ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

News from the Field

ACQUISITIONS

• On September 27 Archbishop Fulton John Sheen, dedicated the Sheen Room to house his personal and public archives which he has given to St. Bernard’s Seminary, Rochester, N.Y. These consist of books and pamphlets which he has written since 1925; about 1,500 tapes of sermons, retreats, lectures, and informal talks; phono-recordings and TV tapes of the “Life Is Worth Living” series, 1951-1957; radio and TV tapes of the Catholic Hour broadcasts, 1930-1952; newspaper clippings and photographs; correspondence and memorabilia.

The dedication of the Sheen Room marked the beginning of a major library renovation for the 83-year-old seminary to house its 80,000- plus-volume collection. The Sheen Archives have not yet been cataloged and will be subject to standard archival practices.

The Rev. Jasper Pennington, historiographer and priest of the Episcopal Diocese of Rochester, is library director. A Sheen Chronology and Bibliography has been published by the librarian, and copies are available for two dollars each.

• Sam Goldman of Denver has given his personal library of approximately 5,000 books to the University of Colorado Lirrary at Boulder, the most important gift of books in the history of the university. The collection contains an important range of materials on music and art, and a large number of first editions of twentieth-century writers, including inscribed first editions of Edna St. Vincent Millay, Theodore Dreiser, and Robert Frost. There are more than 2,000 albums of classical music, mostly produced before World War II, which include performances by the greatest conductors and musicians of that time, including Toscanini, Fürtwangler, and Koussevitsky, and recordings of the great performances of the Mozart operas at Glyndebourne, England.

The largest concentration of the collection is about 2,000 books from the revival of printing as a fine art by the poet William Morris in 1891 to the end of that great movement, which profoundly influenced contemporary book production, in 1939. The collection includes all 53 books published by Morris’ Kelmscott Press, including the Kelmscott Chaucer.

There are 32 of the 40 books published by the Ashendene Press, and 42 books published by the Doves Press, including an immaculate copy of their five-volume Bible and a number of inscribed presentation copies by T. J. Cobden-Sanderson to his wife.

There is also a complete set of all publications of the Nonesuch Press, one of the finest commercial presses of all time, and 67 books published by the Golden Cockerell Press, including its four-volume edition of The Canterbury Tales illustrated by Eric Gill and a specially bound copy of Keats’ Endymion.

There is a copy of Thomas Browne’s Urne Buriall illustrated by Paul Nash, one of the most notable books published by Cassell in London in the 1920s, and a copy of the extremely rare translation of Homer’s Odyssey by T. E. Lawrence (of Arabia), privately published by Bruce Rogers and Emery Walker. There are books from the Gregynog Press, the Eragny Press, and the Vale Press, many in unusually fine special bindings.

The collection includes many books by followers of the tradition of printing as a fine art, including the Heritage Press, the First Editions Club, the Folio Society, the Imprint Society, and a complete set of the books published by the Limited Editions Club from 1929 to 1972.

The collection contains complete runs of the Fleur on and Colophon, two extremely rare periodicals in the field of fine book-making.

The collection was assembled by Mr. Goldman over a period of 50 years, and its acquisition provides the university library for the first time with a collection of research strength in book-making as a fine art.

• Common Cause, the nonpartisan citizens’ lobby, has designated the Princeton University Library as the repository for its archives and historical materials, beginning with its records for 1970 and 1971, which were recently received in the newly opened Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library.

Common Cause was founded in 1970 by John W. Gardner, former secretary of health, education and welfare, to promote openness, responsiveness, and accountability in government, working with members of Congress and state legislators with the aid of professional lobbyists in Washington and in the several states.

James M. Banner, Jr., associate professor of history and a member of the national governing board of Common Cause, noted that the archives will add significantly to the university library’s collections of the papers of modern American public affairs organizations, which include the archives of the American Civil Liberties Union as well as other holdings of related interest. Banner called Common Cause “one of the most influential and venturesome organizations to take shape in the 1970s,” whose records “will greatly enhance scholars’ ability to understand recent American political history. That Princeton is to be their home is testimony to the university’s growth as a major repository for materials on modern statecraft and government.”

