But let not the children's worker labor under the delusion that
when she closes the door of the library her work is finished. On
the contrary, another phase of it is only beginning, for she is
constantly meeting the children on the street, in the stores, in
fact almost everywhere she goes, and it behooves her to be on the
watch for friendly smiles, to listen with interest when Johnny
tells her that Mary is coming out of the hospital tomorrow, or
when Mike calls across the street, Did you know Willie was
pinched again? to make a note of it and take pains to find out
whether Willie is paroled under good behavior or whether he has
been sent to a boys' reformatory school; or, when she is waiting
for a street car and a newsboy rushes up and says he can't get
his books back in time and will she renew them for him, the
children's worker takes his library number and renews the books
when she returns to the library.
If the worker is at all earnest in her work she can not help but
have her heart wrung time and again by the sufferings of the
children of the poor. Not that they complain--they take it all as
a matter of course, but by some unconscious remark they quite
often throw an almost blinding light on their home conditions
showing that family life for a good many of them is anything but
easy and pleasant. Children of the poor often have
responsibilities far beyond their years, and the library with its
books, pictures, flowers and story-telling means much more to
them than to a child who has all these at home. One little girl
about 10 years old came one afternoon and was so disappointed to
find there was to be no story. On being told to come at ten
o'clock next morning, she said: What, do you think I can get here
at ten o'clock with four kids to dress! As first heard, funny;
but after all showing a pathetic side, a childhood without
childhood's freedom from care.
The whole secret of success is really to be in sympathy with
children, quick to see their needs and to look at things from
their point of view; but above all to have a genuine, common
sense love for them so that we may feel as did the little girl
who missed one of the assistants, and asking for her was told
that she was taking a vacation. I love her, said the child, and
then, fearing she had hurt the feelings of the one to whom she
was speaking added, I love all the library teachers, 'cos we're
all childs of God.
THE LIBRARY AND THE CHILDREN: AN ACCOUNT OF THE CHILDREN'S WORK
IN THE CLEVELAND PUBLIC LIBRARY
The interesting experiment of conducting a Library League is
described by Miss Linda A. Eastman in the following account of
the children's work in the Cleveland Public Library. A sketch of
Miss Eastman appears on page 159.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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