Reading for Moral Progress: 19th Century Institutions Promoting Social Change. Occasional Papers No. 207.

The three papers in this document examine the motives behind the collecting and loaning of publications in the 19th century. They describe the effects of three discrete movements designed to assist religious, military, and academic endeavors. The first paper, "Bread Upon the Waters: The Printed Word in Sunday Schools in 19th Century England and the United States" (Donald G. Davis, Jr.), investigates nineteenth century Sunday school libraries. It traces their development to an English layman's idea about religious instruction for deprived young people in 1625 through its American transmutation in 1791 and then to the societies that grew to serve the needs of Sunday school teachers and students in succeeding decades. The second paper, "The Library Is a Valuable Hygienic Appliance" (David M. Hovde), documents the parade of portable libraries that made their way to the Civil War battlefronts and recounts the array of organizations that supplied soldiers with religious, literary, historical, scientific, and educational books and pamphlets. The third paper, "Wide Awakening: Political and Theological Impulses for Reading and Libraries at Oberlin College, 1883-1908" (John Mark Tucker), chronicles in detail the scope of donations to and acquisitions by Oberlin College for 25 years at the turn of the 19th century; it sketches the intentions of the donors and librarians and how the books were used. (Author/AEF)