The archives of Common Cause will include correspondence and other documents dating from its beginning in 1970 and relating to its founding; documents relating to its governing boards, staff, and internal affairs; papers connected with studies, reports, and memoranda issued by Common Cause; and press releases and other papers. Following the first installment of noncurrent records, additions to the archives will be made annually, with each new installment containing files dating from five years prior to their acquisition by the library. It is understood that the papers will be generally accessible to researchers as soon as the library staff has been able to organize them and prepare the necessary cataloging.

• The Friends of the Columbia University Libraries celebrated their 25th anniversary November 4.

A devoted group of some 500 private book collectors and scholar-benefactors, it constitutes one of the oldest continuously active organizations of its kind at a major American university. The Friends have brought research materials worth more than $2.3 million to Columbia since 1951 through purchases and gifts from their personal collections. Their chairman is Gordon N. Ray, president of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

The original Rockwell Kent drawings for Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass were formally presented to the university by the Friends as a group. More than 165 members and their families made special contributions toward the purchase of the 127 drawings, including Herman Wouk, Francis T. P. Plimpton, William S. Paley, Corliss Lamont, Melville Cane, Paul Mellon, Mr. and Mrs. Helmut N. Friedlaender, and William S. Beinecke. A copy of the 1936 edition of Leaves of Grass, inscribed by Kent, accompanied the gift. The drawings “express with both strength and delicacy Kent’s sympathy for the poet’s celebration of America,” said Columbia rare books librarian Kenneth A. Lohf. The materials will become part of the extensive Rockwell Kent Collection at Columbia, which numbers more than 5,000 drawings and sketches.

These and other selections from the gift collection are being exhibited through February 24 on the third floor of Butler Library, 114th Street and Broadway.

• The millionth volume of the Texas A&M University Libraries, a gift from Mrs. M. F. (Chan) Driscoll of Midland, Texas, was officially accepted by Clyde H. Wells, chairman of the board of regents of the Texas A&M University System, in a special ceremony on November 20.

Considered by collectors to be “number one” among the top rarities in the literature of the range cattle industry, Prose and Poetry of the Live Stock Industry of the United States (Denver and Kansas City: National Live Stock Historical Association, 1905) was described by Dr. Irene B. Hoadley, director of libraries, as especially appropriate for addition to the university libraries’ collections during Texas A&M University’s centennial year because it records some of the first accounts of the colorful range cattle industry which flourished in Texas a century ago.

The donor, who owns ranchlands near Midland, Texas, is a past president of the Friends of the Texas A&M University Library and is presently vice-president and president-elect of the organization. Two of Mrs. Driscoll’s sons are graduates of Texas A&M University, and she was instrumental in the organization of the Texas A&M University Mothers’ Club in Midland, serving as its first president.

The rare Prose and Poetry of the Live Stock Industry of the United States has been identified by one book collector, Louis P. Merrill, as the “king of the book aristocrats” of the range cattle literature. In a recently published bibliography of 120 “best books on the range cattle industry,” William S. Reese deems it to be “the most desired and desirable book on the range cattle industry.”

Prose and Poetry of the Live Stock Industry of the United Statesjoins a wealth of other rarities in the university libraries’ Jeff Dykes Range Livestock Collection, which is one of the most extensive collections on the subject. The nucleus of this research collection, which now contains more than 9,000 items, was put together by Texas A&M University alumnus Jeff Dykes of College Park, Maryland.

• Peter L. Oliver, librarian of the Andover- Harvard Theological Library, has announced the gift to the Harvard Divinity School of the Universalist Historical Society (UHS) Library. A rare and valuable collection of some 5,000 books, 2,200 bound periodicals, 672 volumes of manuscripts, and 1,600 pamphlets, the UHS Library includes official records of the Universalist Church of America, the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, the Universalist Publishing House, the Universalist Youth Fellowship, the General Sunday School Association, as well as papers of Univeralist ministers and records of many state organizations and local churches.

