The Newberry Library is an independent research library, specializing in the humanities. It is located in Chicago, Illinois, and has been free and open to the public since 1887. The Newberry fosters a deeper understanding of our world by inspiring research and learning in the humanities and encouraging conversations about ideas that matter. Its mission is rooted in a growing and accessible collection of rare and historical materials.[2]
The Newberry’s collections contain primary and secondary sources spanning more than six centuries of history related primarily to the history, culture, and people of Western Europe and the Americas.[3] Core collection strengths include:
The collection consists of about 1.6 million books; 600,000 maps; 1,300 distinct archival collections containing approximately 5 million manuscript pages; 500,000 different postcards; approximately 250,000 pieces of sheet music; and much more.[15]
Notable items held at the Newberry include:
Chicago's only copy of Mr. William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies, commonly referred to as the First Folio
The Popol Vuh, which is the earliest surviving copy of the Mayan creation story
Ledger art created by Northern Cheyenne warrior-artists in the 1870s, as well as modern interpretations of the ledger art tradition by contemporary Native artists
A 1692 fur trade contract that has one of the first references to “Chicago” in writing
As a non-circulating library, all collection items are made available free of charge on site to anyone who is 14 years of age or older. Reference staff are available in the Newberry's two reading rooms and in the Welcome Center just off the lobby. Reference librarians work with all readers and offer orientation, in-depth bibliographical instruction, and specialized assistance as needed.[16]
Many items from the Newberry’s collections are digitized and can be accessed online.[17]
Newberry Library Writers on Writing with Rebecca Makkai and Lauren Groff on October 4, 2023.
The Newberry offers free public programs,[18] which are often livestreamed and shared on the library’s YouTube page.[19] These programs explore a variety of topics related to the library’s collection strengths. Recent speakers include: Rebecca Makkai, Chicago-based author of The Great Believers; Tiya Miles, Professor of History at Harvard University and author of All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley's Sack, a Black Family Keepsake; Jill Wine-Banks, MSNBC Legal Analyst; maritime archaeologist Mensun Bound; Elizabeth Ellis (Peoria Nation of Oklahoma), Associate Professor of History at Princeton University; Mike Amezcua, Assistant Professor in the Department of History at Georgetown University and author of Making Mexican Chicago; and poet, essayist, and cultural critic Hanif Abdurraqib.
The Newberry mounts four free exhibitions a year in two gallery spaces.[20] These exhibitions consist primarily of items from the library’s collections.
Adult education classes are offered throughout the year at the Newberry. Classes are either held at the library or virtually via Zoom. Led by experts in a variety of fields, these classes can help participants jumpstart or elevate their next learning endeavor.[29]
The Newberry Bookshop, located in the lobby of the library, curates a selection of books reflecting the Newberry's collection strengths and upcoming public programming. It also sells goods such as cards, posters, puzzles, and literary action figures.[30]
Resources for Scholars, Students, and Teachers[edit]
Newberry Fellows examines item from the library's collection
Beginning in 1944 with a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Newberry began hosting researchers from different disciplines and backgrounds for both short- and long-term fellowships.[31] These fellows form a close community during their time at the Newberry and continue to build their relationships with one another and with the library long after they leave. Researchers with long-term fellowships spend four to nine months at the Newberry.[32] Researchers with short-term fellowships spend one to two months at the library.[33] Newberry fellows often produce works that stems from their research at the library.
Examples of recent books by former Newberry fellows include:[34]
Only the Clothes on Her Back by Laura Edwards (Long-Term Fellow 2019-20)
Last Call at the Hotel ImperialbyDeborah Cohen (Long-Term Fellow 2019-20)
Botanical Entanglements: Women, Natural Science, and the Arts in Eighteenth-Century England by Anna Katie Sagal (Long-Term Fellow 2017-18)
The library offers a series of content-based professional development seminars for teachers. Led by scholars and educators from the Chicagoland area and beyond, these humanities-focused seminars create space for teachers to connect with peers, explore the Newberry’s collection as scholars, and learn to use primary sources in the classroom.[35]
The Newberry Library Undergraduate Seminar (NLUS) offers select students from DePaul University, Loyola University Chicago, Roosevelt University, and the University of Illinois Chicago the chance to participate in an intensive research seminar inspired by the Newberry’s collection. During their semester at the library, students attend seminar meetings and learn to conduct research. Students work closely with Newberry staff to form research questions before venturing into the archives on their own. The seminar culminates in a major research paper and presentation.[36]
Library from Washington Square on a c. 1910 postcard
The Newberry was established in 1887 as the result of a bequest by Walter Loomis Newberry, an early Chicago resident and business leader involved in banking, shipping, real estate, and other commercial ventures. Newberry died at sea in 1868, while on a trip to France. He included in his will a provision of funds for the creation of a "free public library" should his daughters die without heirs. They did, and so, following the death of Newberry's widow, Julia Butler Newberry, in 1885, it was up to Newberry estate trustees William H. Bradley and Eliphalet W. Blatchford to bring the library to fruition.
