MOORE, ANNE CARROLL (1871-1961)

Anne Carroll Moore was a pioneering children's librarian who shaped the profession of children's services in American public libraries. Devoting her career to children's librarianship, Moore touched every aspect of the field-writing, reviewing, lecturing and teaching, training staff, administering children's services at the New York Public Library, and consulting with publishers. Her insistence on quality literature for children stimulated the growth of American children's literature in the twentieth century.

Born and raised in Limerick, Maine, Moore was the only daughter of Luther Sanborn Moore and Sarah Barker Moore. She and her seven brothers lived on a farm named Alderwood in southwestern Maine, in sight of Mt. Washington. Moore's parents were clearly influential in developing her strong personality. Luther Moore was a farmer, lawyer, and politician who brought his daughter along as company in visits and read to her. Anne absorbed her mother's love of beauty, particularly in the form of flowers and gardens. Her educational experiences were particularly positive, both at Limerick Academy, a preparatory school in Maine, and the Bradford Academy in Massachusetts, a two-year college with which she sustained a long association. After her formal education, she returned home to study law under her father's tutelage, despite the unpromising prospects for women in the field.

All her plans drastically changed when her parents died suddenly in 1892 from a severe bout of influenza and then her sister-in-law died later in that same year. She helped her widowed brother raise his two children for several years, her only child-rearing experience. Career options seemed unappealing to her—either missionary work or teaching. One brother, recognizing her kinship with books, suggested the new field of librarian-ship. She applied to the state library school in Albany, New York, for which she lacked the requisite college degree, and then applied to Pratt Institute Library School in Brooklyn, New York, where she began her professional studies and career.

At Pratt, Moore began a tutelage under Mary Wright Plummer, director of the library. Plummer, a librarian with international stature, was made director in 1894, after which she helped design an expanded facility that included a children's room—the first of its kind in the country to be built. The one-year training course did not yet include the subject of children's librarianship. Moore's intention was to return after graduation in June 1896 to Maine in the new area of county library service, which did not materialize as a prospect. On her way to the American Library Association convention in Cleveland, she met Caroline Hewins, the director of the Hartford Public Library, who pioneered the professional interest in library services to children. After returning from the conference, Moore received a job offer from Mary Wright Plummer to assume responsibilities for the new children's room at Pratt. These two women—Plummer and Hewins—became Moore's mentors in the field.

At Pratt, Moore developed the professional practices that shaped her subsequent career: managing the children's room, participating in professional activities, and writing. Moore's intention, which included methods of the new kindergarten movement, was to open access to books for children, to organize a system of circulation, to create thematic exhibits of pictures and books with accompanying reading lists, and to extend the influence of the library beyond its walls. In 1898, she introduced her well-known register pledge, which pledged the child to take good care of all books, to pay all fines, and to obey all rules. She also began work with schools: making contacts, giving talks, and providing special library services, such as storytelling.

It was during the Pratt years that Moore became a leader in the profession in the new practice of children's services. Moore was chosen as chair of the Club of Children's Librarians, which later became the Children's Services Division of the American Library Association. She presented a landmark paper at the 1898 conference, "Special Training for Children's Librarians," in which she stated for the first time what was needed in this new field. Her leadership role in the American Library Association was instrumental in forming an organizational identity of children's librarians and in raising concerns of critical importance to the field.

Moore was recruited for the position of Superintendent of Work with Children at the New York Public Library in 1906, where she served until her retirement in 1941. Moore developed the Children's Room into a cosmopolitan site of international interest, where foreign visitors often toured, and immigrant populations felt connected to their own native culture. It was here that the expanding children's book community was centered as Moore became a leader in both the publishing and the provision of books for children.

After her first decade at the New York Public Library, Moore's interest began to shift from professional issues to the literature of childhood. Her interest in communities now encompassed the publishing industry, which was just beginning to diversify into the children's book market. These interests emanated from her high standards of selection for branch libraries and her heightened sense of the quality desirable in the content and production of children's books. Her exhibits and reading lists were an economic impetus for publishers to heed her counsel. Moore began writing reviews in The Bookman, which was the first ongoing critical column on children's books, and later in the New York Herald Tribune and the Horn Book magazine.

Moore also wrote two novels for children: Nicholas: A Manhattan Christmas Story (1924) and Nicholas and the Golden Goose (1932). The books were modeled on a doll, which became for Moore an imaginary companion, whose existence disconcerted colleagues. Her presence was long felt in the New York Public Library and book community even after her retirement. She served as a visiting lecturer, received an honorary doctorate from Pratt Institute, and was honored with the Regina Medal by the Catholic Library Association.

Moore died on January 20, 1961. Despite subsequent reevaluations of her reputation, she remains one of the most influential figures in the history of children's services in American public libraries.

See also:Librarians; Libraries, History of; Storytelling.

Bibliography

Bader, Barbara. (1997). "Only the Best: The Hits and Misses of Anne Carroll Moore." Horn Book 73(5):520-528.

Bush, Margaret. (1996). "New England Book Women: Their Increasing Influence." Library Trends 44(4):719-735.

Lundin, Anne. (1995). "A Delicate Balance: Collection Development and Women's History." Collection Building 14(2):42-46.

Lundin, Anne. (1996). "Anne Carroll Moore: 'I Have Spun out a Long Thread." Reclaiming the American Library Past: Writing the Women In, ed. Suzanne Hildenbrand. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.

Moore, Anne Carroll. (1924). Nicholas: A Manhattan Christmas Story. New York: Putnam.

Moore, Anne Carroll. (1932). Nicholas and the Golden Goose. New York: Putnam.

Sayers, Frances Clarke. (1972). Anne Carroll Moore: A Biography. New York: Athenaeum.

Anne Lundin