Rarer items in the collection include the unpublished letters of John Murray, the founder of American Universalism; the letters and workbooks of Hosea Ballou, the denomination’s preeminent nineteenth-century theologian; the minute book of the earliest gathering of Universalists in the United States, the 1790 convention in Philadelphia; and records of the Universalists’ general conventions from 1793 through 1869. A large portion of the records and reports of these conventions exist solely in the original ledger books.

The UHS Library was founded in 1834, and for the next 35 years was in the possession of the Rev. Thomas J. Sawyer. In 1869, Sawyer took the library with him to Tufts University, where he taught for some time but where his library remained for more than a century. Finally, in June 1975, the society voted to turn the library over to the Harvard Divinity School, whose existing collection the gift enhances appreciably.

Several years ago, the Andover-Harvard Theological Library acquired many of the books and periodicals and nearly all of the manuscripts held by the Historical Library of the Unitarian Universalist Association; and since that time, the association has given its nineteenth- and much of its early twentieth-century archives to the Divinity School. The combination of this gift and the newly acquired UHS Library makes Harvard’s the richest available collection of Unitarian Universalist historical materials.

• Maestro William Steinberg, former musical director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, has made a generous gift of books, music scores, and mementos to the University of Pittsburgh.

Although William Steinberg is best known as an orchestral conductor, he was in private life an avid reader and book collector. His gift to the university includes about 1,400 volumes of literature, represented by titles in English, German, French, Japanese, and Chinese.

Steinberg’s gift of music consists of about 800 titles, including full and study scores, opera scores, chamber works, vocal and piano solos, facsimile reprints, and recordings. He received numerous presentation copies of symphonic works signed by the composers, such as Samuel Barber, Aaron Copland, Nicholai Lopat- nikoff, Richard Strauss, Arnold Schoenberg, Ernst Toch, and Virgil Thompson. While not a music antiquarian, Steinberg acquired early editions of Beethoven, Chopin, Haydn, and Mozart, as well as an autographed copy of Richard Wagner’s Walküre.

Also included in the gift are various awards, photographs, mementos, and miscellaneous items, such as bronze medallions, silver presentation bowls, presentation scrolls, publicity photographs, and presentation photographs of notable musicians of his acquaintance.

This gift is currently being processed by the university librarians, and, with the generous support of the Hillman Foundation, a permanent display case will be located in the Hillman Library and will feature highlights from the collection along with a pastel portrait of Dr. Steinberg.

AWARDS

• Dean Thomas J. Galvin has announced that Mrs. Marilyn Whitmore, a student in the doctoral program at the Graduate School of Library and Information Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, is the first recipient of the school’s Harold Lancour Award for excellence in international and comparative librarianship. Dean Emeritus Harold Lancour was on hand to present the award to Mrs. Whitmore at the annual dinner of the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Library Schools Alumni Association October 29. The cash award of $250 is accompanied by an engrossed certificate. Honorable mention, with awards of $50 each, went to Mina Schwarz-Seim and Naimuddin Qureshi.

Also at the dinner, Dr. Gerald Orner presented the previously announced Catherine Ofiesh Orner Award to its first recipient, Ms. Cecile Wesley. The award of $500 for excellence in information science was established by the Orner and Ofiesh families in memory of Dr. Omer’s late wife, a notable alumna of the school. Ms. Wesley, a native of the Sudan, intends to return there after completing her work for the Ph.D. degree. Both awards are made on the basis of a paper suitable for publication in a journal of the profession. Ms. Wesley’s paper was entitled “Planning for a National Scientific and Technical Information System.” The title of Mrs. Whitmore’s paper was “The Role of Education and National Development in Latin American Librarianship.”

• The American Revolution in Drawings and Prints, compiled by Donald H. Cresswell of the J. Murrey Atkins Library, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, has won a Certificate of Award in the Printing Industries of America’s Graphic Arts Awards Competition. A publication of the Library of Congress, the book includes more than 900 illustrations of works created between 1765 and 1790. The publication was prepared as a part of LC’s American Revolution Bicentennial Program.

Mr. Cresswell, a member of the library faculty at the university, is the acting special collections librarian. He holds degrees from Belmont Abbey College, the University of Cincinnati, and George Washington University. He is currently a candidate for the Ph.D. degree at George Washington University.

