Above the noise and the hubbub of downtown Cincinnati sits an unlikely book-lover’s paradise. Turn onto Walnut Street, pass the bus station and tobacco shop, go through the revolving doors of a nondescript building into a cool, marble lobby. A sign by the elevator says:
The Prettiest Library You Can Imagine is Just Upstairs.
Take the elevator to the eleventh floor, and you will feel as if you have traveled into another world. One of leather couches, marble statues, antique portraits, and endless, endless bookshelves. Welcome to the Mercantile Library. Their motto is, fittingly, You Belong Here.
The Cincinnati Mercantile Library, known affectionately as The Merc, is a historic library located in the heart of downtown Cincinnati. Open to the public (although you need to be a member to check out books) they have been serving readers, writers, and thinkers since their establishment in 1835. The historical institution remains a focal point of the local literary community, hosting book clubs, public readings, and currently, a family of peregrine falcons that have made a nest on the building’s arches. Seriously, your favorite classic author could not have written it better.
We arrive at 11 a.m. for a tour with their Librarian and Collector, Cedric.
When the Mercantile Library was founded, public libraries had not yet come into existence. In their place were private member libraries associated with a specific industry. “These early libraries were all tied to this zeitgeist of self-improvement,” Cedric says. “The idea was that if you were a well-rounded, more humanistically educated person, you would be better at your profession.”
Most of these private libraries can be traced back to the Library Company of Philadelphia, of which Benjamin Franklin was a founding member. Affluent businessmen were traveling to Europe, buying books in London and Paris, and creating a collection that they wanted to share with their peers.
“Our library was founded by 45 members of Cincinnati’s emerging merchant class, and they were very self-conscious about a lack of higher education, so when they traveled to Philadelphia or New York, they saw these Mercantile libraries for members of the mercantile profession, and they started this place on that same model,” Cedric says.
In 1835 the 45 founders rented a room above a firehouse and began buying books and subscribing to newspapers from around the world, guided by a vision of collective self-improvement. In the hopes of establishing it as a serious place of study, fiction wasn’t allowed in the collection until 1858
In 1840, they moved into the Cincinnati College Building. “[Cincinnati College] was one of the first institutions of higher learning west of the Alleghenies,” Cedric says. “So having the Mercantile library on the site of a small college was a very natural partnership.” Unfortunately, the Cincinnati College Building burnt down soon after, leaving the Merc homeless and costing them much of their collection.
It is a testament to the success of the local merchant industry that only five years later, the 45 were able to raise the $10,000 needed to rebuild, this time on the current site on Walnut Street. Not only that, but they secured an incredible deal on rent. In exchange for the $10,000 to rebuild, the college offered them a 10,000-year lease. “The person who negotiated the lease is believed to be Alphonso Taft, William Howard Taft’s father,” Cedric says.
Thanks to Alphonso, The Merc has 9,822 years to go before they need to start looking for new accommodations.
That lease is also one of the primary reasons the Merc has been able to remain in existence. “As real estate prices went up in urban centers across the country, we weren’t affected because of this amazing lease,” Cedric says. While most other specialized libraries were absorbed into the public libraries movement of the 1850s or institutions of higher learning, the Merc was able to stay uniquely itself through endowments from its members and the luxury of not having to worry about rising rent.
In the 1850s, the library’s board sought to identify their most circulated book in an effort to better appeal to their members. But rather than the kind of educational, business-enhancing tract they imagined for their readers, they discovered the biography of a popular actress. “The board realized these young men were not reading the biography of this actress for practical information,” Cedric laughs.
From there the reforms came quickly. “We expanded to purchasing fiction, which a lot of patrons were afraid would rot people’s minds,” Cedric says. In addition, women became non-voting members of the library in the 1860s and the Merc gained its first Black member, Peter H. Clark, whose portrait now hangs in the library.
It was an exciting time for the library, one in which commerce was booming, information traveled faster than ever before, and new ideas and debates blossomed between the bookshelves. It was in this environment that, across the street from the library, a young man named Samuel Clemens was setting type for a printer that published guides to the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. Young Sam would go on to write one of the most famous river travel novels of all time under his pen name, Mark Twain.
In the center of the library, facing the entrance stands “Silencia”, the goddess of Silence. She is around seven feet tall and made of radiant white marble, the figure of a woman with her finger over her lips, hence her name. On game days in the fall, she sometimes sports a Bengals cap.
“From the beginning, the library took great interest in collecting art, a lot of which was donated by members of this wealthy merchant class,” Cedric says. “Silencia is the work of artist Joseph Mozier. He was a Philadelphia merchant who, after finding success, became a sculptor. He was working in Italy and a member of the Mercantile Library was traveling there and commissioned Mozier to make a copy of her for the library. Silencia illustrates how affluent our members were becoming at the time and how they were able to travel and accrue artwork.”
