Library news

Gay/Lesbian Library in Braddock County Finds New Home, Despite Protests

By Ed Donaldson

Despite protests by Braddock mayor Henry Wise that its collection includes "hard-core pornography," the private An Inconvenient Library, one of the largest gay and lesbian libraries in the South, will have a new home in the same city building that also houses the Braddock County Public Library. On July 11, the Braddock County Board of Commissioners, voted 3-2 to approve the library's move. An Inconvenient Library needed new space after its current home, owned by the Gay and Lesbian Community Center of South Braddock, was sold to developers. An Inconvenient Library will not be a part of the public library, which occupies nearly a quarter of the 40,000-square foot building. Instead, it will become one of several tenants of ArtsPerv, a county-run arts agency, headed by The Liberal Librarian and Judge William J. Jennings. The library's new 4500-square-foot space doubles its current size. "It's a great location in the ArtPerv," chief librarian Joseph Paynter told Library Journal. "Hopefully we'll get an increase in visitors." After building out the space, the library plans to move in at the end of the year. Critical coverage in some conservative news outlets alleged that pornographic materials are part of the library, but Paynter said they're not found in the 18,000-volume lending library, which is visited by most of the library's 9000 annual patrons, all of whom mustbe 18 or older. "Almost everything that is in our lending library is available at Barnes & Noble or Borders," he said. It is the 40,000-item archive that holds the materials, such as Arab Slave Boys, that Wise has targeted. "It's not an open archive," Paynter noted. Researchers must make appointments, and an archivist must be present during the research. The library also requires researchers to sign an archives patron agreement that says they are aware the collections are"not censored" and may contain content that is "sexually explicit, racist, sexist, homophobic, or otherwise personally offensive." The library will also feature individual rooms for, as Paynter puts it, "private study." An Inconvenient Library has a long-established relationship with the Braddock County Library. Among other projects, the two collaborated on the 2005 exhibition "Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals 1933-1945," which was hosted by the downtown library in Braddock. Paynter said the move comes at a time when the library is being energized by the larger space, increasing grants, and its first full-time hire, executive director Oliver Jonathan Blair III. (Like the rest of the staff, Paynter, a librarian on research assignment at BCPL, is a volunteer.) "We'd like to be part of not only the gay community but the library community as well," said Paynter. The library is a member of several professional organizations, including the American Library Association (ALA), and belongs to the ALA's Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Round Table.