Tinker Tomes

The Free Library's got one of the country's most-revered automotive literature collections. Just don't get grease on the pages.

by Mary Armstrong

Michael T. Regan ALPHA BRAVO: "I love anything that goes," says Kim Bravo, tender of the Automobile Reference Collection at the Free Library. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

It's a palace of refinement in marble, suggesting the classics, thoroughly in keeping with the tone of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Who would guess the Central Library's sweeping grand staircase leads to a grease monkey's paradise?

At the top of those stairs, at the east end of the building is where Philly-area socialite and auto fancier Thomas McKean's original exhaustive collection of materials automotive in nature has made its home since 1948. If it had anything to do with cars, trucks or buses, McKean wanted to preserve it. Now known as the Automobile Reference Collection, the archive still aims to preserve history, from the earliest engines to the present: stacks piled close to the ceiling and walls of four-drawered file cabinets jammed with original manufacturers' materials, from sales brochures to shop repair bulletins.

Here surprises abound, not the least of which is the manager of this macho material, a tiny woman about whom some middle-aged patrons have whispered, "She reminds me of Pixanne!" (That's WCAU's 1960s elfin children's television host, to you younger folks.) Meet librarian Kim Bravo, keeper of Thomas McKean's original automotive collection and all that has been added to it in the last 60 years. With a big grin she confides, "I love anything that goes!"

The improbability of her reign has elicited some predictable reactions in the year and half she has been in charge. Down the hall at the general info desk, the librarian calls Bravo on behalf of a patron seeking auto info. The librarian gets Bravo on the line, then hands the phone to the patron who listens, covers the mouthpiece and whispers, "It's a girl!" Then there was guy asking about diagnostic materials. When Bravo probed for specifics, the patron gave her a look and countered, "Why, are you a mechanic?" "No," replied Bravo, with a touch of irritation evident in the retelling, "but I am a librarian and I know my collection. Now, do you want my help or not?" Bravo grins and says he soon provided her the info needed to get his repairs under way.

The ARC is not just a treasure for Philadelphia-area researchers — be they mechanics doing their own work or writers who have never had grease ground into their skin. Detroit Public Library, which Bravo describes as having a deep collection on the Big Three automakers, asks auto info-seekers to pay $10 for a daily use pass or $100 a year for a nonresident library card. Philly, by contrast, lives up to the free in its name. "I do virtual reference, part of the nationwide effort to have librarians available online. If I can e-mail [the material], it's yours! If you want to use it in a book, we want credit and a copy of the book."

Bravo will scan or photocopy and mail information to folks without Internet access for 50 cents a page — information not commonly available elsewhere. While that Detroit collection is deep, "we're broad."

How broad? How about automotive annuals and repair manuals dating back to the dawn of the industry? The collection's goal is to be all-inclusive, thanks to McKean, who had the time and money for the task. Ask to see some of the stuff from the turn of the 20th century and see if you don't get a little thrill in being so close to everyday life from a century ago. Interested in Hupmobiles — the elegant vehicle that expired with the Second World War? Bravo can show you all the original service bulletins in their official loose-leaf binder. Other historical collections have wound up with the ARC, like glass-plate negatives of early auto races in Point Breeze or from the "Belmont" track in Merion Park.

Appointments are necessary to view any of these rarities. Because the collection is so large and space is so limited, books are piled on open shelves way over your head in a little balcony office carved out of what was once air space on the second floor. There are plans for a new and greatly expanded home for Mr. McKean's legacy in an addition to the library. But ask Bravo how soon and her face falls. "Years," she says softly.

Meantime call or write ahead describing what you'd like brought down from the treasure room, full of original owners manuals and service materials for such exotic beasts as the Pierce-Arrow, Durant, Autocar of Exton and Reading's pride, the Duryea.

While viewing these remnants of a popular culture now vanished, you are likely to be surrounded by serious automotive researchers from all over the world. Robert Gabrick of Wisconsin, a widely published author of books on automotive history, is one example. Bravo delights in telling how thrilled Gabrick was to see some of these old manuals. Among the works he has produced is a book on Diamond T trucks. Thought by some to be the finest heavy-duty trucks ever made, Diamond T merged with Reo in the mid-century, and yes, the country band Diamond Rio is named after that hyphenated piece of Americana.

When Gabrick was contacted by some folks in Kansas wanting to restore and retitle an old Diamond T, Gabrick contacted Bravo, confirming that the ARC was "the only place in the country" that had the info to reconstruct the serial number.

Such cooperation breeds cooperation. "Wanda from Iowa" contacted Bravo, looking to restore an old modified farm truck her father drove over a half a century ago. The truck in the photo Wanda sent resembled the car in the video Johnny Cash made for his hit "One Piece at a Time." Bravo called Gabrick. The truck was thought to be an old Studebaker, Gabrick examined the photo, agreed and supplied much material on how the vehicle looked prior to its extensive modifications.

Prefer to look forward rather than back? Bravo can help you there, too. As she notes, "The [ARC] has a great deal of historic info on alternative fuel vehicles (electric, steam, etc.) which weren't so alternative back in the days before Big Oil took over the industry. We also have books on the history of the electric car and Big Oil's efforts to 'kill' it."

(editorial@citypaper.net)

Automobile Reference Collection, Free Library, Central Branch, 1901 Vine St., 215-686-5404, freelibrary.org