The Importance of Books Over the Years

1927 -- English language newspapers and periodicals were rarely available to the individual and distances between Europe and the U.S. (especially the American way of life) seemed very great.

1932 -- After moving to the Amstel Hotel, membership grew substantially, as did the library, which was also housed in the hotel. Some of the topical books recollected from that period include: Germany Turns The Clock Back, Slave Trader's Memoirs, Mein Kampf (in German), and the books of Pearl Buck. 

Travelers and visiting relatives and friends were tactfully pressed to leave behind their weighty literature for the Club library.  When too many books had accumulated, the extras were auctioned to members at three-year intervals.

Helen Goudschmidt never returned to live in Holland, but knowing of the need and love for books, Helena gave the Club a subscription to the Book-of-the-Month Club for a number of years after the war.

After the Germans entered Amsterdam, Goering was in the Amstel Hotel where the Club library was still kept. Carolyn Korthals-Altes took a daily walk past the hotel to see whether the Nazi flag was still hanging there. When its absence indicated that Goering had left, she went inside and asked for the books. The hotel had saved them in a locked cabinet which the management had said belonged to a private club and for which the Germans didn't have the key. Upon her request, the man at the desk said, "the sooner you get them out, the better." The library was rescued.  Its contents were pure gold in the years of literary drought to come, and it would be years before it received any additions.

In the Club year 1957-'58, arrangements were made for monthly Friday afternoon meetings at the American Library on Museumplein. In exchange for the privilege of meeting there, the Club agreed to provide voluntary library workers. Special programs were a regular part of the afternoon, presented by guest speakers and occasionally by members. Tea was served by the Social Committee and cookies were donated by members. 

1969-'70 --  The library of approximately 1,000 hardcovers faced the loss of its home at the Nederland-Amerika Institute which was moving to another location in the following year.

The library books were now privately housed and brought to and from meetings by the Library Chairman.

Five years later, the Onze Kamer chairman was custodian of the books, the function of Librarian having disappeared from the roster.