Sioux City Library System a University for Hundreds

Hundred thousand volumes of every class of books printed
gives adequate facilities for education of all who desire it.

THE Sioux City library system consists of the main library, which is located at Sixth and Jackson streets, seven branches and three deposit statons. The branch libraries are opened at certain hours during the day for the lending of books in charge of one of the members from the general staff. The deposit stations have a supply of books in charge of someone who has assumed charge of the books. These are changed every few days for a new supply.

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These branch libraries and the deposit stations prove of great advantage to the people living too far away from the main library to use it as they would like to. The deposit stations fill a like place except that they are usually in places where the persons who use them do so because they are handy, thus stimulating reading and studying.

The main library is now housed in a brick structure erected in 1912, the gift of Andrew Carnegie. Previous to this it had been in the City Building at Sixth and Douglas streets. There is a public reading room, a reference room, children's room, loan room, conference

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rooms, offices of the staff, a museum and an auditorium which is placed at the disposal of various organizations for meetings. There is 8,000 feet of shelves of books in this building.

The reading room is supplied with over 400 magazines and newspapers, over 300 of which are kept from year to year in bound volumes for reference. This is one of the most popular rooms in the library, many people dropping in to spend a few hours without even registering. Perhaps many a valuable hour is spent there that might otherwise be spent on the streets loafing or in some underisable environment.

The reference room contains over 1,500 volumes which are for use in the building. These include such works as encyclopedias, dictionaries, bound magazines, history sets, handbooks, rand other works of this nature. Three general encyclopedias as well as numerous others on such subjects as religion, art, medicine and others are to be found here. This room is used extensively by college and school children who are getting additional data on their particular subjects.

The adult department contains about 40,000 volumes which may be borrowed. There is a pamphlet collection of 4,000 and a collection of government documents numbering over 7,000 which are available to the public.

Among some of the popular series in this department are the Harvard Classics, Alexander Hamilton Institute books, LaSalle Extension University books and the International Correspondence Schools series. These books alone would make a library from which a man could obtain a liberal education for himself.

The children's room contains over 5,000 books for children. This room is equipped with small sized chairs, tables and desks for the comfort of the little ones who use it. Librarians are in charge of this department who understand the needs of children and who can advise parents on what the children should read and the order in which they should read. There are also pictures and magazines especially for children in this room.

One of the greatest and most important advances in library work within the last few years is the library hospital service. This plan originated in Sioux City and has spread all over the country. The plan is an outgrowth of the war when thousands of books were loaned to the sick and wounded in camps. A collection of several hundred books has been placed in each of the seven hospitals of the city, the county home and the county jail. The hospital library has charge of these, going from one hospital to another seeing that new books are furnished as needed.

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Modern Hotels Help Make Sioux City a Convention City

From thirty to fifty conventions entertained in the city every year-many of national importance.

EVERY year Sioux City is becoming a bigger convention city with from 30 to 50 annually, varying in size from a small conference to conventions with 2,000 attendance. The three controlling factors of a convention city are hotels, meeting halls and railroad facilities. Without all of these no city can even hope to get a convention of any importance.

Sioux City has available over 2,000 modern hotel rooms, and in emergencies has housed many more people. In addition to five first class and modern in every respect hotels, there are numerous smaller hotels with lower rates but excellent service and accommodations. These smaller places play their part in any large convention. The Martin, West, Jackson, Chicago House and Howard are hotels that have stood back of conventions here for many years. They have made special arrangements to handle crowds when necessary.

For smaller conventions the spacious ballroom of the Martin, the quarters of the Chamber of Commerce and other club rooms offer ideal meeting places. The hotels, clubs, churches and restaurants join hands when a large convention is in session and .take a share of the responsibility of feeding and housing the delegates. The Auditorium was built several years ago for public meetings and conventions of various kinds. It has a seating capacity of 1,700 and is ideally located in the business part of the city for conventions.

The Chamber of Commerce is greatly interested in conventions and makes an effort to get any convention of which it has a chance and of which local organizations are interested. The city is wonderfully located for conventions, embodying the three surrounding states or the entire northwestern territory. Train service to various portions of this section of the country is good and attendance is usually excellent. Such organizations as the Tri-State Editorial Association find it convenient to hold their meetings in Sioux City annually. The membership comes from Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota. All are within easy reach of Sioux City.

Sioux City is noted for her hospitality and her treatment of convention delegates. These things, coupled with the fact that it is an interesting city with numerous interesting things to see, makes it a city where people want to come.

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Woodbury County Court House
W. L. Steele, Architect

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Sioux City Office Buildings Make Towering Skyline

Well trained and skilled professional men help fill the giant office
buildings which contain modernly equipped offices
and laboratories.

IN the daily life of any city, the professional men play an important part. Sioux City has become the center of medical practice for the territory. With her ample hospitals, trained doctors and dentists, many of whom are nationally and state known specialists, and well equipped laboratories, Sioux City gives medical attention to hundreds of thousands of people. There are over 100 physicians and surgeons practicing in the city. They come from medical schools and clinic hospitals in all parts of the world. Their skill is shown by the fact that people suffering with ailments come from hundreds of miles for treatment. That Sioux City ranks first in the state from the health standpoint shows what these professional lmen do towards public health.

At the present time there are over 70 practicing dentists. Most of them are in the most modernly equipped dental offices in the country. The men themselves are trained experts in their line and men who give freely of their time for public work both of a civic nature and of a health nature. Their practice is not confined to the city as all of them count their patients from the smaller towns in the territory.

Over 150 lawyers, a number of architects and engineers and other professional men occupy these office buildings and do their share in making the city an important business city. Too many people in the whirl of business forget for the moment that the professional men are an inseparable part of the city's business. They are the balancing factors which permit the smooth operation of business.

These office buildings are beautiful buildings so located and so constructed as to give the greatest amount of office space with good light and air and yet be close to the business activities of the city. Such buildings as the Frances, Davidson, Trimble, Grain Exchange, Warnock, Security, Farmers Loan and Trust, Metropolitan, Iowa, United Bank, Commerce and other office buildings,are the scenes of millions of dollars in business transactions daily.

Sioux City has general agency offices for practically all the larger and better known companies. The Conservative Life Insurance Co. is a Sioux City institution with home offices and officers here. They have built up a large business in Sioux City and the territory, competing equally with larger and older companies.

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