ACRL College & Research Libraries News

Association of College & Research Libraries

Touring Nashville’s university libraries

By Shirley Hallblade

Join one of the library tours offered during the ACRL conference

More than a dozen colleges and universities attract more than 30,000 students from across the U.S. and around the world to Nashville. Attendees who arrive early for ACRL’s 8th National Conference in Nashville, April 11–14, 1997, will have an opportunity to visit four local university campuses the afternoon of Friday, April 11. The Local Arrangements Committee has planned tours that include li- braries at Belmont, David Lipscomb, Fisk, and Vanderbilt Universities. Here is an overview of these institutions and their libraries. For infor- mation about registering for the scheduled tours consult the Preliminary Program sent to ACRL members or the ACRL conference Web site at http ://www. ala .org/acrl. html.

Belmont University

A comprehensive university grounded in the liberal arts, Belmont has an enrollment of more than 3,000 students. Fully accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and affiliated with the Tennessee Baptist Convention, it is the second largest private college or university in Tennessee. In addition to undergraduate degrees in approximately 50 major areas of study, Belmont offers master’s degrees in education, music education, nursing, occupational therapy, business administration, and accounting.

The university’s beautiful campus reflects a long, rich history that dates back to the 19th century, when the grounds on which it is located today were known as Adelicia Acklen’s Belle Monte estate. The antebellum mansion remains and is flanked by modern university buildings erected more than a century later. Paths across the campus weave through Victorian gardens, statuary, and gazebos, all of which serve as reminders of a treasured heritage of Southern culture.

Women’s schools preceding the current comprehensive institution of higher learning include the original Belmont College (1890–1913) and Ward-Belmont (1913–51). In 1951 the Tennessee Baptist Convention founded the second Belmont College (1951–91) with an initial coeducational enrollment of 136 students. Not long after celebrating 100 years on the same campus, the institution became a university in 1991, culminating a decade of rapid growth and progress.

The Lila D. Bunch Library, now in its fourth year in its new facilities, has a collection of approximately 187,000 volumes, and carries subscriptions to 1,300 periodicals. The library’s online catalog and circulation system are based on DRA software. The library offers access to several CD-ROM citation databases through a wide area network with connections available through campus dormitory rooms and offices as well as through terminals located in the library. Access to full-text articles in selected periodicals is provided through UMI’s ProQuest Direct.

Shirley Hallblade is associate director of libraries at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, and cochair of the Local Arrangements Committee; e-mail: ballblade@library.vanderbilt.edu. Three members of the committee also contributed material for this article. They are Ernest Heard, director of library services, Belmont University; Jessie Camey Smith, university librarian, Fisk University; and James E. Ward, director, David Lipscomb University Library.

Belmont’s library has just completed instal- lation of equipment in a multimedia presenta- tion hall located within the facility. The build- ing also houses a microcomputer center on its first floor, which is equipped with about 30 Macintosh computers as well as a scanner, print- ers, CD-ROM stations, and videodisc players. Library staff are engaged in cross-unit sharing of tasks and responsibilities designed to maxi- mize service to users, including an extensive program of outreach and instruction.

David Lipscomb University

David Lipscomb University is a coeducational, church-related institution located four miles south of downtown Nashville. Nearly 2,600 graduate and undergraduate students comprise the student body there, representing approxi- mately 40 states and several foreign countries. Lipscomb is accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Col- leges and Schools to award bachelor’s and master’s degrees. More than 60 undergraduate majors are offered in the liberal arts along with preprofessional and professional programs.

The University Library, completed in 1991, is housed in an attractive 63,000-square-foot facility. The library’s holdings total more than 205,000 books and about 900 periodi- cal titles. Several spe- cial collections reflect the history and heri- tage of the university. Of particular note is the Bailey Hymnology Collection.

A campus fiberoptic network brings computing to all students, faculty, and staff. The Gaylord Galaxy Integrated Library System provides automation services for cataloging, circulation, serials, and an online public access catalog named LINIS. Online searching is available to students and faculty through DIALOG, EPIC, FirstSearch, and access to the Internet. Interlibrary loan services are provided by the library’s memberships in organizations such as OCLC, SOLINET, TENN-SHARE, and Tennessee Resource Sharing.

Fisk University

Fisk University was founded by the American Missionary Association in 1866, six months after the end of the Civil War and two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed. It was named in honor of General Clinton B. Fisk of the Tennessee Freedmen’s Bureau, who pro- vided the new school with facilities in former Union army barracks. The institution was in- corporated in 1867, and from its founding has remained open to all regardless of race.

Fisk offers undergraduate degrees in a num- ber of subject areas and master’s degrees in biology, chemistry, physics, psychology, soci- ology, and social gerontology. Currently there are 812 students enrolled at Fisk.

Among the highlights of Fisk are the world- famous Fisk Jubilee Singers who in 1871 began national and international tours to raise money for the school while also introducing the rich heritage of spirituals to the world; the Race Relations Institutes; and the Infra-Red Spectros- copy Laboratory. In 1953 a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa was established on campus, the first in a black institution. In 1978 the Fisk campus was listed as a historic district in the National Register of Historic Places.

Paths across the campus weave through Victorian gardens, statuary, and gazebos, all of which serve as reminders of a treasured heritage of Southern culture.