EXHIBITS

The affinity between art and poetry as expressed in America’s “little” magazines is the focus of a major exhibit at the Library of Congress. “Making It New: Poetry and the Visual Arts in American Publications, 1893- 1975,” a display of 300 magazines, prints, photographs, and posters, examines the close association between poetry and the visual arts in avant-garde publications.

From the beginning, little magazines have been open to writers as well as workers in the visual arts. On exhibit is America’s first little literary review, the Chap-Book, founded in 1893 by Stone & Kimball, which created and popularized the art nouveau style. Also shown are reviews devoted to publishing both art and poetry on their pages, among them the transatlantic review, Dial, Hound and Horn, Tiger’s Eye, and Partisan Review.

Frequently magazines carried works by poets who were artists or by artists who wrote poetry, such as humorist Gelett Burgess, whose drawings and poems were published in The Lark; poet e. e. cummings, whose drawings often appeared in the Dial; and painter Marsden Hartley, who was a prolific poet. Some artists and poets collaborated to produce a work of art; an example in the exhibit is 21 Etchings and Poems, a portfolio of etchings containing poems in the poet’s hand, published by the Morris Gallery in 1960.

Organized by period, the exhibit covers the art nouveau movement, the twenties, the expatriates, the thirties, post-World-War-II years, regionalism, and the contemporaries. There are also sections of drawings and photographs of artists and poets done by artists and photographers.

The little magazine emerged in the 1890s as a reaction to mass-produced books which technical innovations like offset printing made possible. After 1910, a combination of events—the rise of new experimental movements in the arts, the increased need for outlets for work directed to small audiences, and the birth of the small press movement—led to a great flourishing of the little magazine as the home of the new, the experimental, and noncommercial, and the controversial that continues today. The 1976 International Directory of Little Magazines and Small Presses, which runs to more than 300 pages, is a testimony to the popularity of this medium.

“Making It New . . .” (the title is derived from Ezra Pound’s admonition to poets to “make it new”) has been mounted in conjunction with the Washington, D.C., area-wide poetry and visual arts project, “Inscapes: Words and Images.” It will be on display for an indefinite period in the central corridors, ground floor, Library of Congress Building.

GRANTS

• The Library School, University of Southern California, has received a grant of $44,900 from the Research Division, Bureau of Library Services of the U.S. Office of Education, for a continuation of its “Independent Self-Paced Professional Educational Program.” The first year’s grant was $86,000.

The purpose of this program is to provide an independent, self-paced, professional educational program in library and information science for those persons who because of heavy financial, personal, or family obligations are unable to attend classes in the traditional, scheduled daily classroom setting of formal on-campus study.

• The Office of University Library Management Studies (OMS) of the Association of Research Libraries has received a grant of $110,000 from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in support of a project to design and test a procedure for the analysis of collection acquisition, retention, and preservation policies at university research libraries.

The objective of the project is to identify and investigate key issues related to collection development, such as characteristics of effective collection development policies and mechanisms for revising such policies in response to needed change; the functions, role, and performance of research libraries in terms of size and quality of collections and reliability and speed of access to collections; requirements for libraries’ decision-making processes regarding collection development in a period of economic retrenchment; the reconciliation of steady-state or reduced budgets to the increasing costs of acquiring needed collections; and ways of ensuring that the limited amount of money that an individual research library has to spend on development of collections is used in the most effective way possible. Consideration of these issues will focus on local library needs and capabilities and regional and national trends in resource sharing.

The Collection Analysis Project will be a three-phase effort lasting approximately one year. The first phase will be devoted to the design of a collections analysis self-study procedure for individual libraries; the second phase will be a pilot test of the analytical procedures at a limited number of libraries; and the third phase will focus on evaluating the pilot test with subsequent consideration of appropriate next steps.

To accomplish the project design, the Office of University Library Management Studies will draw upon its experiences in designing and operating the Management Review and Analysis Program, the McGill University Libraries Performance Evaluation Project, the Academic Library Development Program, and the Systems and Procedures Exchange Center. The project provides a unique opportunity to apply contemporary management methods to the investigation of other substantive concerns of research libraries.

