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Virginia Mathews

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Virginia Winslow Hopper Mathews (March 9, 1925 – May 7, 2011) was a literacy advocate and author. Mathews, the daughter of American Indian author John Joseph Mathews, co-founded the American Indian Library Association (AILA). She also helped develop Sesame Street while serving as a consultant to Children's Television Workshop, and she promoted activities to support literacy through libraries[1]

Virginia Mathews
Mathews in 1978
Born
Virginia Hopper Mathews

(1925-03-09)March 9, 1925
New York City, New York, U.S.
DiedMay 7, 2011(2011-05-07) (aged 86)
Central Pennsylvania, U.S.
Resting place
Machpelah Presbyterian Cemetery
CitizenshipOsage Nation
American
Occupations
  • Writer
  • librarian
FatherJohn Joseph Mathews
RelativesJohn Hopper Mathews (brother)

Early life and education

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Virginian H. Mathews was born on March 9, 1925, the first child of John Joseph Mathews and Virginia Winslow Hopper, in Manhattan. Her younger brother John Hopper Mathews was born in August the next year. John Joseph left the family in 1928.[2] Virginia did not see her father again until February 1939.[3] In the 1950s, they reconnected and grew closer.[4]

Matthews was a member of the Osage Nation.[5] Mathews graduated from the Beard School (now Morristown-Beard School) in Orange, NJ in 1942. After high school, she took college courses at Goucher College, the University of Geneva, and Columbia University.[6] In 2004, Morristown-Beard School awarded Mathews their Distinguished Alumni Award.[7]

Career

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Mathews wrote reviews of children's books for The New York Herald Tribune and The New York Times. She also served as Deputy Director and then Director of the National Book Committee. The committee selected the National Book Awards and promoted public literacy during a 14-year period (1957 to 1974). Mathews's work with the National Book Committee to promote reading also helped created National Library Week.[8] The Library of Congress now houses Mathews papers from her time working at the National Book Committee.[9]

After leaving the National Book Committee, Mathews worked for the Center for the Book at the Library of Congress.

She then worked with the National Commission on Libraries and Information Science to organize the 1979 and 1991 White House Conferences on Library and Information Services as well as the Preconference on Indian Library & Information Services.She was responsible for the inclusion of Title IV for Indian libraries into the LSCA Reauthorization, 1984.[10][11] She also assessed the impact of the conferences in 2004.[12]

Mathews also helped develop the American Library Association's collaborations with Head Start.[9] She was a founder of the American Indian Library Association.[13]

During the 1960s, Mathews created the children's TV series Reading Out Loud with Westinghouse Broadcasting executive Mike Santangelo. Produced by Westinghouse for syndication, the show featured notable figures reading aloud their favorite books to children. It debuted in February 1960 on the five TV stations owned by Westinghouse in Baltimore, Boston, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and San Francisco.[14] Reading Out Loud also opened on WNTA-TV (now WNET-TV) in New York City and 46 educational TV stations around the U.S. It ran as a half-hour show for 15 episodes.[15] Reading Out Loud featured guest appearances by:[16]

Personal life and death

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Mathews was a lesbian and lived with her longtime partner, Virginia "Ginny" B. Huie (1920–2008). Her mother's sister, Phyllis Hopper, was also a lesbian and had dated Ginny before Mathews. Mathews died on May 7, 2011, in Central Pennsylvania and was buried in the Machpelah Presbyterian Cemetery next to Ginny.[13][17]

Honors and legacy

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In 1965, the Women's National Book Association awarded Mathews the WNBA Book Award.[18] The American Indian Library Association awarded Mathews their Distinguished Service to Indian Libraries Award in 1993.

In 1994 Mathews was awarded American Library Association Honorary Membership.

The Association for Library Service to Children awarded Mathews a Distinguished Service Award in 1995.[8]

In 2012, the American Indian Library Association named its library school scholarship after her.[19]

Mathews' papers relating to her work as director, National Book Committee, Deputy Director, National Library Week, and consultant, Library of Congress Center for the Book are at the Library of Congress.[20]

