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Americans of all ages, all stations in life, and all types of dispositions are forever forming associations… of a thousand different types — religious, moral, serious, futile, very general and very limited, immensely large and very minute … [for] the greatest number of purposes … Nothing in my view deserves more attention than the intellectual and moral associations in America (Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, [1835] 1945).

ANDREW Carnegie stands apart from all other library benefactors. No other man has given so much, or given so widely, in the cause of library progress. Although the United Kingdom was not the main recipient of his bounty, it received from him, personally, about £12 million, and considerable sums, in addition, from the Trust which he founded. It might well be expected, therefore, that his name would always be in our minds and that we would remember him more kindly than any other library benefactor. But it is not so.