The principal objective of the Association of Research Libraries is to develop the resources and services of research libraries of North America. The Office of University Library Management Studies was established in 1970 by the ARL with financial support from the Council on Library Resources to provide assistance to research libraries in strengthening their management processes and organizational performance. The OMS operation is currently supported by ARL membership dues, a grant from the Council on Library Resources, and sale of services and publications. Project investigators will be Duane E. Webster, director of the office, and Jeffrey J. Gardner, management research specialist.

• Northwestern University Lirrary has been selected to administer a bibliographical project for the National Library of Venezuela. The program planned by the National Library has two phases. The first one will be the identification of the complete bibliographical record of Venezuelan history in all formats. The second phase is the retrieval, on a selective basis, of materials from this bibliographical source.

Northwestern University Library will be responsible for two principal objectives of Phase I. The first is the compilation of a machine-readable Project Catalog of the holdings on Venezuela and by Venezuelans in the major research libraries in the United States. The catalog will cover the fields of humanities, social sciences, science, technology, and archival materials. The preliminary estimate for the number of monographs is about 200,000, while the number of nonbook titles is unknown.

The second important objective of the project is the training of three librarians from Venezuela each year of the project. This intensive program will emphasize bibliographical techniques essential for effective work at Northwestern University Library and at their respective institutions when they return to Venezuela. Special attention will center on cataloging, search techniques, bibliographical skills, international standards, and computer technology for library operations. The visiting librarians will also have an opportunity to observe research methods and modern library techniques in other libraries in the United States.

The Venezuela Project, funded for two years at a total cost of $1.4 million, will be located in space adjacent to the Newspaper/Microtext Department.

• CLENE (Continuing Library Education Network and Exchange) has begun polling personnel in the library/media/informa- tion professions for ideas that will lead to the development of a Model Continuing Education Recognition System.

This major project was funded by the U.S. Office of Education Program for Library Research and Demonstration under Title II-B, Higher Education Act, beginning in mid-September. The grant expires June 30, 1977.

Its objective is to develop a model system for recognition of those in the library/media/in- formation professions who participate in continuing education activities. A draft proposal will be circulated in the spring of 1977 for comments.

Surveys conducted by the National Commission on Libraries and Information Science (NCLIS), as well as state, regional, and national studies, revealed keen interest in developing incentives for post-entry-level education.

The model recognition system project is based on the premise that a carefully designed continuing education program will enhance an individual’s competency and a recognition award system will encourage this activity.

• The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded a $35,508 grant to the University of Washington Archives and Manuscripts Division.

The two-year grant allowed work to begin in January for the compilation of entries for a comprehensive guide to the holdings of the university’s regional manuscripts collection, as well as personal papers in the university archives.

A guide will be published after the entries have been completed.

The university collection is of national as well as regional importance in supplying the research needs of a large research university and documenting the development of a major northwest population center.

“We in the archives and manuscripts division of the university library are naturally proud of the national stature of our collections,” said Richard C. Berner, university archivist and division head. “This stature has been achieved despite a less than optimal growth rate due to insufficient storage space, a situation faced much of the time since 1966.”

Berner pointed out that the NEH rarely awards grant funds for this type of project, but “the combination of national importance of the university’s collections and the inability of the library to sustain this basic program” made the grant possible. Work on such a compilation had been terminated because of work overload and staffing cutbacks, beginning in 1968.

• The Research Libraries Group, Inc., has been awarded a $197,200 grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York to develop, in cooperation with the Library of Congress, a computer-based cataloging system. The 18- month pilot project will provide for inception and operation of the first remote on-line access by a library network directly to LC’s machine- readable cataloging (MARC) data base.

Specifically, the grant will fund the establishment of a telecommunications link between the similar computer systems of the New York Public Library and the Library of Congress. The project’s initial phase will be the connecting of the two systems in such a manner that RLG terminals at both the NYPL and Columbia University appear to the LC system just as LC’s own terminals. Later stages in the system’s expansion will see Harvard and Yale terminals tied in with LC’s data base through the NYPL system. To ensure maximum benefits from the new system, RLG members have agreed to adopt a single cataloging standard based on national norms and on the practices of the Library of Congress.

