David McCullough Quotes

One of the most subversive institutions in the United States is the public library.

More people should use their library.

The point of a library's existence is not persuasion or evangelism, but knowledge. It is irrelevant to the good library whether, as an institution, it shares or promotes your core values or mine, or the Attorney General's or Saddam Hussein's. The library is always an instrument of choice, and the choice is always yours, not your elected or designated leaders.

In my world there would be as many public libraries as there are Starbucks.

With a public library card in your hand, you have access to the Internet and a world of opportunities.

In my view, investing in public libraries is an investment in the nation's future.

Our libraries are not cloisters for an elite. They are for the people, and if they are not used, the fault belongs to those who do not take advantage of their wealth.

Public libraries have been a mainstay of my life. They represent an individual's right to acquire knowledge; they are the sinews that bind civilized societies the world over. Without libraries, I would be a pauper, intellectually and spiritually.

... the more we recruit from immigrants who bring no personal traditions with them, the more America is going to ignore the things of the spirit. No one whose consuming desire is either for food or for motor-cars is going to care about culture, or even know what it is.

Our concern for the future can be tested by how well we support our libraries.

I think the public library system is one of the most amazing American institutions. Free for everybody. If you ever get the blues about the status of American culture there are still more public libraries than there are McDonald's. During the worst of the Depression not one public library closed their doors.

Libraries hold the wisdom of the world and the stories of the ages - available to everyone, free of charge!

Libraries are community treasure chests, loaded with a wealth of information available to everyone equally, and the key to that treasure chest is the library card. I have found the most valuable thing in my wallet is my library card.

I am a public library

Public libraries are our great teachers and storytellers, and are a vital adjunct to our schools. In this day of standardized and homogenized education, a library offers individual and personalized learning opportunities second to none.

Libraries are a hallmark of a civilized culture, and librarians represent that culture to all facets of society.

If you cut funding to libraries, you cut the lifeblood of our communities.

Public libraries are the last vestige of public free space.

Libraries are fun, educational, and the biggest bargain on the face of the earth.

Katie commented that Americans had lost the ability to enjoy themselves. "We watch television," Dave said.

For me, closing libraries is the equivalent of eating your seed corn to save a little money.

To encourage literature and the arts is a duty which every good citizen owes to his country.

A public that tries to do without criticism, and asserts that it knows what it wants or likes, brutalizes the arts and loses its cultural memory. Art for art's sake is a retreat from criticism which ends in an impoverishment of civilized life itself.

I think globalization actually maintains and fosters various elements of national and cultural identities. I don't think everything is being homogenized. If anything, your food, your culture, and your ethnicity might become part of the globalized world, and thus absorbed by other countries.

What in the world would we do without our libraries?