Everybody's Libraries

Twenty Years at Hull-House is Jane Addams‘s germinal account of the settlement house movement she helped found, supporting immigrants and low-income urban residents.

In 1930, Addams published her memoir of the next 20 years, describing her further involvement in Hull-House, her social and political reform work, and her activism for world peace, which won her a share of the 1931 Nobel Peace Prize. The public domain wins The Second Twenty Years at Hull-House in 20 days. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

Few humor books from 1930 still get laughs from many people now, but 1066 and All That does. W. C. Sellar and R. J. Yeatman don’t just send up English history: they also satirize how history is often taught and remembered, where what really matters, whether Bad Kings or Good Things, is the story of whoever’s on top. (They literally punctuate that when they end as the US replaces the UK as “top nation”.) In 21 days the US also gets it in the public domain, before the UK. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

This blog’s #PublicDomainDayCountdown focuses on works joining the public domain in the United States, but there are also many other works joining it in other countries. Many are described in Wikipedia and in the Public Domain Review.

There is some international overlap. Swiss composer Arthur Honegger (1892-1955) published his first symphony in 1930, a commission for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In 22 days, it joins the public domain both where it was written and where it was first performed.

There’s something magical about Swallows and Amazons. It’s not anything supernatural or melodramatic, but as the Vacuous Wastrel notes, the book enchants readers with three worlds: the world of lake and islands that six children explore remarkably independently, the world of adults the children subtly get support and expectations from, and the world of imagination that inspires their adventures. Arthur Ransome’s story, first in a series, can be freely shared in 23 days. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

Aaron Moss’s roundup of arrivals to the public domain in 2026 lists over 150 works newly out of copyright, and discusses how we can’t always reuse the versions we think we can of some public domain stories, songs, and characters.

One such public domain folktale was retold by Mary Jacobs in 1910, and by Mabel Bragg in 1916. In 24 days, we can finally reuse a more familiar version of The Little Engine That Could, as retold by Watty Piper and illustrated by Lois Lenski. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

“The art of the murderer… is the same as the art of the magician,” is a line in John Dickson Carr’s first novel It Walks by Night. It expresses the spirit of this book, and of many of the later mysteries Carr wrote over a long, prolific career. Carr was famous in the Golden Age for his locked-room mysteries, where, as in a magic trick, the question “who did it?” is often less puzzling than the question “how did they do it?” This book’s US copyright unlocks in 25 days. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

The 1930 Gershwin musical Girl Crazy made stars of Ethel Merman and Ginger Rogers, but by 1975, critic Lehman Engel called it “unrevivable” in its original form. The original script may be badly dated, but the songs, including “Embraceable You”, “But Not for Me”, and “I Got Rhythm” have had much more staying power. In 1992, Ken Ludwig thoroughly reworked the show into Crazy for You, which also became a big hit. In 26 days, we’ll all get to go Crazy in our own way. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

There’s the 1980 we know from memory and history, and there’s the 1980 of Just Imagine, where people have names like “J-21”, need permits to marry, and travel in both dirigibles and Mars rockets. For Wonder Stories, the movie, 27 days away from the public domain, was “for those who do not take their science fiction too seriously”, and the mix of futuristic setting with already-dated vaudeville bits was a box-office bomb. But the Oscar-nominated visuals remain striking. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

By 1930, the Harlem Renaissance was undeniably a major force in American culture. While to many the rising visibility of New York Black artists might seem like “a miracle straight out of the skies”, James Weldon Johnson wrote that it was a long time coming. His Black Manhattan tells the story of Black New Yorker’s lives and artistic creations from 17th century New Amsterdam through the Great Migration and the Jazz Age. Johnson’s book joins the public domain in 28 days. #PublicDomainDayCountdown

"I would live all my life in nonchalance and insouciance
Were it not for making a living, which is rather a nouciance"

Ogden Nash had tried to make a living teaching, selling bonds, and writing ad copy. But after he sent some satirical lines to The New Yorker, the magazine offered him a job. Nash’s verse debuted there in 1930, the start of a long career of humor and wordplay. His earliest published poems, including the couplet above, join the public domain in 29 days. #PublicDomainDayCountdown