Libraries And The Press
Books for the people were considered by the Spanish colonial
authorities to be of the nature of inflammable or explosive
substances, which it was not safe to introduce freely.
From their point of view, they were right. The Droits de l'homme of
Jean Jacques Rousseau, for example, translated into every European
language, had added more volunteers of all nationalities to the ranks
of the Spanish-American pat
iots than was generally supposed - and so,
books and printing material were subjected to the payment of high
import duties, and a series of annoying formalities, among which the
passing of the political and ecclesiastical censors was the most
formidable.
The result among the poorer classes of natives was blank illiteracy. A
pall of profound ignorance hung over the island, and although, with
the revival of letters in the seventeenth century the light of
intellect dawned over western Europe, not a ray of it was permitted to
reach the Spanish colonies.
The ruling class, every individual of whom came from the Peninsula,
kept what books each individual possessed to themselves. To the people
all learning, except such as it was considered safe to impart, was
forbidden fruit.
Under these conditions it is not strange that the idea of founding
public libraries did not germinate in the minds of the more
intelligent among the Puerto Ricans till the middle of the nineteenth
century; whereas, the other colonies that had shaken off their
allegiance to the mother country, had long since entered upon the road
of intellectual progress with resolute step.
Collegiate libraries, however, had existed in the capital of the
island as early as the sixteenth century. The first of which we have
any tradition was founded by the Dominican friars in their convent. It
contained works on art, literature, and theology.
The next library was formed in the episcopal palace, or "casa
parochial," by Bishop Don Bernardo de Valbuena, poet and author of a
pastoral novel entitled the Golden Age, and other works of literary
merit. This library, together with that of the Dominicans, and the
respective episcopal and conventual archives were burned by the
Hollanders during the siege of San Juan in 1625.
The Franciscan friars also had a library in their convent (1660). The
books disappeared at the time of the community's dissolution in 1835.
Bishop Pedro Gutierres de Cos, who founded the San Juan Conciliar
Seminary in 1832, established a library in connection with it, the
remains of which are still extant in the old seminary building, but
much neglected and worm-eaten.
A library of a semipublic character was founded by royal order dated
June 19, 1831, shortly after the installation of the Audiencia in San
Juan. It was a large and valuable collection of books on juridical
subjects, which remained under the care of a salaried librarian till
1899, when it was amalgamated with the library of the College of
Lawyers.
This last is a rich collection of works on jurisprudence, and the
exclusive property of the college, but accessible to professional men.
The library is in the former Audiencia building, now occupied by the
insular courts.
The period from 1830 to 1850 appears to have been one of greatest
intellectual activity in Puerto Rico. Toward its close Juan de la
Pezuela, the governor, founded the Royal Academy of Belles-Lettres, an
institution of literary and pedagogical character, with the functions
of a normal school. It was endowed with a modest library, but it only
lived till the year 1860, when, in consequence of disagreement between
the founder and the professors, the school was closed and the library
passed into the possession of the Economic Society of Friends of the
Country.
This, and the library of the Royal Academy, which the society had also
acquired, formed a small but excellent nucleus, and with, the produce
of the public subscription of 1884 it was enabled to stock its library
with many of the best standard works of the time in Spanish and
French, and open to the Puerto Ricans of all classes the doors of the
first long-wished-for public library.
Since then it has contributed in no small degree to the enlightenment
of the better part of the laboring classes in the capital, till it was
closed at the commencement of the war.
During the transition period the books were transferred from one
locality to another, and in the process the best works disappeared,
until the island's first civil governor, Charles H. Allen, at the
suggestion of Commissioner of Education Martin G. Brumbaugh, rescued
the remainder and made it the nucleus of the first American free
library.
The second Puerto Rican public library was opened by Don Ramon
Santaella, October 15, 1880, in the basement of the Town Hall. It
began with 400 volumes, and possesses to-day 6,361 literary and
didactic books in different languages.
The Puerto Rican Atheneum Library was established in 1876. Its
collection of books, consisting principally of Spanish and French
literature, is an important one, both in numbers and quality. It has
been enriched by accessions of books from the library of the extinct
Society of Friends of the Country. It is open to members of the
Atheneum only, or to visitors introduced by them.
The Casino Espanol possesses a small but select library with a
comfortable reading-room. Its collection of books and periodicals is
said to be the richest and most varied in the island. It was founded
in 1871.
The religious association known under the name of Conferences of St.
Vincent de Paul had a small circulating library of religious works
duly approved by the censors. The congregation was broken up in 1887
and the library disappeared.
