Phillips Library (Salem, Massachusetts)

Phillips Library
Plummer Hall in 2005
Country United States
Type Special library
Established 1992 (1992)
Location Essex Street, Salem, Massachusetts
Coordinates 42°31′21″N 70°53′30″W / 42.522389°N 70.891556°W / 42.522389; -70.891556Coordinates: 42°31′21″N 70°53′30″W / 42.522389°N 70.891556°W / 42.522389; -70.891556
Collection
Items collected books, journals, newspapers, magazines, ephemera, maps, and manuscripts
Other information
Staff 8
Website http://pem.org/library
Phillips Library
General information
Architectural style Italianate
Location 132 Essex Street, Salem, Massachusetts
Country United States
Construction started Daland House: 1851; Plummer Hall: 1856
Completed Daland House: 1852; Plummer Hall: 1856
Renovated 1998; 2012
Owner Peabody Essex Museum
Design and construction
Architect Daland House: Gridley James Fox Bryant (original), William Devereux Dennis (renovation); Plummer Hall: Enoch Fuller
Architecture firm Schwartz/Silver Architects (2012 renovation)
Plummer Hall and Daland House c. 1906

The Phillips Library of the Peabody Essex Museum is a rare books and special collections library in the Essex Institute Historic District of Salem, Massachusetts. It "is made up of the collections of the former Peabody Museum of Salem and Essex Institute, which merged in 1992. Both had libraries named for members of the Phillips family."[1][2] The Phillips Library reading room is in Plummer Hall on Essex Street, with offices in the connected John Tucker Daland House.[3]

Plummer Hall was originally built for the Salem Athenaeum in 1857. The Athenaeum provided for space for the Essex Institute and several other groups, and sold the building to the Essex Institute in 1907.[4] The reading room underwent restoration in 1998.[5] Both buildings closed in November 2011 for an extensive renovation. The Phillips Library Reading Room reopened in August 2013 at its temporary location at 1 Second Street, Peabody, MA.[6][7]

On December 8, 2017, much to the dismay of Salem residents, Dan L. Monroe, PEM’s Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo, director and CEO, issued a press release announcing that the 42,000 linear feet of historical documents will be permanently relocated to Rowley, Massachusetts, and that Plummer Hall and Daland House, the two historic buildings which had housed the Phillips Library, will be utilized as office and meeting space.[8]

The announcement of the planned movement of the Salem documents collection to the town of Rowley—located about 17 miles (27 km) north of the Peabody-Essex Museum—has sparked protests by historians and interested Salem citizens who don’t accept that unique documents regarding Salem’s history should reside outside the city.

Collections

"The library, with its gold-leaf pillars, and busts of Nathaniel Bowditch and George Peabody, is best known for holding the original 1692 Salem witchcraft trials papers, and early works by Nathaniel Hawthorne."[9] Collection subjects include art and architecture, Essex County, maritime history, natural history, New England, voyages and travels, Asia, Oceania, and Native American culture.[10] Some featured collections include the C. E. Fraser Clark Collection of Hawthorniana, the Frederick Townsend Ward Collection of Western-language materials on Imperial China, and the Herbert Offen Research Collection.[11][12]

References

  1. ↑ Boston Globe, May 24, 1998
  2. ↑ Prior to 1992, the Essex Institute operated the "James Duncan Phillips Library" cf. Boston Globe, Oct 11, 1988
  3. ↑ http://www.pem.org/library/information
  4. ↑ Ashton, Joseph (1917). The Salem Athenaeum 1810-1910. The Berkeley Press. pp. 24–31.
  5. ↑ Boston Globe, May 24, 1998
  6. ↑ Phillips Library at PEM. Retrieved 05 April 2012.
  7. ↑ Michael Kelley. Phillips Library... to Make Holdings Available Online. Library Journal. 27 September 2011. Retrieved 05 April 2012.
  8. ↑ "Statement Regarding PEM Phillips Library". Peabody Essex Museum. Retrieved 2017-12-09.
  9. ↑ Boston Globe, Mar 28, 2004
  10. ↑ Subject Strengths. Retrieved 05 April 2012.
  11. ↑ Featured Collections. Retrieved 05 April 2012.
  12. ↑ Offen Collection. Retrieved 05 April 2012.

Further reading

  • Kathy McCabe. A new chapter at Phillips Library. Boston Globe, May 24, 1998
  • Steven Rosenberg. Access a Concern After Museum Cuts Library Hours. Boston Globe, Mar 28, 2004. Pg. 1
  • Phillips Library Cutbacks Will Hurt Researchers. Boston Globe. Apr 8, 2004. Pg. 4
  • Steven Rosenberg. Salem Museum Urged To Rethink Library Cuts. Boston Globe, Apr 15, 2004.
  • Petition Urges More Services At Peabody Essex Library. Boston Globe, Oct 10, 2004.
  • Tom Dalton. PEM hires director for Phillips Library [Sidney Berger]. SalemNews.com, February 13, 2007
  • "Historians say wealth of records trapped in now shuttered library", Salem News, Dec 18, 2017
  • "Salem residents angry over museum's plan to move historical records", Boston Globe, January 13, 2018
  • Phillips Library webpage, Peabody Essex Museum
  • Historic Houses at PEM. Descriptions of Daland House and Plummer Hall.
  • Flickr. Photo of library interior, 2006
  • Flickr. Photo of library interior, 2010
  • Flickr. Photo of Daland House, Salem, 2010. Part of the Phillips Library occupies this building.
Salem - 1820
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