Mattie Herd Roland

Mattie Herd Roland was Alabama's first African-American librarian. Herd was selected and trained to head the first library for African-American use in Alabama, the Booker T. Washington branch of the Birmingham Public Library, which opened in 1918.

Early life and education

Mattie Herd was the daughter of a railroad switchman in Birmingham, Alabama.[1]

A group of African-American Birmingham principals met with Booker T. Washington and the director of the Birmingham Public Library in 1913 to select a high school student who would be trained in library services with the aim of leading the library's first black branch; they chose Mattie Herd.[1] She worked after school at the central library to gain library experience.[2]: 14  She finished high school and in 1917 went on to study for a year at the library education program started by Thomas Fountain Blue at Louisville Public Library.[1][3]

Library career

Herd was interviewed in July 1918 to confirm her readiness to serve as a librarian.[1] She was hired at a salary of $35 a month, one-third that of white librarians in similar roles.[4] The branch opened in October 1918, though a planned opening ceremony was canceled due to the 1918 influenza pandemic.[4] The Birmingham Library Board did not permit books to circulate between the white and black branches of the library; instead, books from the central library would be given to the black branch, and a replacement book for the central library would be purchased from funds for the black branch.[4] The board gave Herd the title of "library assistant" despite the fact that she was the head of the branch responsible for providing library services to the 80,000 African-American residents of Birmingham.[2]: 14 

Herd headed the library branch for four months before the board decided that a man would be a better choice to encourage use of the library; the man they eventually found to replace Herd was also poorly supported by the board's actions, and lasted only six months in the position.[2] Despite the fact that she was in the position for only a short time, Herd has been described as "a pioneer in black librarianship".[5] Librarian Annie Greene King described the opening of the Booker T. Washington branch as an important moment in the black public library movement.[2]: 172 

References
  1. Hanbury, Dallas (2016). "Seekers of Knowledge": the Development of Southern Public Libraries and the African American Quest for Library Access, 1898-1963 (Ph. D.). Middle Tennessee State University. pp. 160–161. Retrieved 10 May 2020.
  2. Graham, Patterson Toby (2002). A right to read: segregation and civil rights in Alabama's public libraries, 1900-1965. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: University of Alabama Press. ISBN 9780817311445.
  3. Malone, Cheryl Knott (2000). "Quiet Pioneers: Black Women Public Librarians in the Segregated South". Vitae Scholasticae. 19 (1): 65. hdl:10150/106317. Retrieved 10 May 2020.
  4. Battles, David M. (2009). The History of Public Library Access for African Americans in the South: Or, Leaving Behind the Plow. Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press. p. 50. ISBN 9780810862470.
  5. Phinazee, Annette L., ed. (1980). The Black librarian in the Southeast: reminiscences, activities, challenges: papers presented for a colloquium. Durham, North Carolina: North Carolina Central University School of Library Science. p. 21.
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