The Provincial Institute of Secondary Education, which was located in
the building now occupied by the free library and legislature,
possessed a small pedagogical library which shared the same fate as
that of the Society of Friends of the Country.
The Spanish Public Works Department possessed another valuable
collection of books, mostly on technical and scientific subjects. A
number of books on other than technical subjects, probably from the
extinct libraries just referred to, have been added to the original
collection, and the whole, to the number of 1,544 volumes in excellent
condition, exist under the care of the chief of the Public Works
Department.
Besides the above specified libraries of a public and collegiate
character, there are some private collections of books in the
principal towns of the island. Chief among these is the collection of
Don Fernando Juncos, of San Juan, which contains 15,000 volumes of
classic and preceptive literature and social and economic science,
1,200 volumes of which bear the author's autographs.
The desire for intellectual improvement began to manifest itself in
the interior of the island a few years after the establishment of the
first public library in the capital. The municipality of Ponce founded
a library in 1894. It contains 809 bound volumes and 669 pamphlets in
English, German, French, and Spanish, many of them duplicates. The
general condition of the books is bad, and the location of the library
altogether unsuitable. There was a municipal appropriation of 350
pesos per annum for library purposes, but since 1898 it has not been
available.
Mayaguez founded its public library in 1872. It possesses over 5,000
volumes, with a small archeological and natural history museum
attached to it.
Some of the smaller towns also felt the need of intellectual
expansion, and tried to supply it by the establishment of
reading-rooms. Arecibo, Vega-Baja, Toa-Alta, Yauco, Cabo-Rojo,
Aguadilla, Humacao, and others made efforts in this direction either
through their municipalities or private initiative. A few only
succeeded, but they did not outlive the critical times that commenced
with the war, aggravated by the hurricane of August, 1898.
* * * * *
Since the American occupation of the island, four public libraries
have been established. Two of them are exclusively Spanish, the
Circulating Scholastic Library, inaugurated in San Juan on February
22, 1901, by Don Pedro Carlos Timothe, and the Circulating Scholastic
Library of Yauco, established a month later under the auspices of S.
Egozene of that town. The two others are, one, largely English, the
Pedagogical Library, established under the auspices of the
Commissioner of Education, and the San Juan Free Library, to which Mr.
Andrew Carnegie has given $100,000, and which is polyglot, and was
formally opened to the public April 20, 1901. There is also a growing
number of libraries in the public schools. From the above data it
appears that, owing to the peculiar conditions that obtained in this
island, the people of Puerto Rico were very slow in joining the
movement of intellectual expansion which began in Spanish America in
the eighteenth century. They did so at last, unaided and with their
own limited resources, even before the obstacles placed in their way
by the Government were removed. If they have not achieved more, it is
because within the last few decades the island has been unfortunate in
more than one respect. Now that a new era has dawned, it may
reasonably be expected that the increased opportunities for
intellectual development afforded them will be duly appreciated and
taken advantage of by the people, and if we may judge from the
eagerness with which the youth of the capital reads the books of the
San Juan Free Library, it seems clear that the seed so recently sown
has fallen in fruitful soil.
* * * * *
The history of the Press in Puerto Rico is short. The first printing
machine was introduced by the Government in 1807 for the purpose of
publishing the Official Gazette. No serious attempt at publication of
any periodical for the people was made till the commencement of the
second constitutional period (1820-'23), when, for the first time in
the island's history, public affairs could be discussed without the
risk of imprisonment or banishment. The right of association was also
recognized. The Society of Liberal Lovers of the Country and the
Society of Lovers of Science were formed about this time. The
Investigator and the Constitutional Gazette were published and gave
food for nightly discussions on political and social questions in the
coffee-house on the Marina.
The period of freedom of spoken and written thought was short, but an
impulse had been given which could not be arrested. In 1865 there were
eight periodicals published in the island. On September 29th of that
year a law regulating the publication of newspapers indirectly
suppressed half of them. It contained twenty articles, each more
stringent than the other. To obtain a license to publish or to
continue publishing a paper, a deposit of 2,000 crowns had to be made
to cover the fines that were almost sure to be imposed. The
publications were subject to the strictest censorship. They could not
appear till the proofs of each article had been signed by the censor,
and the whole process of printing and publishing was fenced in by such
minute and annoying regulations, the smallest infraction of which was
punished by such heavy fines that it was a marvel how any paper could
be published under such conditions. These conditions were relaxed a
decade or two later, and a number of publications sprang into
existence at once. When the United States Government took possession
of the island, there were 9 periodicals published in San Juan, 5 in
Ponce, 3 in Mayaguez, 1 in Humacao, and a few others in different
towns of the interior.