Steve Reidburn will speak on the history of Fort Seward at the next Front Porch Chat at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Stutsman County memorial Museum.
Daphne Drewello, director of the James River Valley Library System and head librarian at the Alfred Dickey Library, spoke on the history of the library at the June 13 chat. She said Jamestown has always been "a very library-friendly town."
Originally Fort Seward offered its library one evening a week to the residents of Jamestown.
The first library was a fee-based library at the Gladstone Hotel, where $2 a year entitled men only to its use.
A reading room was attempted in 1883 and 1888 by the women of the community but was not funded by the city council.
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Alfred Dickey came to the rescue with the offer to build a free reading room.
Drewello read one of her favorite quotes from Dickey taken from a letter he had written to his son in 1901. "I have been looking at these half-grown boys and girls running at large with no place to go and nothing to do but get demoralized, until I can not stand it without trying to do something that will help the situation a little."
He offered to fund and supply a free reading room. Unfortunately, Dickey died three days later. However, his son honored his father's wishes and the reading room became a reality. In 1909 it was moved to city hall and became a public enterprise supported by taxes. It became a circulating library in January of 1904.
In 1917 the Methodist church sold its parsonage and building, the new Alfred Dickey Free Library was begun and completed in 1919. In 1980 the building was officially entered into the National Register of Historic Places.
Drewello also spoke about the future and the joining of the Dickey and Stutsman County libraries. Many sites have been explored but found to be unsuitable in one way or another. Currently, the Innovis Clinic site is being considered. When the site has been confirmed the public will be asked to vote on funding a new library building.
