The millionaire philanthropist Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919) believed that the "best gift" that could be given to a community was a free library. As a result of this belief, he helped build 2,509 libraries in countries around the world. Ontario was the fortunate province to receive 111 of the 125 libraries that Carnegie built in Canada.
The Best Gift is a tribute to the Ontario Carnegie libraries, and was written and illustrated by three experts in library design. Illustrations include many excellent photographs of the libraries by John Black and some beautiful watercolours by Stephen Langmead.
The writers have unearthed a great deal of interesting information about the Carnegie grants, particularly the correspondence that took place between many Ontario citizens and James Bertram who was secretary of the Carnegie Corporation for many years and personally approved all the Ontario library grants.
These grants were extremely generous, inasmuch as a grant of $10,000 in 1910 would be the equivalent of $650,000 today. Many small communities would not have been able to afford to build libraries, had it not been for the Carnegie grants.
The authors are to be commended for a splendid tribute to Ontario's Carnegie Libraries. Library users throughout the province will view these libraries with added appreciation.

 

 

 

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