During his lifetime, Bro. William R. Smith, 32°, former
Director of the National Botanical Gardens in Washington,
D.C.,
assembled one of the most complete collections of published
works by and about Scottish poet Robert Burns. Recognized
as
one of the finest of all Burns collections, second only to
the Burns Collection in Glasgow, Scotland, it was cataloged
by Mr.
William Thomson of the Public Library of Edinburgh, Scotland,
and recently converted to the Library’s computer catalog
system by Joan Sansbury, Librarian/Curator of the Supreme
Council. The
industrialist Andrew Carnegie, trustee of Mr. Smith’s
estate, decided that because Robert Burns had been an ardent
Freemason,
it would be appropriate to place the Burns collection in the
library of the Supreme Council, with the condition that it
be
housed in a special room available to the public and community
of scholars.
Also included in the Library are numerous special holdings
such as the Dr. Lewis Carman Collection of Lincolniana, the
Claudy Collection on the works of Goethe, and the L.M. Taylor
Collection of esoteric literature. Each of these contains enough
in-depth materials to satisfy the most demanding scholar.
The Library and Musem Collections Page
