Research Catalog
Books, bluster, and bounty : local politics in the Intermountain West and Carnegie Library Building Grants, 1898-1920
- Title
- Books, bluster, and bounty : local politics in the Intermountain West and Carnegie Library Building Grants, 1898-1920 / Susan H. Swetnam.
- Author
- Swetnam, Susan H.
- Publication
- Logan, Utah : Utah State University Press, 2012.
- ©2012
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| Status | Format | Access | Call Number | Item Location |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schwarzman Building to submit a request in person. | Text | Use in library | JFE 13-731 | Schwarzman Building - Main Reading Room 315 |
Details
- Description
- ix, 251 pages : illustrations, maps; 23 cm
- Summary
- "Susan Swetnam uses case studies of western applications for Carnegie libraries to examine how local support was mustered for cultural institutions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century interior West. This is a comparative study involving the entire region between the Rockies and the Cascades/Sierras, including all of Idaho, Utah, Nevada, and Arizona; western Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado; eastern Oregon and Washington; and small parts of California and New Mexico. The study addresses not just the how of the process of establishing Carnegie libraries but, more importantly, the variable why. Although virtually all citizens and communities in the West who sought Carnegie libraries were after tangible benefits that were only tangentially related to books, what they specifically wanted varied in correlation with the diversity of the communities of the West: "Library proponents in Inland Empire boom towns, for example, touted Carnegie libraries to their fellow citizens as instruments of economic advantage over rival communities; citizens in rural LDS communities promoted Carnegie libraries as a force against the encroaching secular influences they feared threatened their children; a small cadre of Carnegie library proponents in several of Utah's largest cities, in stark contrast, actually promoted the projects to their fellow Gentiles as a corrective to LDS insularity. Economically stable Idaho communities sought Carnegie libraries to reinforce their self-perceived cultural superiority; communities in newly American Arizona sought them to counter perceptions of their towns as 'Hispanic mud villages.' And so on.""--
- Subject
- Carnegie libraries > West (U.S.) > History
- Bibliography (note)
- Includes bibliographical references (pages 230-243) and index.
- Contents
- The culture of the intermountain west, 1890-1920 -- The challenging process of applying for a Carnegie Library Building Grant -- Boom towns : Carnegie libraries and boosterism -- Small mormon towns : Carnegie libraries to protect youth -- Carnegie libraries in religiously diverse Utah communities -- Women's role in bringing Carnegie libraries to settled communities -- Oligarchies and Carnegie libraries in transitional towns -- Carnegie libraries in the service of personal power -- Contested libraries.
- Call Number
- JFE 13-731
- ISBN
- 9780874218428 (cloth : acid-free paper)
- 087421842X (cloth : acid-free paper)
- 9780874218527 (paper : acid-free paper)
- 0874218527 (paper : acid-free paper)
- 9780874218435 (e-book) (canceled/invalid)
- LCCN
- 2012000173
- OCLC
- 774492700
- Author
- Swetnam, Susan H.
- Title
- Books, bluster, and bounty : local politics in the Intermountain West and Carnegie Library Building Grants, 1898-1920 / Susan H. Swetnam.
- Publisher
- Logan, Utah : Utah State University Press, 2012.
- Copyright Date
- ©2012
- Type of Content
- text
- Type of Medium
- unmediated
- Type of Carrier
- volume
- Bibliography
- Includes bibliographical references (pages 230-243) and index.
- Connect to:
- Research Call Number
- JFE 13-731