consciousness concerning those rare volumes and documents which long intervals are con- the library. His reference to the invaluable records so painstak- sulted by the scholar and the historian, and are not to be found ingly prepared by the late Eben M. Hamor was most appropriate. elsewhere than in these great collections. 'Mr. Chairman: "My temptation to talk of another side of library interests is "Not for- the library trustees only; not alone for the citizens very great. I never stand in one of these vast halls, surrounded and residents of Bar Harbor who will presently enjoy it; but in by the wisdom, and the folly, of ages, without being reminded behalf of a far wider constituency; children in their cradles who of a phrase used as a friend of mine, when he described a great when their hair is silvered will come here for inspiration; gener- library as the memory of mankind. Indeed I could talk of the ations yet unborn that will enjoy its benefits; the future when romance of libraries, the sentiment which for me clings about the seed sown here will yield its flower and its fruitage,-for all these vast assemblies of books much or rarely used. Sometimes this and for all these I gratefully accept this splendid gift. [ fancy the life of a book, of any of the great books, might be of "The gift of a library is the best and most perfect public of interest if we knew all of it, how it has affected the lives and gift. I say this not forgetting other forms of public benefaction fortunes of other people, and through what hands it has passed. touching more immediate human needs. I remember a friend of mine, years ago, telling me that having "The greatest and most significant human fact is the cumula- consulted an old Elizabethan book in the Harvard library he found tive quality of achievement, the truth expressed so simply and in it a visiting card of James Russell Lowell, used no doubt as beautifully in the lines of the old hymn: a book mark; and in another place a torn envelope addressed "All the good the past hath had to Longfellow. I have had some interesting adventures in li- Remains to make our own time glad.' braries. This is not the place to relate them; but I am always happy when I leave people with a half-told tale, and the interest "All the discoveries and inventions of the past, all the pie- of ungratified curiosity. tures that artists and poets have painted, all the principles that "Technical libraries of law and medicine have also their place. patriots have fought for, all the truths that martyrs have died The American village, ,library exists under peculiar con- for are ours without money and without price. ditions in order that it provide for the wants of two sets of people "All this is true because of books. It is books that bring We, for example, have to consider first and foremost what a li- to and lay at the feet of each new century all the worth while brary like this should offer for the long winter uses of the vil- wealth of past centuries. Books are the title deeds, the testa- lage people. who have here their permanent homes. We are ments under and by virtue of which a generation has and holds and also bound to furnish our summer guests with the kind of books enjoys the priceless treasures which in all ages of the past the which they most like to find on our shelves. The needs of both exploring mind has brought from the cave of knowledge. involve a judicious choice of fiction, for old and young-a difficult Apprciating then to the full all other forms or public bene- selection or travel, biography; faction, forms that reach relieve more immediate and urgent the standard books of reference. In regard to these WA "Apprciating then to the full all other forms of public pene- of3 faction, forms that reach and relieve more immediate and urgent task-and also the selection of travel, biography, etc. A word of human needs I yet assert without fear of contradiction that a the standard books of reference. In regard to these we are singu- gift of books and of the means of preserving them and of dis- larly deficient, and I take advantage of the possibilities of this tributing them and of stimulating the use of more and better books delightful opportunity to suggest to some of you that you pro- is the best and most perfect public gift. vide for the want which is felt by both classes of those for whom "As to this building I need only to say that it is a worthy this library is meant. I could give you a long list of desirable memorial of that life of large usefulness and of stainless honor books. It is at the disposal of the eager generosity of any who that it is erected to commemorate. It is firmly builded as was may be here present. More than all, however, what I hope to see his life work. It is beautiful and Morris K. Jesup was a believer immediately contributed is the new English Cyclopedia, and the in the essential utility of beauty. The men who have had to do Cyclopedia of English Biography. We need two standard editions with its planning and erection have done their work faithfully of the great English and American classics. and well. The parchitects, the builders, the decorators, the com- This library must largely depend upon the liberality of the mittee, the superintendent, have done their full duty and a little summer guests and of the town for the purchase of books, salaries more. Their been in their work. of Jibrarian and assistant and for the daily care to keep in order ''And the heart what I trust will be an increasingly used collection of books. The Giveth grace unto every art.' choice of books in the past has been most fortunate and calls for nothing but well earned praise of Mrs. Opdycke's and Miss "And this building is dedicated to the highest good as that Louise Minot, to whom has been assigned this difficult task. good is perceived by him who looks with clear vision to the far horizon. "I could say something out of my large experien in regard to the mode of conducting such a library as this. I believe that ""There are certain documents which I should like to see in this building should become a center irradiant of knowledge in this library in easily accessible and conspicuous places. regard to forestry, gardening, education, and all the other intel- "I should like to see the original if it were possible, but all lectual wants of an increasing community. I hope that in the events a copy of the first document using the name 'Mount Desert," future there will be lectures here from time to time of a practical viz., the Log of Champlain, in which three hundred years ago character, that the children be guided as to the books they read, he gave the name to the island. and, I repeat it, that very much-oh, very much-care be given "Then I should like to see the second document in point of to the choice of fiction. This interests me because I some ten time containing the name. This is. the grant dated in 1688 by years ago wrote a paper which was widely read and which made which Louis XIV granted to M. Cadillac 'A league of land on each clear how to make historical fiction useful as well as interesting side. of the River Donaque together with Mt. Desert Island and to the young readers. other Islands in the fore part of said two front leagues.' "Trusting that I have not now taken more than the time as- "And also a copy of the act of the General Court of Massachu- signed me I beg to thank Mrs. Jesup most warmly in the name setts confirming this grans to Madame De Gregoire, M. Cadillac's of the town, the village people and the summer residents for her moble and beneficent gift." granddaughter and heir Then there are two other documents of inestimable value that At the close of the meeting Bishop Lawrence read a note I should be glad to see in this building. I refer to the historical from a benefactor, signifying the writer's intention of presenting researches of Eben Hamor. It may not be known to all of to the library's reference department a set of the last Encyclopedia you that Mr. Hamor who died in this town a year ago full of Brittanica, in the new edition printed upon the light weight India paper. This is a timely gift, and one much needed. years and of honors who for many years enjoyed the distinction of being undisputedly the first citizen of the town devoted the Invitation to the dedication exercises was by invitation and last years of his long and useful life to the collecting and collat- card, because the building would not hold all who would try to ing and recording data concerning the early history of this is- be present if the occasion was entirely public. There was a very representative gathering from every walk of life among the town's land. His researches are contained in two large manuscript vol- umes of three hundred pages each, written in his-own hand and people, including those who had been actively engaged in erecting the building. Many words of approbation were heard for the were given by him to the town. These volumes albeit written by 'fine work of the contracting builder, Mr. Chester A. Hodgkins, and a man above eighty years old. are so clearly written that every also for the carpenters, painters, decorators, plumbers, and the word is as plain as print and in the whole six hundred pages others whose united work has produced one of the most beautiful there is not, I think, any interlineation and there is certainly no libraries of the present time.