According to James E. Skipper, president of the Research Libraries Group, the endeavor is an important first step towards creation of the comprehensive computer-based bibliographic processing system that represents the RLG’s primary aim. The project also is expected to supply statistics and experience requisite for institution of a system for remote access by other library networks to Library of Congress data bases.

The RLG concurrently is planning an additional joint effort, with the Library of Congress, to introduce the standards and communications technology necessary for sophisticated linkage between library networks and LC. Under the direction of John F. Knapp, RLG’s vice-president for systems, this supplemental program is designed to ease the identification and transmission of bibliographic data and to enable the RLG to contribute thousands of catalog records annually to the national data base for titles not acquired by LC. The link established also would permit automatic transfer of unsuccessful electronic searches of the national data base at LC to other bibliographic data bases around the country.

• Two grants to Radcliffe College for the use of the Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America have been announced. The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded a three- year grant of $133,784 to process the papers of American women and their families, and a National Historical Publications and Records Commission grant of $12,637 will fund the first phase of a project to process the papers of Massachusetts women and organizations.

The NEH-funded project, entitled “Career and Family Patterns of American Women,” will enable the Schlesinger Library to prepare for research use approximately 30 manuscript collections. According to Patricia King, director of the library, who will head the project, the papers to be processed include those of nationally known women, including Freda Kirchwey, editor of the Nation; Jeannette Rankin, the first woman in Congress; and Miriam Van Waters, penologist and head of the Framingham Reformatory for Women from 1931 to 1957. Other collections are the records of less-well-known women but have the potential to shed light on many aspects of the history of the family and on the experience of women in both employment and the home. The NEH grant will also fund the microfilming of a few fragile and heavily used manuscript collections.

The NHPRC-funded project will be under the direction of Eva Moseley, curator of manuscripts at the Schlesinger Library. During the year for which funding has been awarded, the voluminous records of the North Bennet Street Industrial School will be processed. The North Bennet Street School, which is still active today, was founded in Boston’s North End in 1881 to offer vocational instruction for children and adults. A settlement house was added early in the 20th century, and the school’s records, which date from the 1880s to the 1950s, will illuminate various aspects of immigrant, labor, women’s, educational, urban, and social history.

MEETINGS

January 28-February2: The Fifth Annual Conference of the Art Libraries Society of North America will be held in Los Angeles at the Staffer Hilton Hotel. Included in the program are visits to the Getty Museum, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, architectural highlights of Los Angeles, etc. For more information, contact: Judith A. Hoffberg, Executive Secretary, P.O. Box 3692, Glendale, CA 91201.

February6-11: “The Effective Use of OCLC,” Kent State University. Contact: Professor Anne Marie Allison, University Libraries, Kent State University, Kent, OH 44242.

February16: An “Interactive Bibliographic Reference and Retrieval” workshop will be held at the University of Arizona, Graduate Library School, 1515 E. First St., Tucson, AZ 85719.

March7-9: Dr. William O. Baker, president, Bell Laboratories, will present the Miles Conrad Memorial Lecture at the 1977 Annual Conference of the National Federation of Abstracting and Indexing Services. The conference will be held at Stauffers National Center Hotel, Crystal City, Arlington, Virginia.

Dr. Baker’s accomplishments as scientist and research executive have brought him many honors and awards, including the American Chemical Society’s Priestley and Perkin medals, the Honor Scroll of the American Institute of Chemists, and the Industrial Research Institute Medal. See the December News for more information.

April24-27: “Clinic on Library Applications of Data Processing—Negotiating for Computer Services,” University of Illinois, UC, Illini Union. Contact: Edward Kalb, University of Illinois, 116 Illini Hall, Champaign, IL 61820. See the December News for more information.

April27-30: The ninth annual meeting of the Council on Botanical and Horticultural Libraries will be held at the Morton Arboretum, Lisle, Illinois. Further information may be obtained from: Ian MacPhail, Librarian, Sterling Morton Library, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL 60532.

