In 1889, twenty-six year old Tessa Kelso becomes Librarian of the moribund Los Angeles Public Library. But her efforts to invigorate the library run counter to the city council’s efforts to reduce its annual costs; Tessa’s expansive social vision and unconventional personality bring her increasingly at odds with the power brokers who control the library and its funding. When a local minister publicly impugns her character before his congregation, Tessa sues him for slander, even though her lawsuit will bring the wrong kind of national attention to Los Angeles, her personal life, and the library she has worked so hard to build.
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My current work in progress is a historical novel. It’s set in 1890s Los Angeles and follows the tenure of Tessa Kelso, Librarian of the Los Angeles Public Library.
In just six years, from 1889 to 1895, Miss Kelso (as she was referred to her entire life) took the dues-based Los Angeles Public Library from a small collection of largely donated books shelved in four rooms of an old downtown building to one of the leading libraries in the country by circulation, and one of the most progressive and innovative of its time.
As for growth, she multiplied the number of volumes in the library by more than 7, the circulation by 10, and the registration of members by almost 160. To put in another way, the library grew from 6,000 to 42,000 volumes, annual circulation from 12,000 to 329,000, and membership from 132 members to almost 20,000.
We take many of her innovations for granted today. She (and the library board of directors) abolished fees to make the library available to all; advocated for open access to shelves; employed the Dewey Decimal system of classification when there was no standardized system in use. Beyond these, she started an art department with advice from the Ruskin Art Club, the oldest women’s club in Los Angeles; started a program of circulating sheet music, one of the first in the country; she and her first assistant, Adelaide Hasse, established a librarian training program, the first on the west coast; instituted civil service placement and advancement in the library years before the city of Los Angeles did so. The list goes on.
What makes her even more impressive is that up to this time she had never worked in a library. She had attended one annual convention of the American Library Association a few years earlier (1886), ostensibly covering it for a newspaper in Cincinnati, where she was from. Nevertheless, she convinced the library board of directors that what the library needed was an administrator, and that she was the woman for the job.
She was also “New Woman” of the Progressive Era. She’s often described in terms similar to this passage:
Hers was, indeed, a forceful personality, and she was an unusual woman tor the time and the place. In action she was decidedly masculine, attacking problems or tasks directly without circumlocution or feminine hesitation. In appearance she was forceful, also, rather than distinctive or femininely attractive. She wore low-heeled, broad-toed shoes, often went without a hat, wore short hair, smoked cigarettes occasionally, and often acted with that unconventional freedom once habitual only among members of the press and upholders of the dignity of the American stage.
Of course, as a woman who defied contemporary norms of how a woman should dress and behave, she made enemies along the way. Though she worked well with the members of the library board, she had recurring fights with City Hall. Her success in securing funding for books led to a two-year legal battle when a rival faction tried to take over the library board in order to control what had suddenly become a plum political asset. Two different city auditors refused her claims for reimbursement for board-approved travel expenses. The second round took nearly a year and had to be resolved (in her favor) by the California Supreme Court.
The most challenging confrontation of her tenure came from a local minister. In a bid to bolster its candidate in upcoming mayoral election, the Los Angeles Herald published a series of articles criticizing the library and its leadership. The Herald ultimately published an “Indescribably Revelation” of a “consummately obscene” French novel in the library. The paper translated the most salacious passages from the book and distributed copies to local clergy who used their sermons to condemn the book and the library for polluting the minds of the city’s young.
Reverend Campbell of the First Methodist Episcopal Church went a step further. He personally chastised Tessa Kelso in a thinly-veiled public prayer for her salvation: “Oh Lord, vouchsafe thy saving grace to the librarian of the Los Angeles City Library and cleanse her of all sin and make her a woman worthy of her office.” A week later, Tessa sued him for slander.
The church eventually settled with Tessa before the case went to trial. But in the meantime, Los Angeles had elected a new mayor, who in turn nominated an entirely new library board. In spite of Tessa’s success in creating a first-rate library for the city, the board made clear that she was no longer welcome. Despite her impressive record, the board first placed her on three-month’s probation, then it reduced her and Adelaide Hasse’s pay. By May first 1895, Tessa Kelso, Adelaide Hasse, and the reference librarian, Estelle Haines, resigned.
Tessa Kelso is remembered as one of the most dynamic librarians of the Los Angeles Public Library. Adelaide Hasse is acknowledged by the American Library Association as one of the 100 most influential librarians of the Twentieth Century. The issues they struggled with—community censorship, control over children’s access to books, political influence over civil service jobs, reduced funding in the face of increased public need—still plague libraries today. In the words of one of Tessa’s contemporaries,
Much is said of the necessity of tact in libraries, but sometime we need simple honesty and courage.
I think the story of Tessa’s librarianship is a worthwhile exploration of that sentiment.