Another incredible feature of the Merc is an enormous, elaborately decorated, antique safe. “Hall’s Safe Company is actually from Cincinnati,” Cedric says. “This one has concrete in the doors, but some used to have cyanide capsules embedded in them. Nothing says Wild West like a giant safe.” While you won’t find diamonds and jewels in the Merc’s safe, amongst the dusty papers are treasures of surprising value. “I just found this when I was moving the archives,” Cedric says holding up a small stack of papers. “Inside it is George Washington’s signature.”
In addition to art collecting and accidentally housing precious historical documents, the Merc strove to be a hub of intellectual debate. “It was always considered part of the mission of the library to bring intellectuals and speakers to Cincinnati,” Cedric says. “We have a painting of Edward Everett who spoke at the library, he was a rockstar orator who was most famous for opening for Lincoln at Gettysburg. Lyman Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe were also both featured lecturers at the library.”
At a table against the back wall, Cedric opens an enormous, leather-bound book “This is my favorite thing to show people,” he says. Inside are rows of columns with people’s names written in sloping, delicate handwriting. “We have visitor logs from the library from 1870 through 1914. It’s really cool because you get a sense of who is visiting the library, where they are coming from, and who introduced them. Ralph Waldo Emerson is in here, he came as a speaker. Arthur Sullivan of Gilbert and Sullivan is in here. Being part of an institution that has handwritten, primary source records really connects you with history in a way you don’t get in a lot of places anymore. We’ve had people contact us who found their ancestors in the visitor log.”
Amy, the Merc’s Head of Events leans over from her desk as we’re peering over the pages. “I don’t allow myself to look at those too often because you just fall down a rabbit hole,” she says. “Once I found someone from my hometown who lived one street over from where I grew up.”
In addition to the visitor’s log, The Merc keeps the minutes from meetings dating back to the 1800s. “A lot of the debates were on issues like, ‘how many books do we buy? How much money do we spend?’ It’s another handwritten record, and so it really allows you to get a sense of the personalities of the people involved,” Cedric says. “Here’s a fun example that was found by an intern we had years ago. It says ‘Meeting commenced, libations were taken and then a spirited debate commenced as to why the elevator operator, who is a Civil War veteran and has a wooden leg, is so grumpy all the time. Is it because he’s got termites in his wooden leg?’”
While the majority of the minute notes are sadly wooden leg-less, they remain an important reminder of the humanity and individuality of those who came before us. When all we see are stoic faces in photographs, it can be a challenge to view our predecessors as funny, intelligent, complex individuals, with as many ambitions, ideas, and nuances as we ourselves possess.
Another staple of the Merc’s expansive collection is, of course, their oldest book. “When I came to the library 18 years ago we were telling everybody it was The Prophecies of Nostradamus,” Cedric says, “This is a first-edition English translation from 1672. But I actually found a volume that’s older than this one. This is Heiroglyphica from 1614. It’s based on a manuscript that is claimed to have been found in 1000 AD on a Mediterranean island, written by Horapollo, an Egyptian priest, about symbolism.” The Merc’s copy of Hieroglyphica contains stunning illustrations of mythical beasts. Holding it truly feels like holding a piece of history in your hands.
Another special piece the library houses is a French Encyclopedia of Natural History with hand-drawn, color plates depicting images of animals. Despite the book’s old age and the practically nonexistent binding, the illustrations are stunning. “That’s part of what’s cool about old libraries. Today, visual imagery and typography have become so devalued, they’re so cheap now. But in books like this, you really get a sense of what that might have been worth and the magic of having that visual experience. It was really valuable for so much of human history.”
“I get excited about these,” Cedric says, pulling out a box with small, paper-bound booklets inside. “This is a first-American-edition publication of Charles Dickens’ novel, Dombey and Son. They were serialized, so people would subscribe to it and wait for the latest chapter to get delivered to them.” Just a few of the many hidden treasures that can be found in the stacks of old libraries.
The stacks of the library stretch over two floors. Thick rows of books rise up around you, making the space feel wonderfully mysterious. Glass floors make up the walkways on the second level.“The stacks are all original from 1905 when this building went up,” Cedric says. “Part of the magic of this place is you can find a really ancient book, but we’re also really active as a contemporary literary center.”
Whether pondering ancient tomes or hotly debating the latest Pulitzer winner, the Cincinnati Mercantile Library is a wonderful escape for anyone who loves books. For all my many words, they said it best themselves, You Belong Here.
A Note From The Writer- Thank you John, Amy, Cedric, Hillary, and the rest of the Merc staff for the baked goods, lively conversation, and endless book recommendations. Most of all, thank you for giving a stranger in a new city a place that felt like home. It means more than you know.
