Salem Social Library

The Salem Social Library (1760-1810) or Social Library in Salem was a proprietary library in Salem, Massachusetts. "Twenty-eight gentlemen ... subscribed 165 guineas. ... A Boston minister, [Jeremy Condy], was employed to buy the books in London and the library opened in a brick schoolhouse May 20, 1761, with 415 volumes including gifts given by members. The revolution was a bitter blow to many of the gentlemen who had founded the library. Many of the proprietors fled to England. ... In 1784 the library made a new start in new quarters in the new ... schoolhouse. Here they remained about 15 years, the schoolmaster acting as librarian." "In 1797 they became incorporated;" Edward Augustus Holyoke, Jacob Ashton, Joseph Hiller, and Edward Pulling served as signatories. "There were over 40 proprietors when in 1810 the library was turned over to the [Salem] Athenaeum."

Subscribers

 * Samuel Barnard
 * Thomas Barnard
 * Samuel Barton Jr.
 * Joseph Blaney
 * Joseph Bowditch
 * William Browne
 * Francis Cabot
 * Joseph Cabot
 * S. Curwen
 * Richard Derby
 * William Eppes
 * Samuel Gardner
 * Samuel Gardner Jr.
 * Stephen Higginson
 * E.A. Holyoke
 * William Jeffry
 * Daniel King
 * John Nutting Jr.
 * A. Oliver Jr.
 * Timothy Orne
 * Benjamin Pickman
 * Benjamin Pickman Jr.
 * Ebenezer Putnam
 * William Pynchon
 * Nathaniel Ropes
 * William Vans
 * W. Walter