Without much direction (Newberry did not leave behind many details regarding his vision for the library) and without its founder's personal collection as a foundation (Newberry's own collection of books perished in the Great Fire of 1871), the first officers and staff members were instrumental in forming the character of the Newberry.
The Newberry's first librarian, William Frederick Poole, was a major figure in the library world when he came to the Newberry. Poole saw the Newberry as a blank canvas on which he could project his ideas, which included and perhaps found their most impassioned articulation in the design and construction of libraries. In 1887–88 it was located at 90 La Salle Street, in 1889–90 at 338 Ontario Street, and in 1890-93 at the northwest corner of State and Oak Streets. The present building, designed by Poole[40] and architect Henry Ives Cobb (1859–1931), opened in 1893. It is located at 60 West Walton Street, across from Washington Square. It is a structure in the Spanish Romanesque architectural style, built of Connecticut granite.[41]
Poole and Cobb feuded bitterly over their different visions for the library building. Poole favored a number of reading rooms with open shelving of materials that could be easily accessed by patrons; Cobb preferred the majestic grandiosity in vogue in Europe and the centralization of collection items. Poole's influence with the library's trustees coerced Cobb to temper the grand staircase he had envisioned and to accommodate open shelving. Over time, however, the open shelving would put too much strain on the Newberry's staff and the security of its collections, and the library would convert to a centralized storage system.
Poole served as Newberry librarian until his death in 1894. Under his leadership, the library built broad reference collections that would be useful to many different Chicagoans, especially professionals and tradespeople. The Newberry's medical department, created in 1890, is an example of this emphasis. Poole also steered the Newberry toward the acquisition of rare materials for use by professional scholars. Two en bloc acquisitions made during his tenure, the private collections of Henry Probasco and Count Pio Resse, yielded notable rarities in music and early printed specimens (incunables), as well as Shakespeare folios and editions of Homer, Dante, and Horace.
To focus its own collecting and to avoid the duplication of resources in Chicago at large, the Newberry entered into a cooperative agreement in 1896 with the Chicago Public Library and the John Crerar Library, by which each institution would specialize in certain fields of knowledge and areas of service.[41] As a consequence, the Newberry came to specialize in the humanities, and the natural sciences became the province of the Crerar. The Newberry immediately transferred its holdings in this area, including its copy of Audubon's Birds of America. The Newberry's medical department was transferred to the Crerar in 1906.[42]
In 1987, the Newberry established the Newberry Library Award in honor of its 100th anniversary. The Newberry Library Award is an honor bestowed to individuals, and in the case of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, organizations, who have made "outstanding contributions to the humanities, particularly in fields of endeavor related to the Newberry’s collection."[45] The award itself is a scale-sized model of the full-sized Virginio Ferrari sculpture created in 1987 called Umanitá that greets visitors as they enter the Newberry Library.[46][47][48]
The Pattis Family Foundation Chicago Book Award at the Newberry Library[edit]
The Pattis Family Foundation Chicago Book Award at the Newberry Library is presented annually to a book that transforms public understanding of Chicago, its history, or its people. The prize, established in 2021 by The Pattis Family Foundation in partnership with the Newberry Library, brings attention to publications that advance greater insight into the city among a general readership while resonating with the Newberry’s collections related to the history and people of Chicago. The award-winning author(s) will receive a prize of $25,000.[49]
Campbell, D'Ann, and Richard Jensen. "Community and Family History at the Newberry Library: Some Solutions to a National Need." History Teacher (1977): 47-54. in JSTOR
Coale, Robert Peerling. "Evaluation of a research library collection: Latin-American colonial history at the Newberry." The Library Quarterly (1965): 173-184.
Davis, Donald G. Dictionary of American Library Biography. "Towner, Lawrence William, 1921-1992."
Horowitz, Helen Lefkowitz. Culture & the City: Cultural Philanthropy in Chicago from the 1880s to 1917 (University Press of Kentucky, 1976)
Jensen, Richard. "The Accomplishments of the Newberry Library Family and Community History Programs: An Interview with Richard Jensen" The Public Historian (Autumn, 1983) 5#4 pp: 49-61 in JSTOR
Butler, Ruth Lapham. A check list of manuscripts in the Edward E. Ayer collection (Newberry library, 1937)
Mohr, Carolyn Curtis. Guide to the Illinois Central archives in the Newberry Library, 1851-1906 (Newberry Library, 1951)
"Back to Adam," a Survey of Genealogy in the Western World as Illustrated N the Collections of the Newberry Library, Chicago, Illinois: An Exhibition Catalogue (Newberry Library, 1992)
