A crime against culture
At Carnegie Library, a shocking theft of rare items
The theft of more than 300 items from the Oliver rare books room of the Carnegie Library in Oakland is a crime against Pittsburgh, even if few people will notice the loss directly.
Libraries are integral to the cultural legacy of a city. These missing books, maps and prints hold more than monetary value. They are a depository of knowledge, part of the fabric of civilization, a gift from the past for future generations.
One rare-book dealer estimated the collective value of the missing items to be as high as $5 million, but the damage to the integrity of the collection — and the library’s reputation — is incalculable.
As the Post-Gazette’s Marylynne Pitz reported this month, an insurance appraisal in April 2017 revealed the thefts, and the library moved swiftly to close the rare books room and bring in law enforcement. Detectives from the Allegheny County district attorney’s office working the case went public last month by notifying the Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America, seeking its members’ help in tracking down the missing items.
This world has its code of honor, but it is also vulnerable to deception. The provenance of antiquarian objects, which don’t carry serial numbers, can be obscured by their very nature. The Carnegie Library has made careful public statements, which is understandable as the investigation is underway. But it’s hard to imagine that this is a case of an amateur thief. “We’re very saddened by the breach of trust. This theft occurred over an extended period of time,” said library spokeswoman Susan Thinnes, by a knowledgeable individual or individuals. The staff member who oversaw the room is no longer employed by the library.
The dark side of bibliomania sometimes makes its way into the news. Stephen Carrie Blumberg went to prison in the 1990s for a long-running crime that netted him more than 20,000 objects worth some $5 million. He deluded himself into thinking he was a better guardian of the precious goods. John Charles Gilkey, the subject of “The Man Who Loved Books Too Much,” thought that a fine book collection was the mark of distinction. His scam on the rare book community was thwarted by one dogged dealer, who revealed him to be a garden-variety kleptomaniac. In the Carnegie Library case, it’s too soon to determine an emotional motive. All we can see is a crime scene, and an apparent financial motive. The criminal mind, in essence, is absent a sense of right or wrong — it is just the cold calculation of what can be gotten away with, betraying trust as easily as breathing.
The Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh is inherently a public trust, with 90 percent of its annual budget from tax revenues and a vital role to play in the city. The legacy of Andrew Carnegie himself looms large. The industrialist who made his fortune here started his network of libraries in this region. “Carnegie’s free-to-the-people libraries remain Pittsburgh’s most significant cultural export,” former Post-Gazette arts writer Patricia Lowry once wrote, “a gift that has shaped the minds and lives of millions.”
The Oliver Room, while not part of the daily life of most library patrons, was a feather in the system’s cap. The trustees and leadership of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh are no doubt devastated by this breach, but must ultimately bear responsibility for having it take place on their watch.