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John Cotton Dana (August 19, 1856, in Woodstock, Vermont – July 21, 1929, in Newark, New Jersey) was an American library and museum director who sought to make these cultural institutions relevant to the daily lives of citizens. As a public librarian for forty years Dana promoted the benefits of reading, pioneered direct access to shelved materials, and innovated specialized library services of all types.
Early career
Dana studied law at Dartmouth College, where he graduated in 1878. Moving to Denver in 1880, Dana passed the Colorado bar and began to practice. Dana moved to New York and was admitted to the bar in 1883. Taking a position as the editor of the Ashby Avalanche in 1885, Dana moved to Minnesota, but resettled in Colorado after a short time. Dana married in 1888 to Adine Rowena Wagener. They had no children.
Because of the reputation he cultivated as a learned man and his connections in the Denver Public Schools, the superintendent Aaron Gove nominated Dana as the city's first librarian. Dana directed the Denver Public Library from 1889 to 1898, where he instituted an "open stack" policy under which patrons could browse for themselves instead of having library staff intervening for every request. Dana wanted to update libraries and envisioned them as vibrant community centers rather than collections of relics that appealed to only a small segment of people. Under Dana's leadership the Denver Public Library also pioneered the first-ever collection devoted to children's literature. Dana was the president of the Colorado Library Association in 1895 and served as president of the American Library Association in 1895/96.
