Posted on August 31, 2019 at 8:00 AM by Sadye Scott-Hainchek

Smithsonian magazine has given us yet another reason to be grateful we live in the modern era and not the past.

During the late 1800s and early 1900s, just as public libraries were beginning to spread, some leading minds began to believe that patrons could catch illnesses from the books they borrowed.

This belief came in part from better understanding of how diseases were transmitted, but it also underscored a widespread skepticism of the idea of public libraries.

After you read the article about the "great book scare," please be sure to take comfort in the fact that wiser people did prevail.

Tagged As: History, Libraries

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