History of the State Library

The State Library of Louisiana traces its roots to 1838, when the first iteration opened in New Orleans. It closed in 1911 after years of neglect, leaving the state one of the most bookless in America and with only five public libraries.

By 1925, more than half the state's population — 1.2 million people — had no access to books. The five public libraries were all inadequately equipped and lacked proper funding.

Recognizing the importance of an educated population, state lawmakers created the Louisiana Library Commission that year. The goal was to open a public library in every parish. The person picked for the job was Essae M. Culver.

She got to work with a $50,000 grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York to demonstrate free library service to the people of one state whose service was inadequate, with the hope that this would serve as an example for other states.

Beginning in 1926, the legislature appropriated $2,500. Lawmakers have continued to support the State Library ever since.

From humble beginnings in a single room in the Old State Capitol using borrowed furniture, the State Library quickly grew in scope and size. (Though Culver noted she was so uneasy about the prospects that she bought a roundtrip train ticker, just in case the experiment failed.)

EARLY EFFORTS

The State Library grew its collection and began to lend books across the state while working to open demonstration libraries in hopes that residents would vote to make them permanent. They did just that in most cases. From 1939 to 1942, when it was disbanded, the Works Progress Administration also played a part in library development in Louisiana, working with the Louisiana Library Commission to open small libraries around the state and provide staff for established and demonstration libraries.

Public libraries would open in all 64 parishes during the next 40 years thanks to the demonstration method Culver set up.

Early efforts also involved purchasing a bookmobile to publicize library services, establishing a library school at LSU, providing services to the Legislature, and writing state public library laws.

By 1946, the Legislature changed the name of the Louisiana Library Commission to the Louisiana State Library. The next year, it set up a significant and unusual demonstration library unlike any others when the state requested a library at the Louisiana State Penitentiary. That library remains in service today, and there are libraries at the other seven correctional instructions in the state. The Library Development Division offers training to help with day-to-day operations and answers reference questions from those facilities as well as fulfilling book requests.

In 1954, the state set aside $2 million to build a new State Library building on the site of the cramped Hill Memorial Library, in the shadow of the Capitol, where the State Library had operated since 1940. The new building opened in 1958.

By the time Culver retired in 1962, there were public library systems in 51 parishes. Sallie Farrell, who had been a top aide to Culver, was named the new state librarian. She oversaw the establishment of public libraries in the final 13 parishes that did not have them when she was named state librarian.

EXPANDING SERVICES

Farrell would come to be known as the "super salesman of Louisiana libraries," and her efforts were felt far beyond the state's boundaries. She played an important role in getting Congress to pass the Library Services Act, later renamed the Library Services and Construction Act. At the height of the Cold War, she traveled to the Soviet Union with six other leading librarians to represent the American Library Association during an exchange mission.

Closer to home, she worked with leaders of the Department of Corrections and Department of Hospitals to establish libraries in institutions run by those agencies and set up sharing agreements among public libraries in rural parts of the state.

Among her most important efforts, though, was expanding the State Library's services and focus after the final public library system opened in Jefferson Davis Parish in 1969. Library Development began to work with libraries to find ways to improve services that were now available to every resident of the state.

The State Library became an office of the Department of Culture, Recreation, and Tourism after the 1974 constitutional convention, and the Board of Commissioners, retained the authority to appoint the state librarian.

Farrell retired the next year, and the board named Thomas F. Jacques the state's third state librarian. Before his time at the State Library, he had been an administrator at the Rapides Parish Library and assistant director for library development at the Mississippi Library Commission, the equivalent of Louisiana's State Library.

THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION

During his 30-year tenure, he worked to increase statewide literacy programs and keep up with the rapidly evolving pace of technology. He created summer reading programs, the nation's first statewide automated interlibrary loan system, a statewide network of book delivery, created the Louisiana Center for the Book and Louisiana Book Festival, oversaw the development of public internet access at all Louisiana public libraries by the mid-1990s, and managed an $8 million expansion and renovation of the State Library building.

When he retired in 2005, the board named Rebecca Hamilton his successor. Two months later, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita pummeled Louisiana, decimating many public libraries across the state. She worked to collect almost $15 million in grants from various foundations for those libraries to continue operating and rebuild. In 2010, the State Library received an $8.8 million Broadband Technology Opportunities Program grant to provide more than 760 computer work stations in every public library in the state, establish wireless hotspots, and provide four mobile computer training labs to deliver job skills training.

Meg Placke was named state librarian in September 2023. Prior to that selection, she served as interim state librarian, deputy state librarian, associate state librarian, and as the E-rate Consultant in Library Development. She worked with the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana Foundation to provide better access to telehealth services around the state with a grant of $50,000, allowing 11 library systems in rural parts of the state to offer free telehealth services, a service Culver never could have imagined nearly a century ago when her efforts to put books in the hands of all state residents began.

History of the State Library: 1925-1950 (PDF)

History of the State Library: 1950-1975 (PDF)

Libraries for Louisiana, a 1960 film produced to show the value of  public libraries in the state.