Boston Public Library Commission Proposes a Hibernica Room to House its Vast Irish Collections

The Boston Public Library Centennial Commission considered a proposal in February 1954 to create a Hibernica Room at the Copley Square library, to house the vast amount of material on the history, social and economic development, biography, and literature of the Irish, particularly of the progress and achievement of persons of Irish birth and ancestry in America.

The Boston Public Library Centennial Commission was formed in 1953 to reflect upon the library's first hundred years and to chart a course for the future, which included plans to increase the library's spending budget for new books and eventually to expand the library to accommodate the growing needs of its constituents.

The proposal for a Hibernica Room was presented at a meeting at the library, according to a Boston Globe story. "The project was presented most persuasively by Paul E. Tierney, chairman of the Irish-American committee; Patrick F. McDonald, president of the Library trustees; Milton E. Lord, Librarian; John I. Taylor, chairman of special gifts, and Bishop John J. Wright of Worcester, Envoy Extraordinary.

"In his remarks. Bishop Wright stressed particularly the value of a repository for the history and achievements of the Irish in this country since two great universities, Harvard and Boston College, already have remarkable collections of Irish-American material," the story continued.

Bishop Wright said, "It would be a great tragedy if the only record of our people should be found in newspaper files. It is to Boston, in the long haul, that historians will look back with the greatest satisfaction for the story of the Irish in America, for it is in Boston only that assimilation has combined with a reservation of the real values which are basically and characteristically Irish."

The Centennial Commission estimates the initial cost of the Hibernica Room at $150,000, its development to be continued by endowments and bequests.

A few weeks later, the Commission received its first donation to the Hibernica Room, presented by the American League for an Undivided Ireland.

Learn more about Boston's Irish history by visiting IrishHeritageTrail.com.

Research + Text, Michael Quinlin

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