Advertising by securing condemnatory action of some sort, such as exclusion from the shelves, has also not been uncommon. This requires the aid of the press to condemn, abuse or ridicule the library for its action, and so exploit the book. The press, I grieve to say, has fallen a victim to this scheme more than once and has thereby given free use of advertising space ordinarily worth thousands of dollars. A flagrant instance of this kind occurred in one of our greatest cities about ten years ago. The work of a much-discussed playwright was about to be put upon the boards. A wily press agent, in conversation with an unsuspecting librarian, obtained an adverse opinion. The aiding and abetting newspaper, which was one of ostensible high character, proceeded at once to heap ridicule and contumely on the library and the librarian for their condemnation and exclusion of the play (which really wasn’t excluded at all). The matter, having reached the dignity of news, was taken up by other papers and for a week or more the metropolitan press resounded with accusation, explanation, recrimination and comment. The gleeful playwright cabled objurgations from London, and the press agent, retiring modestly into the background, saw advertising that would have cost him $100,000, at the lowest estimate, poured into his willing lap by the yellow, but easy, press of his native burg. It is possibly unfair to cite this as an attempt to “work” the library--it was the public press that was ingeniously and successfully exploited through the library. The fact that the mere presence of a public library is an advantage to the neighborhood in which it stands has led to numerous attempts to locate library buildings, especially branches, in some particular place. These are often accompanied by offers of building-lots, which, it is sad to say, have occasionally appealed to trustees not fully informed of the situation. I recall several offers of lots in barren and unoccupied spots--one in an undeveloped region whose owner hoped to make it a residence park and another in the middle of a flourishing cornfield, whose owner considered it an ideal spot for a branch library--at least after he had sold off a sufficient number of building lots on the strength of his generous gift. These particular offers were declined with thanks, but in some instances members of boards of trustees themselves, being only human, have not been entirely free from suspicion of personal or business interest in sites. Here it is difficult to draw the line between the legitimate efforts of a particular locality to capture a branch site and those that have their origin in commercial cupidity. Both of course have nothing to do with the larger considerations that should govern in such location, but both are not exploitation as we are now using the word.