May8-20: Eleventh Annual Library Administrators Development Program, University of Maryland’s Donaldson Brown Center. Contact: Mrs. Effie T. Knight, Administrative Assistant, Library Administrators Development Program, College of Library and Information Services, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. See the December News for more information.

May12-14: Midwestern Academic Librarians Conference, 22nd Annual Meeting, St. Cloud State University. Contact: Tony Schulzetenberg, St. Cloud State University, St. Cloud, MN 56301.

June6-10: “Women in Library Management.” Contact: Drs. Judith Braunagel and John Ellison, School of Information and Library Studies, State University of New York at Buffalo, 201 Bell Hall, Amherst, NY 14260.

June12-17: The University of Florida at Gainesville will be the site of the Twenty- Second Seminar on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials.

The theme of the seminar will be “The Multifaceted Role of the Latin American Subject Specialist.” A series of workshops, panels, and roundtables will examine the multiple and diverse activities engaged in by present day subject or area specialists. These activities include the selection of library materials in all formats, the technical procedures involved in acquiring the material, making it available to the public, and the provision of reference service and classroom instruction.

The Seminars on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials have been sponsored since 1956 by the Organization of American States as an activity of its Inter-American Program of Library and Bibliographic Development and carried on informally by libraries and institutions interested in the procurement of Latin American materials.

Registration for the twenty-second seminar is $20 for members and $30 for nonmembers. Librarians and scholars from Latin America and the Caribbean may register without charge. Students from all areas will be admitted free to the conference but must register and pay a fee of $12.50 if they wish sets of the preprinted papers and abstracts distributed at the meeting and the Final Report and Working Papers of the conference, published afterward by the SALALM Secretariat. Invitation and registration forms will be distributed soon. Information on the content of the program and working papers may be procured from Mrs. Mary Ma- gruder Brady, University of Saskatchewan Library, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada S7N OWO. News on local arrangements will be supplied by Rosa Q. Mesa, Latin American Documents, University of Florida Libraries, Gainesville, FL 32611. For other information refer to the Executive Secretary, Miss Lou Wetherbee, University of Texas at Austin, Benson Latin American Collection, Sid Richardson Hall 1-108, Austin, TX 78712.

June20-24: The American Theological Library Association will hold its thirty-first annual conference at the Vancouver School of Theology in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Further information may be secured from: Dr. John B. Trotti, Librarian, Union Theological Seminary in Virginia, 3401 Brook Rd., Richmond, VA 23227.

MISCELLANY

• The Research Libraries Group (RLG), comprising the libraries of Columbia, Harvard, and Yale universities and the Research Libraries of the New York Public Library, recently was chartered as a nonprofit corporation in the state of Connecticut. As a corporation, the RLG will continue the work it has undertaken since its start three years ago as an informal consortium—planning and implementing programs for the improvement of access to its combined collection, for the elimination of unnecessary duplication in collection development, and for the establishment of a single computer- based bibliographic processing system to serve the needs of present and future group members.

The Research Libraries Group, Inc., will be governed by a board of directors composed of the corporation president and three representatives from each member institution. The president and the directors of member libraries together will constitute the executive committee of the board.

Officers of the corporation are Warren J. Haas (Columbia), chairman of the board of directors; James E. Skipper (RLG, Inc.), president; Patricia Battin (Columbia), secretary; and John E. Ecklund (Yale), treasurer.

Other members of the board of directors are Douglas W. Bryant, director of the Harvard University Library; Richard W. Couper, president of the New York Public Library; Juanita Doares, planning officer for the New York Public Library; Donald B. Engley, associate Yale University librarian; James W. Henderson, director of research libraries of the New York Public Library; Louis E. Martin, librarian of Harvard College; Rutherford Rogers, Yale University librarian; Joe B. Wyatt, director of the Office of Information Technology, Harvard University; and James S. Young, vice-president for academic planning at Columbia University.

• The Library of Congress was host to participants at a three-day meeting on November 10-12 to address one of the great uncharted areas of English-language bibliography—the creation of a comprehensive record of printing in the English-speaking world for the years 1701-1800. This Mount Everest of bibliographic projects—as the London Times styled it— has long been contemplated by bibliographers. As comparable compilations for the years 1475 to 1640 and 1641 to 1700 near completion, scholars in the field have been asserting that the time is ripe to turn attention to the 18th century.

