John Cotton Dana 1856 1929 should be a household name He started out as a reform minded librarian intent on making libraries into engines of education hence of opportunity for women workers and the business community He took a similar view of art museums The museum he established in Newark still the largest in New Jersey was planned as an alternative to institutions like the Metropolitan Museum of Art dedicated to the display of masterworks. At the Newark Museum the intrepid Dana showed copies of masterpieces just as good in his opinion installed a lending library of art shared shows with Bamberger s department store mounted exhibitions of items manufactured in New Jersey and worked with ethnic groups in Newark to organize exhibitions of native crafts At one point he mounted displays of items from five and dime stores to prove that beauty has no price The genius of the Readymade Marcel Duchamp is in Dana s debt So too are librarians museum officials and all those concerned with the Progressive legacy in America s ongoing struggle to be a democratic society A Matter of Class John Cotton Dana Progressive Reform and the Newark Museum
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