Salem Women's
History and
Business Community
History and
Business Community
Salem Public Library
Associated Salem women:
• Mary A. Bertram
• Jennie M. Emmerton
• Clara Bertram Kimball
• Annie Bertram Webb
• Hannah Harris
Other Salem libraries:
• Salem Athenaeum
• Phillips Library, Peabody Essex
Museum
• Mary A. Bertram
• Jennie M. Emmerton
• Clara Bertram Kimball
• Annie Bertram Webb
• Hannah Harris
Other Salem libraries:
• Salem Athenaeum
• Phillips Library, Peabody Essex
Museum
370 Essex Street — Open to the Public
On June 1, 1888, Mary A. Bertram and her three daughters, Jennie M. Emmerton (d. 1912, Caroline Emmerton's mother), Clara Bertram Kimball (d. 1920), and Annie Bertram Webb, gave the beautiful mansion that was their family home to the City of Salem in memory of their husband and father, the philanthropist John Bertram, to house the Salem Public Library. In a letter to the Mayor of Salem written for the occasion, the four Bertram women explained that “with the same generous hearts and noble desires, [John Bertram’s] widow and children offer to the City of Salem to-night a gift that will carry into every home within our corporate limits the sunshine and wealth of enjoyment that will come with added advantages and increased opportunities of learning.”1
Interestingly — and annoyingly — histories of the Salem Public Library credit John Bertram with making this magnanimous gift to the City of Salem when, in fact, the benefactors were the women in his immediate family.
As early as 1823, long before the library’s present home, Hannah Harris purchased the contents of Salem’s Central Circulating Library. For access to her library’s four thousand volumes, subscribers paid five dollars per year to borrow two volumes at a time, or seven dollars a year to borrow four. Subscribers could change books once a day, and no book could stay out for longer than one month. Non-subscribers paid for each volume when it was returned.
There are two other libraries in Salem associated with women: The Salem Athenaeum and the Phillips Library of the Peabody Essex Museum.
Sources
1 Proceedings [upon the dedication of the Salem Public Library] (Salem, Mass., 1888).
On June 1, 1888, Mary A. Bertram and her three daughters, Jennie M. Emmerton (d. 1912, Caroline Emmerton's mother), Clara Bertram Kimball (d. 1920), and Annie Bertram Webb, gave the beautiful mansion that was their family home to the City of Salem in memory of their husband and father, the philanthropist John Bertram, to house the Salem Public Library. In a letter to the Mayor of Salem written for the occasion, the four Bertram women explained that “with the same generous hearts and noble desires, [John Bertram’s] widow and children offer to the City of Salem to-night a gift that will carry into every home within our corporate limits the sunshine and wealth of enjoyment that will come with added advantages and increased opportunities of learning.”1
Interestingly — and annoyingly — histories of the Salem Public Library credit John Bertram with making this magnanimous gift to the City of Salem when, in fact, the benefactors were the women in his immediate family.
As early as 1823, long before the library’s present home, Hannah Harris purchased the contents of Salem’s Central Circulating Library. For access to her library’s four thousand volumes, subscribers paid five dollars per year to borrow two volumes at a time, or seven dollars a year to borrow four. Subscribers could change books once a day, and no book could stay out for longer than one month. Non-subscribers paid for each volume when it was returned.
There are two other libraries in Salem associated with women: The Salem Athenaeum and the Phillips Library of the Peabody Essex Museum.
Sources
1 Proceedings [upon the dedication of the Salem Public Library] (Salem, Mass., 1888).
