Literary Society Libraries at Muhlenberg College

4"UHLENBERG COLLEGE was established in 1867 to some extent as successor to two earlier Allentown institutions, the first founded in 1848 as a preparatory school, the second developing from the first as a preparatory and collegiate institution. Muhlenberg itself began by offering college, academic, preparatory, and primary programs and continued to operate a secondary school until 1939. The first class at Muhlenberg consisted of twenty-five students in the "Collegiate Department" and 136 students in the three lower departments. During the first forty-five years of its existence—the period of the literary society libraries—the total enrollment was quite evenly divided between collegiate and non-collegiate students. There were periods of ups and downs for each group, but the total enrollments for these forty-five years were 3,762 in the college department and 3,316 in the preparatory departments. In 1912, the last year under consideration, there was a collegiate enrollment of 132—no larger number ever having been enrolled—and a preparatory enrollment of 123. These figures are given to illustrate the fact that for almost its first half century at least Muhlenberg did not concentrate its educational endeavors at the collegiate level. The original charter called for ".. . an Academy to consist of a primary School, a College, and such other appropriate departments as the patrons and managers of said Institute shall find themselves able to maintain, by the name, style and title of MUHLENBERG COLLEGE.. . ." The whole College was housed in one building , and there is evidence that at least occasionally members of the College faculty taught courses in the lower departments. To what extent this lack of concentration on education at the collegiate level affected the development of an institutional library is a matter of conjecture. Certainly the rigidly prescribed courses of studies in the preparatory departments demanded no books other than textbooks in this area. It seems reasonable to assume, therefore, that the divided efforts of the institution weakened the emphasis on higher education and on the development of a library to serve the needs of higher education. By way of contrast, it is astonishing to see what the collegiate-controlled literary societies did to provide books and other reading materials for their own use. Some credit must be given the College for its attempts at creating an institutional library. It is true that the original charter, the statutes, the several announcements and addresses made at the opening of the …