Griffin Library to Feature Massive 70-Year Old Dictionary for Visitors
11 Pounds. 2,300 Pages. 4,000 Illustrations
What’s 11.2 pounds, five inches thick, has to be assembled from nearly twenty individual pieces, and contains the entire width and breath of English language knowledge (from 1957 anyway)?
If you said the Assemble It Yourself New Century Dictionary, Deluxe Illustrated 1957 English Language Edition, you would be correct.
A copy of this incredible, monstrous dictionary walked through the library’s doors as a donation the other day and now we want to bring the book to our patrons to have a look. The dictionary is 2,300 pages, with 4,000 illustrations!
Visitors can see the book starting on Tuesday, Oct. 22 during regular library hours.
Back in the late-1950s when you bought a copy of this book, it came in pieces with long metal posts and you needed a screwdriver to assemble it. We even have the instruction manual that went with it.
This book is the 1950s equivalent of today’s iPhone. It likely would have been unusual for an individual of the day to have this book, but libraries, law firms and universities would certainly have it available.
And we’re going to bring that back for patrons to have a look. The book isn’t rare or valuable in terms of worth, so we don’t have to worry about that. We’ll find a book stand that can handle it and place it in a location that patrons can lay hands on it without any worry of damage.
That’s how they did it 70 years ago, and now our community (or anyone) will be able to have a look for themselves. Bring a magnifying glass because for a 2,000+ page book, the text is awfully small!
As so many of our patrons know, but some may not, the Griffin Free Public Library was chartered all the way back in 1893 as not just a library but as a museum as well. We have a fairly large collection of period pieces both from our founder, Sebastian Griffin, but also of items donated to our collection over the years.
Our goal is to add this massive book to our collection as Touchable History - a way for our community, especially kids, to see what having all the information in the palm of your hand actually looked like back then!
The New Century Dictionary will be available for visitors to the library to hold or look at starting on Tuesday, October 22 during our regular hours. We will allow visitors to lift up and take pictures and selfies with the book. The display will be located in our front, museum space, the oldest and original room in the library.
We’ll have it out for at least a week. We hope the incredible book gives visitors some insight into how drastically information availability has changed. We’ll look forward to seeing you!
Griffin Free Public Library is located at 22 Hooksett Road, Auburn NH 03032. Hours and info at www.griffinfree.org
What fun!
We had a huge dictionary but I do not remember if we had to put it together. I could barely lift it. The binding was yellowish and ornately designed. Back in the days when you also had encyclopedias in your home or the library was full every night with students doing assignments.