Free for All: The Public Library | movie | 2025 | Official Trailer - video Dailymotion

The story of the quiet revolutionaries who made a simple idea of a public library happen. From the pioneering women behi | dG1fNjFvdThGMG5YSTA

Transcript

00:00That moment when you pick your first book.

00:05The kids sort of, you mean I can take it home?

00:08You must say you're on a very nice little establishment here.

00:13Then don't be such a stranger.

00:15As soon as they think of a library, they think, quiet.

00:19You know, it's supposed to be quiet in the library.

00:22Well, if they come here, it's not quiet.

00:24My philosophy is that I'm throwing a party

00:29every day and everybody is invited to the party.

00:32This is not the old maid stereotype.

00:37Public libraries reflect what's going on.

00:41The library of all public institutions in America,

00:44we are the most trusted place.

00:46The United States built up a great network of public libraries.

00:51They were designed by men and they were built by men.

00:54But it was the women that gave these buildings meaning.

00:57And there's something spectacularly American that this information was available to everybody.

01:05In a nation where literacy was the line between citizen and slave,

01:11there is no greater place to me in the world than a library.

01:16For the first time ever, the Carnegie Library System says it's shutting down branches.

01:23We didn't realize how dire the situation was.

01:26As of right now, the Douglas County Library System is closing.

01:29Kind of saddened. Our libraries are going away.

01:32Why public libraries? Why do we need a library? Everything's going to be online.

01:37We need them because we care about learning and we care about knowledge and we need to express that together.

01:43Our country is divided.

01:45That means that we need to offer all points of view and be the people who bring people together.

01:51In a time that people are needing a safe place, public libraries are there.

01:58The public library is one of the purest expressions of the possibility of democracy in America.

02:05You see it in many Carnegie libraries. It's on the threshold or on the frees above. Free for all.

02:11Public resource. How amazing is that? Right at your fingertips. Right in your neighborhood. And free.

02:20Why would you pay?

02:30adulation.

02:32Leave.

02:35I don't think you got.

02:41I feel like I'm saying you think that hopefully does anything for a little bit.