by We planned a visit to the Parkway Central Library in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, because we wanted to see a stuffed raven, naturally.
We were delighted to find much more.
The Parkway Central Library is a branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia, which was chartered in 1891 as a “a general library which shall be free to all.”
Its mission is “to advance literacy, guide learning, and inspire curiosity.” I love the “inspire curiosity” part of their mission!
Today there are 54 locations and 28,000 yearly programs in the system. It even has a Culinary Literacy Center with a commercial-grade kitchen. Libraries are amazing and it’s always a privilege to have access to all that goodness. If you’re not using your library, you are missing out.
The Parkway Central Library opened in 1927 at its present location, a beautiful Beaux-Arts building that has a twin next door (currently home to the Philadelphia Family Court). Both are modeled on the Hôtel de Crillon and Hôtel de la Marine in Paris, which were built in the mid-18th Century.
The Parkway Central Library is the main library and also the administrative headquarters of the Free Library system, but among other things, it has a renowned Rare Books Department. This department has a celebrated Charles Dickens collection, which includes first editions, personal letters, and the item that drew us there in the first place: Dickens’ stuffed pet raven, Grip.
That’s right, Dickens had a pet raven named Grip, who lived in the family home and could repeat several phrases (a favorite being “halloa old girl”).
That may sound fun, but if you read the Wikipedia article on her –– for indeed, she has a rather lengthy entry –– she was a bit of a terror, biting people, and stealing their things.
Grip was a minor character in Dickens’ novel Barnaby Rudge. Edgar Allan Poe wrote two reviews of the novel, including this bit:
The raven, too, intensely amusing as it is, might have been made more than we see it, a portion of the conception of the fantastic Barnaby. Its croaking might have been prophetically heard in the course of the drama.
Poe and Dickens met twice in Philadelphia in 1842, where Poe was thrilled to learn the Grip was a real bird.
Many Poe scholars believe that Grip was the inspiration for Poe’s famous 1845 poem, The Raven.
Apparently after it was published, Poe and Dickens had some words about copyright infringement, and if you read the Wikipedia article, you can see how Dickens might have felt a bit put out.
There were many other items on display in the Rare Books Department that we enjoyed looking at. At the end of our journey through the department we came to a locked door with windows. As we peered through at the “favorite room” of William McIntire Elkins which had been moved from his home to the library, a voice said “would you like to see inside?” Us? You betcha!
The librarian had been on tap to do a public tour of the room earlier, but no one showed up, so he gave us the tour instead. Elkins had bequeathed his entire rare books collection to the library, which included books and other items related to Charles Dickens, now part of the largest collection of Dickens books and documents of any library outside England. (Doug was pleased to see that Elkins had some Trollope books in his collection, as well.) The librarian pulled out some amazing very old items to show us, and we were delighted at this unexpected bonus to our visit.
The cover photo is a slide set for “Buy Your Own Goose”, circa 1891. They are used for a magic lantern show, where the lanternist tells the story – in this case how temperance leads to a better life.
