Chapter 23. The School Board Takes over School Library Service and Ray Lindquist Retires

AS 1967 came to a close, the last one year contract with the School Board for supplying library service to the schools came to an end. The Library’s School Department vas abolished on January 1, 1968. The School Board hired its own school library administrator. The school librarians became employees of the School Board with a liaison person at the Library until the transition was completed. The quarter of a million books which were the property of the Library remained in the school libraries, with the understanding that the Library would no longer add to them. The Library, also agreed to continue the delivery and pickup of special loan requests to the school libraries. These provisions were made upon the advice and approval of the County Prosecutor, the Library’s legal counsel.

The Library had finally been able to completely relinquish its partnership with the School Board in providing school library service. The Library Board as a creature of the School Board along with the Library administration had been placed in a most awkward and untenable situation by the Budget Commission and the Ohio Supreme Court’s ruling on school library service. The result was cold and strained relations with the School Board. The brunt of this change in relations was to be borne by Library Director Ray Lindquist and by me. It was to affect Ray Lindquist first.

Early on in 1968, one of the newer members of the Library Board made an appointment to come to my office for a private conference. Even now after almost thirty years, it pains me to think of it. It is an experience that I wish I had never had. It was a brief but most upsetting conference. On his arrival this board member shut my door and took a chair along side my desk and without any preamble of any kind proceeded to tell me that he wanted me to tell Ray Lindquist that it was time for him to resign or retire from his position as director of the library. I was so shocked and unable to say a word in reply for several seconds. Before I could recover, he went on to say that he and other members of the board were not happy with Mr. Lindquist and felt that he should move on. By this time, I had recovered. I replied that this was not a conversation that he should be having with me, that I as Mr. Lindquist’s Deputy Director had great respect for him as the Library’s director, and that I could not do such a thing. Our meeting ended on that note. In August of 1968, Ray Lindquist retired after having served first the Cuyahoga County Library and then the Cleveland Public Library with distinction for a combined period of more than twenty years.

All my instincts told me that this kind of pressure by a recently appointed Library board member might have been inspired by the Board of Education. I felt strongly that this did not bode well for the library. For the first time in my long and happy career in the library, I began to have grave doubts about the future of the library.

My intuition was telling me that this was the time for me to end my professional career in my home city and seek a position elsewhere. In years past I had had offers from the Akron Public Library when its director Russell Munn had sought me as his Assistant Director, when I had received job offers from the Boston Public Library, from the Worcester Massachusetts Public Library, and from Alan Hoover when he had invited me to be the Director of the Hoover Presidential Library in West Branch, Iowa. I had turned down all those offers because of my loyalty to the Cleveland Public Library. I had no doubts about my ability to get another library position comparable to the one I had in Cleveland.

That evening I discussed this turn of events with Grace. She agreed that this might be the time for me to make the change in my career. I recall that I immediately went to my home files and pulled out my resume and began to update it. As I began making the necessary changes, I began thinking of father and how he might advise me at this time. As I thought about how he might react to my thoughts of leaving the library, I found myself overcome by a sense of guilt. I recalled another time when I had thought of leaving, the time when Quincy Mumford had asked me to go to the Library of Congress with him in 1954. I remembered that I had resisted the temptation to go because I felt that it was not the right thing to do at the time. I had stayed because I felt that I would be deserting the Library. That night I recall saying to Grace, “How can I leave now that Ray Lindquist is gone, when In 1954, I did not leave when Quincy Mumford left.” I ended by saying, “I can’t desert the Library now!” As I look back on that evening, I remember Grace laughing and saying, “I knew all along that you’d decide to stay!” And so I continued to serve the people of Cleveland in the Cleveland Public Library.

It was natural that following Ray Lindquist’s retirement in August, that as Deputy Director I should conduct the business of the library until such time as the Library Board made other provisions. I did so until October 29, 1968 when the Library Board decided that I should be appointed Acting Director until such time as a Director could be appointed. I accepted this appointment not knowing what lay in store for me in the year and a half that was to follow.

The Library Board proceeded to search for a director nationwide through advertisements in the professional journals, other publications and through contacts with the American Library Association, etc. As Acting Director, I not only assumed the responsibilities of the office of Director but also continued with the duties of Business Manager as I had been charged to do in 1959 when the Library Board promoted me to Assistant Director and again in 1967 when I was promoted to Deputy Director. I recall that on that October day in 1968 when I temporarily assumed the helm of the Cleveland Public Library, a Branch Librarian who had been one of my mentors when I was a Page back in the nineteen thirties, came to congratulate me. In doing so, she asked, “How does it feel to be the chief cook and bottle washer?” She ended by saying, “Take care of yourself, and remember that you are not made of iron!” At the time, I laughed, not realizing that she was giving me a warning.