Fisk is also known for its library. From its early location in a Carnegie building, the library later moved to a multistory facility and in 1969 to its present site. The modern build- ing houses the Aaron Douglas Art Gallery and displays important works by African American artists and on African American sub- jects throughout the fa- cility. Library automa- tion is well under way, using the Innovative Interfaces system.

Fisk’s special collections are an international treasure, containing some of the oldest and most definitive collections of African American history and culture. In 1929 a systematic effort was begun to collect books on the African American experience by enlisting the aid of foreign dealers to purchase rare items. The efforts of Arthur Schomburg, a distinguished bibliophile who became curator of the Negro Collection in 1930, helped develop these distinctive collections.

The purchasing of the Southern YMCA Library added another dimension to the growth of the collection. Since the YMCA had specialized in securing materials relating to African Americans prior to 1865, and Fisk after 1865, the collection was expanded in scope, size, and significance. In addition to its focus on the African American, the library has also amassed extensive materials and books on the West Indies, Africa, and the Caribbean.

Rare items held include the Bible presented to Presi- dent Lincoln by free blacks of Baltimore in 1864; a bible especially edited for slaves in the West Indies in 1808; and Harriet E. Wilson’s Our Nig (1859), the first novel pub- lished by a black in the United States. The archives hold the records of the university, in- cluding the Jubilee Singers, as well as records of organizations such as the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the Julius Rosenwald Fund, etc. Manuscript collections include papers belonging to W. E. B. DuBois, Aaron Douglas, Langston Hughes, Thomas Dorsey, and the George Gershwin Collection of Music and Musical Literature. Fisk’s special collections include the Black Oral History Col- lection which was begun in 1970. Strengthened by a National Endowment for the Humanities grant in 1971–73, the collection has taped in- terviews with persons who have been eyewit- nesses, participants, or contributors to the black experience.

Vanderbilt University

Vanderbilt University is an independent, privately supported institution founded in 1873 through a million-dollar gift from Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt. It is one of the few independent universities offering high-quality undergraduate programs and a full range of respected graduate and professional schools. Vanderbilt’s ten schools and colleges have an enrollment of approximately 5,600 undergraduates and 4,200 graduate and professional students from all 50 states and at least 75 countries.

Vanderbilt has a full-time faculty of more than 1,600, plus more than 1,100 part-time and adjunct faculty who serve teaching and clinical roles primarily in the Schools of Medicine and Nursing. The institution has recruited many eminent scholars who excel in teaching and research. Its faculty attract external funding in excess of $113 million annually and have been recipients of many professional awards, includ- ing the Nobel Prize.

Kirkland Hall on the campus of Vanderbilt University

Vanderbilt is located on a 333-acre, beautifully land- scaped campus about three miles from downtown Nash- ville. The campus, with its many varieties of trees and plants, was granted national arboretum status in 1988.

Library services were for many years provided to Vanderbilt University, Peabody College, and Scarritt College through the sepa- rately incorporated Joint Uni- versity Libraries, an entity begun by the late Frederick Kuhlman in the 1930s. This multilibrary cooperative venture endured until 1979 when George Peabody College for Teachers merged with Vanderbilt. The name of the library was changed that year to Vanderbilt University Library; the organiza- tion was renamed in 1984 to honor retiring Chancellor Alexander Heard and his wife, Jean, who started the Friends of the Library.

Today, nine campus libraries (Biomedical, Central, Divinity, Education, Law, Management, Music, Science and Engineering, and Special Collections) and two off-campus facilities constitute the Jean and Alexander Heard Library. The collections exceed 2.3 million volumes and include more than 16,000 serial subscriptions. The staff of 225 includes 83 librarians. Vanderbilt’s library is a member of the Association of Research Libraries, the Center for Research Libraries, the Coalition for Networked Information, and participates in OCLC through SOLINET.

Extensive library automation programs enhance traditional library services and collections. The library has recently converted its integrated online system from NOTIS-based software to the SIRSI Corp.’s client-server software. Several databases are mounted centrally for access through the library’s network; many other CD- ROM databases are available in libraries through local area networks.

The main library building, erected in 1941 with a wing added in 1966, houses the Central Library with collections in the humanities and social sciences, the government documents depository, and distinctive collections in French; the Divinity Library which includes a special collection of Judaica materials, and the Special Collections and University Archives featuring distinctive collections of the writers known as the Fugitives and the Agrarians, materials on Southern history and culture, and rare books and manuscripts. A separate Science and Engineering Library, located in the Stevenson Center in the wing housing the new chemistry building, includes a U.S. Patent Depository.

The Education Library, located on the Peabody campus, focuses on materials in education, educational psychology, special education, and literature and curriculum materials for children and young adults. Separate libraries for Law, Management, and Music are located in the buildings housing those schools.

The newest library facility is the Eskind Biomedical Library, a $12.5 million, 77,000-square- foot state-of-the-art building designed by Davis, Brody & Associates. It houses the library, as well as the Information Management Department of the Medical Center and the academic Division of Biomedical Informatics.

Off-campus, the library has a small collection of astronomy materials at the Dyer Observatory, and manages an environmentally controlled, 31,000-square-foot storage facility which opened in 1988.

We hope many conference visitors will join us on April 11 for tours to some of our local college and research libraries!

Ed. note: Advance registration is required. Details and forms are in the Preliminary Program mailed in November and on the ACRL homepage: http://www.ala.org/acrl.html.■