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Honoring the Past, Building Our Future: One Hundred
Years of the Virginia Library Association
| Founding the VLA The Virginia Library
Association began as a collaborative enterprise between senior
staff of the Virginia State Library (now the Library of
Virginia), led by State Librarian John P. Kennedy, and
librarians across the state. Answering a call to meet,
librarians convened in Richmond on 6 December 1905 to organize
the Virginia Library Association.
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Click Image to Enlarge
Letter, Edward S. Evans, Assistant Librarian, to Librarian,
Hampden-Sydney College, 27 November 1905. Typescript.
Virginia Library Association Papers, acc. 32434 |
In his letter, Edward S. Evans encouraged H. R. McIlwaine,
librarian at Hampden-Sydney College, in Farmville, to attend the
organizational meeting. Evans included a draft constitution for
the proposed Virginia Library Association, which began
We, citizens of Virginia believing that Library facilities
are necessary for the culture and education of the people and
that libraries are as important as any branch of the great
system of public education; do hereby organize ourselves for the
promotion of a close intercourse among librarians and all
interested in library work in Virginia and to further library
interests in general.
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McIlwaine, one of the founding members of the Virginia
Library Association, later became State Librarian. |
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Click Image to Enlarge |
Minute book, 1905–1930s. Bound manuscript. Virginia Library
Association Papers, acc. 32434. On 6 December 1905, a group of librarians met at the
Virginia State Library to organize the Virginia Library
Association. |
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