We are continuing our celebration of National Library Week by highlighting films from our collection featuring stories about libraries. Check out Part One here and use this tool to help you find your local library.
The films featured in this post were made for different reasons and audiences, but both highlight the services that libraries provide for their communities and advocate for their use and support. As seen from the previous post, expanding and improving services to small towns and rural libraries was a major priority. These films highlighted how larger libraries in the county can use their resources to meet the needs of all communities, and has been a common factor for the films highlighted for National Library Week.
Small Town Library, created in 1950 is part of a series about American life produced for the US Army to be shown in Allied occupied countries after World War II, and is listed as one of more than 350 films in the USIS Film Catalog for Japan. These films would often have translated versions that had been adapted and voiced for local audiences and may have had accompanying study guides for group discussions afterward. The USIS Film Program was a “massive reorientation and reeducation programs conducted by the Department of State in Germany and Japan, the first such foreign cultural, information and education endeavor by the U.S. government.”[1] Films were held by the Public Affairs Division of the American Embassy in Tokyo[2] and could be checked out for viewing by companies, schools, labor unions, public halls, and other associations.
The Day the Books Went Blank, was a collaborative effort between the six New England states, showing the best current library practices and promoting improved services for small towns. This film was created as a part of the Library Services Act, a 5-year program to further the extension of public library services to rural areas. The program was extended for an additional 5 years in 1960 due to its success.[3] The film highlighted a very successful outcome of the program in helping to raise awareness of the value and use of libraries.[4] As seen in the film, there were three major accomplishments from the act: the strengthening of resources and services libraries can provide, improved training activities for staff, and the “creation of a new and enlarged concept by a vast number of people of the role which a good public library can play in the life of every citizen.”[5] The film highlights how organization between libraries, extension of services from existing libraries, promoting and establishing reference and technical services, interlibrary loans, acquisition and storage of materials, establishing scholarship and other training programs, surveys and research projects about the needs of their patrons[6] are greatly supported by the Library Services Act and how those benefits extend to patrons and communities. These practices have continued to evolve and change the way libraries service their communities today.
For more on libraries, in case your local library isn’t enough, check out this post on the Library War Service.
[1] Washington D.C. United States Information Agency, The United States Information Agency: A Commemoration, Washington D.C.: United States Information Agency, 1999, p. 11. https://web.archive.org/web/20110607062001/http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/usia/abtusia/commins.pdf#
[2] USIS Film Catalog for Japan, 1953, p. 5.
[3] State Plans Under the Library Services Act, Supplement 3, Washington D.C.:U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education, 1963, p. 1.
[4] Ibid. p. 18.
[5] Ibid, p. 1-2.
[6] Ibid, p. 2.
Sources:
“National Library Week 2025: Drawn to the Library!”. National Library Week. ALA American Library Association, 2025. https://www.ala.org/conferencesevents/celebrationweeks/natlibraryweek
“National Library Week”. National Library Week. Wikipedia, September 10, 2024. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Library_Week
“Promoting Democracy in Japan (1953).” Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project. George Washington University, Columbian College of Arts and Sciences. https://erpapers.columbian.gwu.edu/promoting-democracy-japan-1953#:~:text=The%20exchange%20was%20part%20of,difficult%20time%20for%20the%20Japanese.
Gharabaghi, Hadi and Bret Vukoder. “The Motion Pictures of the United States Information Agency: Studying a Global Film and Television Operation.” Journal of E-Media Studies Special Issue 6.1 (2022): https://pub.dartmouth.edu/journal-of-e-media-studies-special-issue/the-global-film-and-television-operation-weve-never-heard-of-the-motion-pictures-of-the-united-sta
Landgraf, Greg. “”Wake Up and Read” to “Libraries Lead” The 60-year history of National Library Week.” American Libraries. (2018): https://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/2018/03/01/national-library-week-60th-anniversary-libraries-lead/
State Plans Under the Library Services Act, Supplement 3. Washington D.C.:U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education, 1963. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Bulletin/WJZLAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22the+day+the+books+went+blank%22&pg=RA7-PA37&printsec=frontcover
USIS Film Catalog for Japan. 1953.
Washington D.C. United States Information Agency. The United States Information Agency: A Commemoration. Washington D.C.: United States Information Agency, 1999. https://web.archive.org/web/20110607062001/http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/usia/abtusia/commins.pdf#