The title of this piece, which was composed entirely off of my (French, elegantly linked) cuff, is not merely an allusion to the Book Mill, a charming used bookstore in Massachusetts, though it is that. I'm really just ripping them off in order to open a tribute to what has to be one of the most obscure places in my beloved New Haven: The Young Men's Institute Library.
Miss Edith grew up -- yes, Miss Edith was, once, a child -- in downtown New Haven, a mere, what, six blocks from the site of the Young Men's Institute Library. And yet she knew naught of its existence until she was in her twenties -- and her late twenties, at that. It's ridiculous, but true.
A young man, a Yale student, who was a customer of Edie's when she worked in a rare book shop, once asked Edie if she knew anything about the place. By this point, I'd noticed the sign, but knew nothing about the joint, and she was honest about this to the Yalie, who was sort of a pal of hers. "If you ever work up the nerve to go in there," she said, "Let me know what it's like."
Months later, he reported back: he'd finally gone in. "It's kind of horrible and wonderful at the same time," he said. It was, he said, a private library. He had not joined. I was left to continue my lurid imagining about what the place must be like. I had decided, on the basis of the name, and by freely interpreting the Yalie's reaction to the place, that the Young Men's Institute Library must once have been a grand place which was now reduced to being a hangout for chickenhawks and the men who enjoy their company. (Not, Miss Edith hastens to add, that she had any serious reason for thinking this would be the case.)
The Institute Library -- as its sign read -- remained pretty much a mystery to Edie until she and Notarius finally got hitched, at which point a dear friend gave them a membership as a wedding gift. It turned out to be a remarkable gift.
The Institute Library -- which is located at 847 Chapel Street in downtown New Haven, literally a few yards from the city's Green -- turns out to be exactly as the Yalie had said. Standing almost at the corner of Chapel and Church Streets, tucked among a bunch of low-end jewelry shops and bank offices, it is horrible and wonderful at the same time. The library owns the building it's in, which is a narrow brick structure built in the 19th century: it has the high ceilings and incredibly tall windows that one expects of such buildings. You enter the Institute Library through a very unremarkable front door and immediately go up a long flight of stairs; there's a sensation not unlike how I imagine it would feel to go to the second floor office of Sam Spade or some other 1940s detective. There's no cigar smoke hanging in the air, but it wouldn't surprise you if there were. It's just that kind of space.
Basically, you've entered a time warp.
Once at the top of the stairs, you go through another set of doors, and suddenly you're in this huge, grand space, a very long room, with ludicrously high ceilings -- one's first thoughts include, "How do they heat this place?" -- and worn old tile or painted wood floors and rows and rows of books. There are two librarians, polite, sweet lady librarians, who greet you cheerfully and then leave you utterly alone until you request their assistance. And that's fine, because what you want to do is just walk around and look at the shelves.
The books in the Institute Library are not the point of joining this place. By and large, in a word, the collection is crap. But it's also completely amazing, because it's such a snapshot of what people have actually been reading for the last century. The Institute Library has never had pretenses toward being a serious research library -- no reason to, I suppose, with Yale's domineering presence only a few blocks away -- and so the Institute's collection is really centered on whatever crap its members liked to read in their down time. Additionally, the library is very, very lazy about deaccessioning. As a result, browsing the shelves is a stunning experience. You see books you heard of but had never seen a copy of. You see books you've never heard of, and never will again, but which were bestsellers in 1954 or 1978. You see copies of titles that are now absolute classics which were purchased when the title in question was brand new; in many cases, these are books which, if they weren't raddled old library copies, would be worth real money in the world of modern firsts. As it is, though, the collection is pretty much without retail value.
But part of what's remarkable about the Institute Library's collection is that, precisely because it was never intended to be a "serious" collection, the collection is, in fact, something that would be valuable to people researching American middlebrow reading habits. MLS candidates looking for a thesis topic: consider doing research on the Institute Library's collection. I can promise you there is nothing else like it anywhere.
The Institute Library has the requisite old leather chairs, worn but comfortable; the requisite massive wooden tables where you can spread out your newspaper to read; it has a no cell phones rule, too, so it's absolutely quiet even though it's in the middle of New Haven's business district. Entering the Institute Library is really like leaving this moment in time and going back to an era when things were... slower. Different from how they are now. People can go to Sturbridge Village or Colonial Williamsburg and see re-enactments of How It Was Then... or, for way less money, people can drop by the Institute Library, and take a deep breath, and slow down, for just a moment or two. Or an hour or two. For a few hours, a few days a week anyway, the weird, charming, shabby calm of the Institute can be enjoyed by anyone curious enough to walk up that old staircase.
The Institute Library is open four days a week, Monday through Thursday, from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. As of this writing, a one year membership costs a mere $25.00, and I can promise you it'd be money well spent. For a membership application, please contact the library at 203-562-4045 or drop Miss Edith a line. I'll be happy to assist you.
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