Jacob Sears Memorial Library

The town of Dennis, Massachusetts has three other libraries in addition to the Jacob Sears Memorial Library. All of them date to the economic turnaround of the 1920s, which allowed the town to begin appropriating money for village libraries. The West Dennis Free Public Library Association was organized in 1920, and the present building was constructed in 1923. The South Dennis Free Public Library was organized in 1918, replacing an earlier library association. After incorporation in 1928, the library moved into the former home of John Rose, which had been willed to the village for that purpose by Captain Jonathan Matthews (1850-1926). The Dennis Library Association dates to 1873, but its current home dates to 1924 and is dedicated to the veterans of World War I. All four village libraries have received annual support from the Town of Dennis since 1922 but have remained as independent entities. 

The origins of the East Dennis library on Quivet Neck date to 1866, when William F. Howes developed a plan for a library association. The library was initially housed in private homes until 1870, when Nathaniel Myrick donated $500. This precipitated changes in the association and a move to more permanent quarters in Worden Hall on the Old King’s Highway. Captain Prince S. Crowell made a similar donation at about the same time. While located in Worden Hall, the library collection grew to approximately one-thousand-two-hundred volumes. Circulation was initially restricted to members who paid fifty cents in annual dues. An even more generous gift from the estate of Jacob Spears provided the means for construction of a permanent, purpose-built library and memorial hall. 

Jacob Sears was born on May 5, 1823, in a house built by his father, Daniel at 66 Sea Street on Quivet Neck in 1820. Sears grew up in the area and attended the East Dennis public school on the corner of School and Center Street. Sears grew to be a very successful farmer and cranberry grower – twenty-eight cranberry bogs were cited in his 1871 will – and had business investments in shipping and railroads. He was particularly noted for development of an improved packing method that preserved more cranberries from shipping damage. 

Sears married the girl who lived next door to his family, Olive Frances Kelley, the daughter of Stillman Kelley, partner in a large fleet of fishing vessels that operated from a dock on Sesuit Harbor’s eastern side. Kelley retired from the sea in 1849, when he moved to East Dennis and opened a wharf-side store. Jacob Sears and Olive Kelley married on April 29, 1860 and Olive moved into the Sears family home at 66 Sea Street, which was less than a mile away from the library.  

Sears was distrustful of the new school system that was emerging in the 1860s, which replaced fourteen one-room schoolhouses with five larger graded schools, one in each of Dennis’s five smaller villages. Specifically, Sears mourned the loss of the old district school on Quivet Neck that he had attended as a boy. Thus, Sears, who was childless, drew up a will that stated that following the death of his wife Olive, the proceeds of his estate should be used “for the benefit of the inhabitants of East Dennis and vicinity, for educational purposes”. Sears passed away in 1871 and Olive did in 1892 - at that time, her late husband’s estate was valued at approximately $23,000.  

Sears’s siblings contested the will in a case that went to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in 1893. The 1893 State Court ruled that Sears’s will “constitutes a good gift to charity and may be executed as a valid charitable trust”. Milton P. Hedge, Henry H. Sears, and O. Walter Hall, all residents of Sears’s beloved Quivet Neck, were appointed trustees of the bequest. Sears also stressed in his will that a library be erected with funds from his estate, with the appointed Board of Trustees overseeing the building, its programs, and its endowments. 

The Board of Trustees purchased a parcel of land on the south side of Center Street from Barnabas H. Sears on June 15, 1895 for a cost of $250. The plans for the library were prepared by Boston architects Kendall & Stevens according to the Yarmouth Register, which reported on the new building on June 18, 1896. The library building was quickly completed for a cost of $3,500. On May 23, 1896, the inhabitants of Quivet Neck met at the library to choose trustees and discuss other related matters. The voted to name the building the Jacob Sears Memorial Library. The library portion of the building was opened on July 3, 1897. Each year, at least one lecture was scheduled to carry out further terms of Sears’s will and trust. The trust that Jacob Sears left to support the library has a current value of approximately $550,000. 

Jacob Sears Memorial Library, National Register of Historic Places. Accessed January 7th 2021. https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63794037.

History, Jacob Sears Memorial Library. Accessed January 7th 2021. https://www.jacobsearslibrary.org/history.html.