This is an excerpt from a speech delivered by George Peabody, after whom our city and our Library is named.  He gave this speech at the dedication of the Peabody Institute in Baltimore (now the Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University).  

Peabody announced his endowment of the Institute in 1857, but bureaucratic arguments and delays pushed the construction of the project to 1861.  Then, as Peabody’s biographer notes, “the opening of the Institute had to be postponed until 1866 because the trustees were divided into hostile camps during the Civil War.  Thirteen had been loyal to the Union, while ten had supported the Confederacy…Thus, sectional and political differences had almost wrecked the institute before it was opened, and though the war was over, bitterness among the trustees continued.”

Thus, it was up to George Peabody to set the tone for the institute with his speech, and find a way to unite people who, quite literally, had not sat together in the same room for over half a decade.  In his speech, Peabody said:

When War came I saw no hope for America except in Union victory.  but I could not, in the passion of war, turn my back on my Southern friends.  I believed extremists on both sides guilty of fomenting the conflict.  Now I am convinced more than ever of the necessity for mutual forbearance and conciliation…of united effort to bind up the wounds of our nation…To you, therefore, I make probably the last appeal I shall ever make.  May not this Institute be a common ground, where all may meet, burying former differences and animosities…to make the future of our country prosperous and glorious.

George Peabody was a remarkable man: one of the richest men in the world who never, ever forgot what it meant to go hungry.  A man who was the guest of kings and presidents, but dedicated his life to educating and housing the poor and the otherwise forgotten.  And we can do nothing better to honor his memory than by heeding his plea.

So let me make this clear: The Library is a safe space.  A common ground.  Everyone is welcome here.  You are welcome here.  And you are safe here.  That, above all things, is never going to change.

If you need help, whether it’s finding a book or borrowing a pencil, or something more complicated, please let us know.  That is, quite literally, why we are here.  For you.  And to make the future better.

Our task is not to bring order out of chaos, but to get work done in the midst of chaos.
~George Peabody~