Biblioteca Maria Goia

Cervia's Maria Goia Municipal Library is named for the teacher and labour organiser who founded a circulating popular library in 1919. The modern municipal institution, established in 1968, carries forward her belief in reading as a resource for workers and the wider community.

Why it matters

Maria Goia was born in Cervia in 1878 and worked to make books available to people who had limited access to education. As secretary of the town's chamber of labour, she created a small lending library for labourers, artisans and workers. The collection was lost under Fascism, but the municipality later renewed the public library project. The institution's name keeps Goia's civic and educational work connected to the town.

What to notice

The library's collection brings together books, periodicals and other media, with local-history materials that document Cervia and its communities. A special collection includes the bequest of journalist Max David, whose books and papers contribute to the library's historical holdings. The library is part of the ScopriRete network, which links institutions across Romagna and San Marino.

Context and history

The municipality established the library by resolution in 1968, and it opened to the public in 1973 on Via XX Settembre. In 1981 it moved to Torre San Michele, the seventeenth-century tower built for the salt town's defence. The growing collection later moved to new civic premises on 10 October 2004. The library's history thus joins Maria Goia's early popular reading room with the development of a municipal cultural institution.