Before the Public Library

Mark Towsey PhD (2007), University of St Andrews, is Reader in Modern British History and Director of the Eighteenth-Century Worlds Research Centre at the University of Liverpool.Kyle B. Roberts PhD (2007), University of Pennsylvania, is Associate Professor of Public History and New Media in the History Department and Director of the Center for Textual Studies and Digital Humanities at Loyola University Chicago.

“This is a significant book and deserves to be widely read. Its chapters are ably argued and impressively researched. Major themes recur such as ideas of community libraries and the place of libraries in local and national identity, while the thorny question of fiction is well-rehearsed.”Keith Manley, in: Library & Information History, Vol. 34, No. 3 (2018), pp. 184-185.“Towsey and Roberts’s undertaking is unique and sets a new standard for historical exploration of library history. Without hesitation, I recommend thus important book for all libraries whose mission is to support and maintain access to quality research.”Edward A. Goedeken, Iowa State University. In: Libraries: Culture, History, and Society, Vol. 3, No. 1 (2019), 121-123.

• AcknowledgementsList of IllustrationsNotes on ContributorsIntroductionMark Towsey and Kyle B. RobertsPart 1: Empire and Enlightenment1 Building Religious Communities with Books: The Quaker and Anglican Transatlantic Libraries, 1650–1710Louisiane Ferlier2 Poetry and Civic Urbanism in the Coffee-House Library in the Mid-eighteenth CenturyMarkman Ellis3 Of Mudfish, Harpsichords and Books: Libraries and Community in Eighteenth-Century JamaicaApril G. Shelford4 Affleck Generations: The Libraries of the Boswells of Auchinleck, 1695–1825James J. Caudle5 Sedition, Revolution and Libertinism in Eighteenth-Century Brazil: The Library of Naturalist José Vieira CoutoJúnia Ferreira FurtadoPart 2: Revolution and Nation Building6 Uncommon Knowledge: Late Eighteenth-Century American Subscription Library CollectionsCheryl Knott7 Reading Sheffield: Sheffield Libraries and Book Clubs, 1771–1850Sue Roe and Loveday Herridge8 Challenging Institutional Ambitions: The Practice of Book Exchanges at the New York Society Library, 1789–1795Rob Koehler9 A “Quaint Corner” of the Reading Nation: Romantic Readerships in Rural Perthshire, 1780–1830Katie HalseyPart 3: Institutionalisation and Expansion10 From Private Devotion to “Public” Education: Northern Dissenting Academy Libraries and Their BenefactorsRachel Eckersley11 The Foundation of Plymouth Public Library: Cultural Status, Philanthropy and Expanding Readerships, 1810–1825Annika Bautz12 Reading on the Edge of the Atlantic: The Easton Library CompanyChristopher Phillips13 Crafting Respectability: The Politics of Class at the Mechanic Apprentices’ Library of BostonLynda K. YankaskasPart 4: Public Libraries14 Reading Publics: Books, Communities and Readers in the Early History of American Public LibrariesTom Glynn15 From Voluntary to State Action: Samuel Smiles, James Silk Buckingham and the Rise of the Public Library Movement in BritainAlistair BlackBibliography of Secondary WorksIndex