J i LOUHHULLE FREE PUBLHZLLBRARY
was the answer: an institution where nothing
`* would be charged for the use of books; where
\ rich and poor alike could go for information
y and enjoyment.(2)
P The instrument Durrett fashioned for the
\_ materialization of his vision was dazzlingly
spectacular and the machinery for contriving it
was, of necessity, elaborate; yet the device
` itself was simple and elementary in its popular
j appeal. That it became tainted subsequently
? with a suspicion of chicanery was a circum— i
it stance that did not rob the original idea of
ii its hallmark of genius.
i This time the library founders would not
{ I seek their support in driblets of funds uncer-
g 5 tain in regularity and duration. Instead, they
L would achieve it in a single splendid stroke of
i ‘ financial generalship. The device would appeal
e at once to altruistic motives of public service
and mercenary prospects of private gain. The
T orthodox laws of economics could be hurdled,
f and those of morality were flexible enough for
l such an enterprise——a lottery.
‘ Now from earliest times the lottery had been
a popular means of raising money and, for at
least the first forty years of the Union, had
` . been an eminently arespectable means. To it
churches, schools, libraries, roads, and other
` public and private institutions have owed their
\ ‘ existence. Eaneuil Hall in Boston, the "Cradle
l } of Liberty," was financed by one; the wheel of
[ fortune was used in Puritan New England to
eliminate church debts, and the same method
/ aided Yale, Harvard, and Princeton in their
; early days. George Washington was interested
N i in the lottery which financed construction of
/ _ 22
i
T1
"~'?'\`i·~*— .  , . ,. . ., . ..__-. _ . W