Bio of COUNTRYMAN, Gratia Alta (b.1866), Hennepin Co., MN
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EXTRACTED FROM: History of Minneapolis, Gateway to the Northwest; 
Chicago-Minneapolis, The S J Clarke Publishing Co, 1923; Edited by: Rev. 
Marion Daniel Shutter, D.D., LL.D.; Volume I - Shutter (Historical); 
volume II - Biographical; volume III - Biographical
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GRATIA ALTA COUNTRYMAN - Vol III, pg 229
Gratia Alta Countryman, the period of whose service in the Minneapolis public
library covers more than a third of a century, has been its efficient librarian
for nearly two decades and in this connection has made a record of which she may
well be proud. Her birth occurred in Hastings, Minnesota, on the 29th of
November, 1866, her parents being Levi N. and Alta (Chamberlain) Countryman, who
arrived in this state as pioneer settlers in 1854. The father, a graduate of
Hamline University, served as a soldier of the Civil war.
Gratia A. Countryman completed a high school course in her native city with the
class of 1882 and seven years later was graduated from the University of
Minnesota, with the degree of Bachelor of Science. She belonged to the Delta
Gamma sorority and Phi Beta Kappa. In the fall of 1889, before the library
building was opened to the public, Miss Countryman entered the service of the
public library, with which she has been identified continuously since. She took
a position as assistant under the librariariship of Herbert Putnam, afterward
librarian of congress. She became suc­cessively head cataloguer, assistant
librarian to James K. Hosmer and finally chief librarian, to which office she
received appointment in 1904. During her administra­tion the library has grown
to a collection of four hundred thousand volumes, with seventeen branches and
many stations, with service to hospitals, to factories, and business houses, to
schools and to the entire county. The Minneapolis library has kept up with every
new phase of the library service, and as far as funds have allowed, has
developed and expanded through every avenue that was open to it, in the interest
of adult education. Miss Countryman was instrumental in establishing the state
library commission and served as its secretary for many years. She was a member
of the national war service committee of the American Library Association, which
fur­nished camp libraries to American soldiers, and is a member of the American
Library Institute as well as a member of the executive board and the council of
the American Library Association.
Miss Countryman has also been interested in local civic and welfare work. She
was a promoter and charter member of the Woman's Club of Minneapolis, a promoter
and first president of the Women's Welfare League, was the first president of
the Business Women's Club and is a member of the board of directors of many
civic organizations. Her interests have been wide and varied and her development
of the public library has kept it in touch with every civic and educational
movement. Her public life in Minneapolis has extended over thirty-four years and
has touched, in a quiet way, almost every civic interest in the city, for a
librarian must always keep the library in touch with every movement in order to
assist it.