Cole, George Watson, 1850-1939

Epithet: Librarian Henry E Huntington Library

George Watson Cole: school teacher, 1872-1876; admitted to Massachusetts Bar, 1876, and practiced law until 1885; from 1885-1886 compiled the Classified Catalogue of the Fitchburg Public Library; in 1886 became Librarian of the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn; from 1888-1891 worked for Newberry Library in Chicago; from 1891-1895 worked for the Free Public Library of Jersey City; from 1901-1915 worked on compiling bibliographies; in 1915 became Librarian of the Henry E. Huntington Library.

George Watson Cole: school teacher, 1872-1876; admitted to Massachusetts Bar, 1876, and practiced law until 1885; from 1885-1886 compiled the Classified Catalogue of the Fitchburg Public Library; in 1886 became Librarian of the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn; from 1888-1891 worked for Newberry Library in Chicago; from 1891-1895 worked for the Free Public Library of Jersey City; from 1901-1915 worked on compiling bibliographies; in 1915 became Librarian of the Henry E. Huntington Library.

George Watson Cole was born at Warren, Conn., September 6, 1850. His early education was received in the public schools of his native county and at Phillips Academy, Andover, Mass. After teaching school for four years, during which time he read Law, he was admitted to the bar in 1876 and practiced law in his native county until 1885, when he abandoned law to engage in library work.

During 1885 and 1886 he compiled the printed Classified Catalogue of the Fitchburg (Mass.) Public Library . From Fitchburg he went to New York in the autumn of 1886 to become the Librarian of the Pratt Institute of Brooklyn; at the same time he attended the Library School at Columbia University, from which he was graduated in 1888. For the next three years he was connected with the Newberry Library in Chicago, which he left in January 1891 to become the Librarian of the Free Public Library of Jersey City, N.J., then being organized. In December 1895, because of ill-health, Mr. Cole resigned his position as Librarian and devoted the next three years to travel.

On his return to this country he became interested in bibliography; in December 1901, he began compilation of the extensive and valuable collection of American and English Literature and Miscellany in the Library of the late E. Dwight Church, of Brooklyn. The result of his labors was a catalogue comprising seven volumes, containing in all 3,789 pages, with 1,755 facsimiles of title pages, colophons and other interesting features of the collection.

In October 1915, Cole became Librarian of Henry E. Huntington's collection, then housed in New York. He continued to hold the position after the collection was transferred in 1920 to the present location of the Huntington Library in California.

In 1924 he became Librarian Emeritus. Thereafter he continued to publish articles and books on bibliographical and other topics. He died on October 10, 1939.