I recently ran across this wonderful libguide on the history of Anatolia College Libraries in Greece:
https://anatolia.libguides.com/bissell/about/history
It’s a great site about a historic Greek library, and it also offers an example of how to harness the commonly-used web platform libguides to paint a portrait of a library’s history.
Best,
Brett
Through the form of a tour of libraries, this podcast series offers a wonderful exploration of the collections, history, and impact of Historically Black College and Universities in the USA! The Council on Library and Information Resources sponsored its creation.
“In the third season of CLIR’s podcast, Material Memory, host Sharon M. Burney takes us on a tour of six HBCU libraries, highlighting the people and collections, and giving us a glimpse into the vital role these institutions play in their communities.”
https://material-memory.clir.org/season-3/
Sources on the history of HBCU Libraries:
Owens, Brandon A., Sr. 2020. “A History of Fisk University Library: 150 Years of African American Public History and Culture, 1866 – 2016.” Middle Tennessee State University. https://jewlscholar.mtsu.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/5d76a65b-9e75-4343-af3f-133772c86610/content
Owens, Irene. “Stories Told but Yet Unfinished: Challenges Facing African-American Libraries and Special Collections in Historically Black Colleges and Universities.” Journal of Library Administration 33, no. 3-4 (2001): 165-181. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1300/J111v33n03_01
“Join the Social Responsibilities Round Table (SRRT) for our fourth annual Afternoon of Social Justice. This free virtual event features scholars and librarians as they present on a variety of topics including feminist struggles in times of crises, disabilities, and boycotts. Time will be allowed at the end of each presentation for questions and discussions.”
August 9, 2023 12:00pm – 4:30pm Central Time
Full Details:
The International Society for Medievalist Librarians is soliciting participants for two roundtables to be held during next year’s International Congress on Medieval Studies in Kalamazoo, Michigan (May 9-11, 2024). If your academic background includes any study of the Middle Ages, please consider participating! Questions can be directed to the contact person for the individual panels.
“Medievalist Librarians in Technical Services” (A Roundtable)
Contact: Allie McCormack (allie.mccormack@utah.edu)
Format: Hybrid – participants can choose either virtual or in-person attendance
Library technical services – including collection development, cataloging, and processing – is not well understood by the public. However, teaching, research, and other services offered by libraries would not be possible without this behind-the-scenes work. Presenters will shine a light on technical services roles, explain the skills needed for success in these positions, and share how their medievalist backgrounds influence their work.
“The Global Middle Ages in the Library: Building and Using Diverse Medieval Studies Collections” (A Roundtable)
Contact: Anna Siebach-Larsen (annasiebachlarsen@rochester.edu)
Format: In-person
The last few years have seen long-overdue discussions about the representation of a diverse and global Middle Ages in our classroom and research. However, missing from these conversations is the role of library collections in shaping and supporting this approach to scholarship and pedagogy. Moreover, this vital aspect of librarianship is often unseen or misunderstood by the public. This panel invites librarians and curators to discuss the challenges and opportunities of developing diverse collections in premodern studies, taking into consideration issues of staffing, funding, expertise, provenance, open access, and classroom integration. Presentations will be followed by discussion and collective brain-storming.
Please share widely with anyone else who may be interested! All panelists must submit proposals through the conference portal: icms.confex.com/icms/2024/cfp.cgi.
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Allison McCormack
Original Cataloger for Special Collections
University of Utah
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Here is another fantastic poster from a fellow LHRT member. In this poster, Tara Murray Grove, Librarian for Germanic and Slavic Languages and Literatures at Penn State University and former President of the Special Library Association, discusses philatelic libraries. You may remember that Tara also wrote a history of the American Philatelic Research Library for the blog in the past (it is the second entry down on the “Library Chronicles” page).
Per her poster abstract, “Philatelic libraries—libraries dedicated to stamp collecting and postal history—provide a promising case study for investigating how the development of non-profit special library structures and practices influence the level of public access to collections.” You’ll find facts about each library’s history within their profiles in the attached poster. Tara also explains in the poster that “the next phase of this project will investigate the history of each library with the aim of understanding the role of non-profit special libraries in society and how they build relationships with other institutions.” We’re excited to watch her project unfold!!
Special Delivery: Philatelic Library Models and Access to Collections
https://scholarsphere.psu.edu/resources/fc30c7c9-a3f2-45e7-8361-c8db44e5ee6f
Dr. Stephen G. Hall notes that “books have been the lifeblood of our resistance to oppression and Black librarians are the guardians”:
For our Summer 2023 Member Spotlight, we are pleased to feature Dr. Mary Carroll, Associate professor and Associate head of school staffing and development at Charles Sturt University.
Hello everyone,
Hope your summer is proceeding well!
To help mark LHRT’s 75th Anniversary, Andrew Wertheimer, David M. Hovde, Emily Spunaugle, and Cara Bertram at the ALA Archives have graciously provided photos from LHRT’s past for a special celebration page on LHRT News & Notes at:
https://lhrt.news/lhrt-75th-anniversary-gallery/
Wayne Wiegand, Bernadette Lear, and Eric Novotny also contributed much in the way of ideas and information for the captions. Many, many thanks to all of them for their work!
Hope everyone enjoys looking through the albums, either to reminisce or to learn for the first time about LHRT’s past, people, and accomplishments.
Your help is needed LHRT members! There are key people in the Round Table for whom we are missing photos. There are also lots of seminars and conferences that we have no photos for at all. If you have photos from LHRT’s past, please consider emailing them to me at dbs21@psu.edu.
We also need help identifying some of the people in the photos we already have on the page, or adding more content to the captions. There must be many out there who have pictures, anecdotes, or background information they can add to the celebratory albums. Perhaps there are also some out there who have old seminar and conference agendas or other ephemera that you could scan and send as well.
As we celebrate LHRT’s 75th Anniversary, let’s also celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the ALA Archives, which serves as the foundation for so much library historical work, by enjoying their digital collections and online exhibits: https://www.library.illinois.edu/ala/blog/
Happy Anniversary LHRT and ALA Archives!
Brett
Brett Spencer
Reference Librarian
Thun Library
PO Box 7009
Tulpehocken Road
Penn State Berks
Reading, PA 19610-6009
Phone: 610-396-6261
Email: dbs21@psu.edu
Library News: https://sites.psu.edu/thunlibrary/