Selected publications

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  • Lacy, Dan Mabry; Mathews, Virginia H. (1969). Social change and the library, 1945-1980. Washington, D.C.: United States Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education.
  • Mathews, Virginia H.; Lacy, Dan (1970). Response to change: American libraries in the seventies, Issues 1-7. Indiana State Library.
  • Mathews, Virginia H. (1975). Continuing Adult Education and Indian Libraries. National Indian Education Association.
  • Mathews, Virginia H. (1978). Libraries for Today and Tomorrow: How Do We Pay for Them? Who Uses Them? Who Staffs Them? What are Their Services?. Doubleday. ISBN 0385055641.
  • Libraries, Aids to Life Satisfaction for Older Women: A 1981 White House Conference on the Aging Background Paper (1981)
  • The Parent and Child Services Program: a 1995 sourcebook on parent and child projects (1995)
  • Mathews, Virginia H. (1996). Kids Can't Wait -- Library Advocacy Now!: A President's Paper. Chicago: American Library Association.
  • Mathews, Virginia H. (2004). Libraries, Citizens & Advocacy: The Lasting Effects of Two White House Conferences on Library and Information Services. Center for the Book, Library of Congress / White House Conference on Library and Information Services Taskforce.

References

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  1. ↑ .Beaudin, Janice (1998). "Virginia Mathews Interviewed by Janice Beaudin". In McCook, Kathleen de la Peña (ed.). Women of Color in Librarianship: An Oral History. Chicago: American Library Association. pp. 61–78. ISBN 0838979939.
  2. ↑ Snyder 2017, p. 64.
  3. ↑ Snyder 2017, p. 75-76.
  4. ↑ Snyder 2017, p. 78.
  5. ↑ "Virginia H. Mathews Papers: A Finding Aid to the Collection in the Library of Congress" (PDF). Library of Congress. 2018. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
  6. ↑ Snyder 2017, p. 81.
  7. ↑ Distinguished Alumni: 2004 - Virginia Hopper Mathews - 1942 Archived 2014-06-06 at the Wayback Machine "Virginia has been on an ongoing crusade for literacy since her graduation from the Beard School. She has served as a project director including the US Department of Education, the Endowments for both Arts and Humanities as well as the Department for Health and Human Services, the Department of the Interior, the Office of Economic Opportunity and the Library of Congress. Never forgetting her American Indian roots, Virginia also took part in the First White House Conference on Libraries and Information Services in 1979, fighting for funds for libraries on Indian reservations. Her passion for children's education led her to serve as a consultant in the early stages of Sesame Street's development and to write the Sesame Street Parent Guide."
  8. 1 2 Council of the American Library Association (2011), Memorial Resolution Honoring Virginia Mathews (PDF), Proceedings of the American Library Association, New Orleans, Louisiana: ALA, archived from the original (PDF) on 3 December 2013
  9. 1 2 Duty, Shannon Shaw (11 June 2009). "Mathew's manuscripts on literacy sent to the U.S. Library of Congress". Osage News. Archived from the original on 19 July 2013. Retrieved 25 January 2014.
  10. ↑ Bach, Shir (November 17, 2022). "Intern Spotlight: Libraries, Self-Determination, and Collaboration: Virginia Mathews and the 1978 White House Preconference on Indian Library & Information Services". Unfolding History. Library of Congress. Retrieved April 14, 2026.
  11. ↑ White House Conference on Library and Information Services. 1991. Washington D.C. Conference.
  12. ↑ Mathews, Virginia H., Center for the Book., and White House Conference on Library and Information Services Task Force. Libraries, Citizens & Advocacy: The Lasting Effects of Two White House Conferences on Library and Information Services /. White House Conference on Library and Information Taskforce, 2004.
  13. 1 2 Snyder 2017, p. 82.
  14. ↑ "Back to Books?". Time. Vol. 75, no. 7. February 15, 1960. p. 69.
  15. ↑ Nixon, Guy (2011). Finding Your Native American Ancestors. pp. 182–184.
  16. ↑ Crosby, John (February 1, 1960). "Television and Radio". The Sarasota Herald-Tribune.
  17. ↑ Beverly Goldberg (2011). "Children's Services Champion Virginia Mathews Dies". American Libraries (May/June). Archived from the original on 2014-12-16. Retrieved 2014-06-03.
  18. ↑ "WNBA Book Award".
  19. ↑ American Indian Library Association names scholarship in honor of Virginia Mathews
  20. ↑ "Virginia H. Mathews Papers". Manuscript Division. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress. 1897–1991. MSS85459. Retrieved April 14, 2026.

Works cited

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  • Snyder, Michael (2017). John Joseph Mathews: Life of an Osage Writer. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 978-0-8061-5609-5.
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