The Franklin Institute was established in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1824 by a group of prominent citizens of the city. Their intent was to combine the features of a "mechanic's institute" and a learned society. The name, a rather obvious choice, honored the city's most famous citizen, scientist, and artisan of an earlier day, Benjamin Franklin. An important goal of the institute, stated at the outset, was the establishment of a library, specifically to house books relating to science and the useful arts. The library received its first donations in 1824, and thereby began an illustrious history of service.

Library growth was rapid, mostly through gifts and some purchases, but also through exchange of the organization's publication, the Institute Journal, begun in 1826. Among the gifts may be mentioned copies of the patent files of several nations, Orville Wright's aeronautical engineering collection, including many early drawings of Wright biplanes, Lewis Sharpe Ware's collection on sugar, along with a trust fund for its maintenance and increase, and several gifts resulting in the accumulation of a fine horological collection. This randomly selected list could be extended greatly, but does suggest the riches of the library.

In 1829 the library occupied space in the institute's new building on Seventh Street in downtown Philadelphia, where it remained for over a century. It later moved to the institute's building on Benjamin Franklin Parkway. In the early years the library acted primarily as a subscription library, providing services to the institute's members. Over the years these restrictions were relaxed, so that the library eventually offered service to a wide public. Indeed, the strengths of the library promised a long future of service.

In 1985, however, the governing body of the institute rather abruptly announced the sale of nearly all the collection. The purpose of the sale was apparently a change in the mission of the library: no longer would it serve as a general resource for information on science and technology. Instead, its role would henceworth be limited to providing support only for the institute's current function as a museum. This liquidation of a renowned collection naturally caused much consternation among other local institu­tions, since it had been hoped that the material could remain in Philadelphia.

Unfortunately for these hopes, the collection was sold in a manner and with a speed that could only result in its fragmentation and dispersal. The sale took place in several stages, beginning about two months after the first announcement. The first was a mail auction of groups of monographs, followed by an open auction of rarer material. Other sales followed to dispose of runs of periodicals, trade catalogues, and other materials. Today the Franklin Institute Library is a mere shell of its former self, its resources spread far and wide—a reminder that no collection, no matter how sig­nificant, can be considered truly permanent.

Over the years the Franklin Institute library has used a number of bookplates, some of graphic interest, some not. Each donation or bequest seems to have had its own plate, and often several. At times the library used an entirely undistinguished, entirely typographic, label. This issue's cover depicts what is apparently the earliest identifiable bookplate. An engraved portrait of Franklin, its low accession number, and appearance in a volume from the 1840s suggest its age. Another example of a plate appears with this note and is typical of the ones prepared in the latter part of the nineteenth century to identify gifts or bequests.

Philip A. Metzger

Lindeman Library

Lehigh University

Bethlehem, Pennsylvania