The Oswego Public Library was founded in the midst of America’s greatest crisis as our country debated the issue of slavery. Gerrit Smith, who donated the money for the library building and materials in 1853, was a noted abolitionist who openly invited fugitive slaves to his estate in Peterboro, New York. “From Peterboro they were sent in Mr. Smith’s wagon to Oswego.”¹ Mr. Smith owned a majority of the land on the river’s east side. He made two requirements for the new library:

1. locate the library on the East side of the Oswego River
2. shut out no person on account of their race, complexion, or condition

Gerrit Smith ran for President of the United States three times and was a close friend of John Brown, Frederick Douglass, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Below is an 1866 portrait of Gerrit Smith by the artist Alonzo Pease.

From the opening of its doors in 1857 to the present, the Oswego Public Library has had African-American patrons including prominent members of the Underground Railroad and the local community. Early borrowing records confirm that several African-American families used the library during its first years. Tudor E. Grant and his son George Franklin Grant, 11-years-old when the library opened, are listed in the books. George was the second African-American graduate of Harvard’s Dental School in 1870. He went on to become a faculty member, invent the golf tee, and pioneer the treatment of cleft palates. Tudor Grant, David Friman, and Nathan Green were all African-Americans involved in the Underground Railroad. David’s entire family were library patrons along with Nathan’s children Harriet and John. The Greens were fugitive slaves who settled in Oswego instead of continuing on to Canada. Other prominent African-Americans in Oswego Public Library borrowing records from the 1850’s include Mary Smith, sister of barber Charles Smith who partnered with Tudor; Percillia Thomas who lived with the Greens; and Mrs. William Rattery.

The library building was built in 1855 in the popular “Norman” or “castellated” style of the time, recreating medieval castle appearances throughout the East Coast. The Oswego Public Library is the oldest remaining public library building in New York State still being used as a library. When the New York State Legislature chartered it on April 15, 1854, it was the second public library chartered in the entire state.² Created at the beginning of the free library movement twenty years before Carnegie began funding public libraries, it remains today as an open institution allowing everyone access to books of all types, on all subjects, and to the entire world through free Internet and computers. Today, the Oswego Public Library also offers books read on CD and award-winning and educational videos on DVD.

1. Siebert, Wilbur Henry and Albert Bushnell Hart. The Underground Railroad: from slavery to freedom. Page 127.

2. Vedder, Marion H. Letter of February 8, 1963 from University of the State of New York, Division of Library Extension.