Books, Bluster, and Bounty: Local Politics and Carnegie Library Building Grants in the Intermountain West, 1890-1920

7. Oligarchies and Carnegie Libraries in Transitional Towns

166 7 Oligarchies and Carnegie Libraries in Transitional Towns “A healthy and elevating influence on the community” Most Carnegie public library building grant applications in the turn-of-the-twentieth-century interior American West might be called status quo projects in terms of their locally assigned significance. Proponents spoke of potential libraries as institutions which accorded seamlessly with extant values, institutions that would move the community into more perfect alignment with the essential nature it already possessed. In a small subset of Intermountain West communities, however, Carnegie applications functioned as components of deliberate campaigns to reinvent local identity. Opinion leaders in these communities played not to residents’ pride in perceived strengths, but to their embarrassments or awareness of current limitations, seeking to convince them that their homes could become radically different and better sorts of places. Rather than reinforcing extant assumptions about civic identity, Carnegie libraries in these five towns became symbols of transformations-in-progress, simultaneously agents and evidence of positive change. These reinventions were related to the Intermountain West’s evolution at the turn of the twentieth century from an American outback to a more settled, civilized region. All five were seeking to become less distinctively “Western” by fitting themselves into a more mainstream, self-consciously modern American community model. Two of these communities, Spokane and The Dalles, were attempting to put their frontier reputations as “wideopen towns” behind them. Two others, Tucson and Yuma, were engaged Oligarchies and Carnegie Libraries in Transitional Towns 167 in spurning their Hispanic roots. Phoenix was seeking to claim new status as a place of national importance, courtesy of the US Department of Reclamation. What distinguishes these applications besides their ideological trajectory is the breadth of the coalitions that worked on their behalf. In Spokane, The Dalles, Tucson, Yuma, and Phoenix, the work of applying for a Carnegie library grant was cooperatively conducted by men and women, business and professional people, leaders of various faiths, and representatives of multiple interest groups.1 What these people shared was a deep conviction that their communities needed to reshape their images in order to thrive. Respectability and Moral Reform: Spokane and The Dalles Daniel F. Ring has written that the public library in the rowdy mining town of Butte, Montana was championed as “an instrument to convince the East that Butte was a civilized place to live,” an institution citizens hoped would radically improve the city’s disreputable image.2 Such was also true in two Intermountain West communities that sought Carnegie libraries, Spokane, Washington, and The Dalles, Oregon. Spokane’s image problem was particularly desperate, for the city held a reputation for vice so notorious that even San Franciscans spoke with awe of its “wide open,” lawless character.3 A substantial district containing brothels, saloons, and gambling halls flourished along Front, Bernard, Main, and Howard Streets. Daily reports of burglaries , drunkenness, armed robbery, and battery crowded the communities’ newspapers. Juvenile gangs terrorized the citizenry, including one headed by a vicious young thug nicknamed with Dickensian relish “Lidgerwood Red.”4 In Spokane’s early years, the lawlessness had seemed inevitable, a product of the community’s proximity to mining districts. But as the city 1 Only in the small religiously diverse Utah towns discussed in chapter 5 were the groups of citizens who united to pursue Carnegie libraries equally diverse. Ring’s discussion of Montana Carnegie library applications suggests a correlation between social control motives and diverse leadership there also in, “Carnegie Libraries as Symbols for an Age,” 8–9. 2 Ring, The Origins of the Butte Public Library. 3 Youngs, The Fair and the Falls, 76. 4 Stimson, A View from the Falls, 41 and Spokane (WA) Spokesman-Review, Jan.10, 1901. Books, Bluster, and Bounty 168 grew, doubling in population between 1890 and 1900, so did its aspirations . Wealthy residents constructed elaborate mansions and cultural amenities increased.5 Frontier rowdiness began to seem like an embarrassing anachronism in a city that aspired to be the most important community in its region. Spokane’s newspapers began lobbying for reform using shaming tactics as well as direct argument. When a headline announced on February 6, 1910 that Seattle—a city considered one of Spokane’s chief rivals—had banned open gambling, the editor suggested that Spokane should follow that commendable lead. But, he taunted, those who profited from vice in Spokane would never let that happen. If such a thing...