CHAPTER 5
THE NAVAL LIBRARY SYSTEM
This chapter was based on information available to the writer at the time
the text was written. It is anticipated that significant changes in the
administration of the general library system are forthcoming. Current
instructions should be consulted and followed. The information in this
chapter will be revised, if necessary, when permanent changes have been
issued by the Chief of Naval Operations.
The Navy’s General Library Program provides
afloat and ashore libraries with an inventory of books.
The first ship’s library was placed aboard the warship
USS FRANKLIN in 1812 just before the FRANKLIN
sailed for a 3-year cruise of the Pacific. Upon the return
of the ship, the books remaining in the collection became
the nucleus of the Seaman’s Library at the Brooklyn
Navy Yard.
HISTORY
The shipboard libraries of that era were among the
first projects sponsored by Navy chaplains to improve
the social and moral conditions of naval personnel.
Similarly, the promotion of learning was among one of
the chaplain’s earliest collateral duties. One chaplain
serving aboard a ship during this period wrote of “forty
men aboard who could read poorly or not at all.”
Since 1828, when the Navy assumed official
responsibility for provision of shipboard libraries from
appropriated funds, the Navy’s General Library
Program has been an important factor in meeting
educational, information, communication, professional,
and recreational needs of commands and individual
personnel.
Figure 5-1 shows a shipboard library around 1898.
Compare the view of the shipboard general library of
1898 with that shown in figure 5-2 of a shipboard library
on a modern warship in today’s Navy.
Despite
variations, the purpose of the shipboard library remains
very much the same. As wooden ships gave way to steel
ships that required extensive shore support facilities,
shore libraries were added to the Navy’s general library
system.
MISSION
The primary mission of naval general libraries
afloat is to assemble, organize, preserve, and make
available to all naval personnel afloat a well-balanced,
unbiased, and uncensored collection of library
materials, including print and nonprint materials as well
as accompanying library services, specifically adapted
to the interests and requirements of naval personnel, in
support of missions and tasks of commands so naval
personnel may do the following:
Educate themselves continuously
Keep pace with progress in all fields of
knowledge
Become better members of home and community
Discharge political and social obligations
Develop their creative and spiritual potentialities
Appreciate and enjoy literature, art, and music
Make use of leisure time in ways that will
promote personal and social well-being
Develop esprit de corps in the naval service
To achieve these goals, the Navy’s General Library
Program guides and supports the Navy’s general
libraries afloat and ashore.
THE NAVY’S GENERAL LIBRARY
PROGRAM
Religious Program Specialists (RPs) normally
provide library service on board aircraft carriers and
other deep-draft vessels to which they are assigned. As
an RP, you need to understand the responsibilities of
5-1
