Voluntary and ‘Involuntary’ Libraries: Library Philanthropy in Victorian Britain

Public libraries developed slowly in the late nineteenth century because many ratepayers objected to paying higher taxes for the privilege. Many places, though, enjoyed free, or nearly free, ‘substitute’ public libraries, funded by wealthy philanthropists or by raising money from well-wishers. They were ‘voluntary’ because they were free of local government control and often run by volunteers. Such libraries are virtually unknown to historians, and there are fascinating stories to be told including two libraries funded by mines in Colorado (both disastrous), a free library for actresses, Toynbee Hall, and the Russian Free Library whose librarian had an explosive career, as well as more conventional urban libraries. Workplace libraries acted as ‘alternative’ public libraries and were found in factories, mills, mines, railway works, police stations, and shops. And there were what might be termed ‘involuntary’ libraries for soldiers, sailors, hospital patients, nurses, workhouse inmates, prisoners, and domestic servants (and hotel guests). A cornucopia of little-known book provision.

Dr K.A. Manley is an Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Historical Research, University of London, and of CILIP (Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals), as well as a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. His publications include Books, Borrowers, and Shareholders: Scottish Circulating and Subscription Libraries before 1825 (2012) and Irish Reading Societies and Circulating Libraries founded before 1825 (2018). He also co-edited The Cambridge History of Libraries in Britain, Vol. 2: 1640-1850 (2006).