Cecil R. Roseberry describes in his “History of the New York State Library” that the first of the traveling libraries containing 100 volumes of books chosen out of the New York State Library's holdings was sent out on February 8, 1893 to a hamlet of Charlton, Saratoga County. Melvil Dewey, the Director of the New York State Library, refrained from talking about the traveling libraries for seven years after they were launched. At last, in 1901 a tract on “Traveling Libraries” was published by the Education Department at Albany.
Tomosaburo Sano, designated as the Director of the Akita Library in April 1900, contributed an article on “the beginning and developments of traveling libraries in the United States of America” to No. 115 (February 1902) of the Journal of the Akita Education Association. It is supposed that Sano acquired the Annual Reports of the Regents of the University of the State of New York and the bulletin “Traveling Libraries” written by Melvil Dewey. Sano inaugurated the traveling libraries from October 1902 in Akita Prefecture, which was the first attempt in Japan.
