Appointed to the position in 1984 and reappointed in 1990, Berthé M. Gaines is the first African-American woman to serve as a trustee of the Boston Public Library and only the fourth woman to serve in the history of the Library, which was established in 1848. Her appointment followed a time of fiscal crisis for the city (1981-1984) when she was actively involved in SAVE OUR LIBRARIES, a citywide multi-racial, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural group of men and women committed to keeping neighborhood libraries open.