LJ Talks to Bernard Margolis, Departing President of the Boston Public Library
John Berry -- Library Journal, 11/14/2007
When it was announced last week that Bernard Margolis, for a decade the president of the Boston Public Library would not be reappointed, Margolis did not speak publicly, though his supporters defended him forcefully in the press, portraying him as having run afoul of Boston Mayor Thomas Menino. (In the photo, Margolis, at right, is with the mayor.)
After the library board acted officially on Tuesday, Margolis was free to talk to the press. He spoke to the Boston Globe and later to LJ’s John Berry LJ: How are you doing?
BM: I’m holding up!
LJ: What are some lessons from this for library directors?
BM: We don’t teach people in library school any skills that equip them to deal with the rough and tumble politics in big city government or elsewhere. That is good, in the sense that it builds up your resistance when you learn it on the job, but it is bad that we don’t give people skills to deal with this reality.
LJ: Is there any silver lining?
BM: I am not happy that it came to this. Still, it is a great opportunity to have a community discourse on the library. That’s good for two reasons. I hope it will prove that professional librarians are worth their salt, and that what we do is important. I hope it will help get rid of that untrue stereotype and show that librarians can be forceful, outspoken, that we are powerful and important. Second, I hope it will get the public invigorated in a discussion of what the role of the public library is today. What better place to have that discussion than Boston, where it began?
LJ: Should your successor have a library degree?
BM: Before I came the statute was changed so it is no longer required that the position be held by a librarian. I believe, I think the Boston Public Library needs a librarian. There are hundreds of examples of why this is so. It is a question of training, experience, and the ethical and contextual world of libraries. That has informed me in a way that has helped me do the job, a way that an accountant or someone from another profession would not understand. [It is about] our professional values and actions in areas like intellectual freedom, privacy, and public access.
LJ: You’ve dealt with such issues.
BM: My first day in Boston began with those issues. The mayor wanted to filter the Internet terminals. I didn’t. The compromise we negotiated was same as the outcome in the Supreme Court’s later decision.
LJ: Would you have done anything differently?
BM: I don’t think I had enough control to do things differently. At the beginning, and after, I reached out to the Mayor, tried to do the right things.
LJ: What’s next for you?
BM: I am going to look over professional opportunities. I have had hundreds of communications of support—email, notes, flowers—I’m really.feeling buoyed by it. I couldn’t feel any higher about the community response. [But] the city, that is, the mayor and his administration, is very unhappy. I’ve even had a couple of job offers. I’m not sure whether to look at professional opportunties, in Boston or not, whether to consider a career change.
