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Libraries

My Uncle Bill McCarthy, after graduating from Rice, attended Yale in pursuit of advanced degrees. His mentor was Chauncey Tinker. One of the first tasks that Tinker asked him to perform was to find the original three hundred books that were donated to found the Yale Divinity School. They had been scattered quite a bit over the previous two hundred years. He found almost all of them.

Uncle Bill then came to Austin to work with Fannie Ratchford, the librarian of the Wrenn Library at the University of Texas. He catalogued the Stark and Aiken collections of Texana. These collections became the foundation for the Wrenn Library, and are incorporated into the Humanities Resource Center at the university. He then helped set up the Houghton Library of rare manuscripts at Harvard. He spent many years of his life convincing the heirs of Emily Dickinson to donate her papers to Harvard. They are there today.

He then went to work as the first curator of the Rosenbach Foundation in Philadelphia. Because of his influence and the encouragement of my cousin Liz Carpenter and others, I have always viewed libraries as gold mines in my life.

A number of years ago I was in London and was researching a project at the Westminster Reference Library on Trafalgar Square. The investigation showed that a book that I was determined to read was in the British Library.

Being naïve, I thought you just went into the library and found the book you were looking for and read it. I was made aware that getting into the stacks of the British Library was not a right but a privilege. Well, I was determined to read the book.

I was ushered into a room for an application interview. I sat down with a delightful girl who promptly asked me, "Why do you seek access to the British Library?"

I answered, "Because the book I want to read is in only two places in the world, the Library of Congress in Washington and the British Library, and I am here."

She replied, "Certainly that is a good reason but I am sorry, we have a strict policy that requires applicants to offer references in order to get into the Library."

Not willing to be thwarted, I asked her, "Have you ever been in the rare manuscript public viewing room?"

She answered, "Yes, of course I have."

I asked again, "Have you ever seen the manuscript of Alice?"

She answered, "Yes, I have."

I said, "The only reason that it is here is because of my uncle."

She replied, "Oh, really, and how do you explain that?"

I told her, "When the Lewis Carroll estate grew destitute and was in need of money they offered his manuscripts for sale. They were offered to the British Library and typically the board of trustees procrastinated. A. S. W. Rosenbach was aware that the priceless manuscripts were becoming available and when he found out that the British Library was dawdling, he was incensed that they didn't immediately bid for them. He bid the estate the original asking price, without trying to negotiate, and he secured the manuscripts. The manuscripts were brought to Philadelphia to the Rosenbach Foundation where my Uncle Bill was the curator. They were put on display.

"Uncle Bill knew that the manuscripts belonged in England. Over a period of about twelve years, he solicited fifteen benefactors to contribute a sixteenth of the original purchase price each. He had the tacit approval of Mr. Rosenbach, having convinced him of the validity of his efforts. Upon achieving the goal, Mr. Rosenbach donated the remaining sixteenth of the purchase price and the manuscripts were donated to the Library of Congress for tax reasons. Margaret Truman returned the manuscripts to the British Library."

The girl's eyes lit up and she declared, "That's right. Certainly you can have a reader's card to the Library!" It is a picture ID and I still have it, though it has expired.

I successfully completed my research and when I got back to the hotel I left the card on my wife's pillow. She is a professor of musicology at UT and a former associate dean of the graduate studies program. She knew the process that is involved in getting a reader's card and when she saw the card lying on her pillow she sighed and said, "Texas charm!" (Actually she said, "B.S.," but I can't say that.)

Uncle Bill brought the Alice in Wonderland manuscript to Houston one time for a showing at Rice University. He read to us kids from it and we got to hold it.

Rosenbach also had a great collection of correspondence, including signatures, between the founding fathers of our country. Uncle Bill would bring some of them to Houston for display at his alma mater, Rice. These invaluable manuscripts would usually spend the night in my grandfather's attic on Audubon Place in the Montrose area of Houston. So that the manuscripts would remain safe from the prying eyes and fingers of the grandchildren, "One-tooth" the bear was invented. He lived in the attic and another uncle, Lawrence, learned ventriloquism. He would project roars that seemed to come from the attic. We never dared go up there until Uncle Lala had put "One-tooth" in his hidden cage.

Uncle Bill was a good friend of Ethel and Robert Kennedy. Mr. Kennedy collected the signatures of the founding fathers and Ethel would call Bill in Philadelphia and say, "It's Bobby's birthday. You know what he has and what he needs for his collection. Please find something that I can give him."

Uncle Bill was also a trustee of the J. P. Morgan Library in New York.

The old Rice Institute provided Uncle Bill with the basic building blocks for a great career.

Chuck McCarthy
Austin, Texas
Published: November 14, 2005