More Words, Deeper Hole

I do know the first publicly funded library was in Peterborough, NH (also the supposed origin town of "Our Town"). The little library in our village of Auburn, NH, is still called the Griffin Free Public Library as it was a typical "private" library (funded by the Griffin family, not the town), and then was turned over to the town in the 1960s to be publicly funded. (I was a library trustee in the village -- an interesting time indeed. We still had an outhouse out back of the library then: no joke.)