To consider the feasibility of compiling such a catalog, the British Library and the American Society for Eighteenth Century Studies (ASECS) convened a conference in London on June 14-18 of last year. The 40 American and British librarians, bibliographers, scholars, and computer specialists who gathered for this purpose concluded that such a project is indeed feasible. To carry forward their work, they appointed a smaller group, the Organizing Committee, to explore issues which had proved incapable of easy resolution.

It is this smaller 13-member group which met at the Library of Congress, chaired by D. T. Richnell, director general of the British Library Reference Division, and Paul J. Kor- shin, executive secretary of ASECS. Directors of the libraries of Harvard, the Bodleian Library, Oxford, the Cambridge University Library, the John Rylands Library, Manchester, and the John Carter Brown Library are among the committee members working to bring this project closer to fruition. William Matheson, chief of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division, is the Library of Congress representative on the Organizing Committee.

Meeting discussion papers addressed such matters as methodology for entering information into the computer, the length of the short- title entry, the interrelationships of this project with existing bibliographic projects, and—perhaps the most vexing question of the London meeting—what should be included. In discussing the size of the project, the London conference took 500,000 entries as a base figure. Depending on the definition of ephemera (the “ragged edge” of publication in the period as one of the participants in the June conference labelled it), the figure might be increased by hundreds of thousands of entries. The committee is seeking solutions which serve the purposes of scholarship and are at the same time possible within the financial constraints inevitably imposed on such an undertaking.

To identify the materials to be incorporated into this project, the search is expected to extend into more than 500 libraries throughout the world. The benefits of the resulting record to students of all aspects of English civilization will be incalculable. Scholars will have access to information on hitherto unknown materials of interest to their fields and on relevant holdings throughout the world. The resulting record will enable the Library of Congress and other major research libraries better to fulfill their roles as centers of scholarship.

• The Cataloging Distribution Service of the Library of Congress is 75 years old. Known formerly and perhaps better known as the Card Division, the service is in the business of distributing cataloging information throughout the library world, a task that once involved primarily the sale of catalog cards and which today also includes the sale of numerous book and microform catalogs and cataloging information in the form of MARC (MAchine Readable Cataloging) tapes. Catalog cards are still an important part of the LC’s service to the library community, as witnessed by the fact that more than one billion cards have been sold just in the last 20 years. That figure represents only a portion of the total number printed and distributed.

On October 28, 1901, a four-page announcement signed by then Librarian of Congress Herbert Putnam polled the library community for interest in subscribing to the LC card service. The response was so satisfactory that a month later “a second circular, giving additional information and correcting misapprehensions” was issued. The response continues. In fiscal year 1976, the Cataloging Distribution Service distributed more than 82 million catalog cards and tens of thousands of publications and MARC records.

Automation and diversification signalled the name change from Card Division to Cataloging Distribution Service. In 1968, the first stage of mechanization of the card distribution service was installed. Orders for cards are now received on machine-readable order forms, and MARC records are used to print sets of cards automatically for the LC catalogs and for distribution to the library community.

According to Deputy Librarian of Congress William J. Welsh, the service is continuing to distribute the bibliographic products of the LC Processing Department in both conventional book form and in microform. For example, Library of Congress Subject Headings is now being issued in a completely new edition every three months in microfiche and in microfilm produced by the computer-output-microform (COM) process.

Paralleling the other services is the MARC distribution service, begun with an experiment nearly 10 years ago in which MARC information on magnetic tapes was distributed weekly to 16 cooperating libraries. That service has grown to include virtually all LC’s current cataloging of roman-alphabet monographs and to include motion pictures, films, filmstrips, maps, and serials. Ultimately all the LC cataloging output will be included.

A new MARC service, announced only last month, will make available LC authority data in machine-readable form. The first files being made available are subject headings and references, but the format has been designed so that all kinds of authorities, such as names, subjects, and uniform titles, can reside in the same data base or be manipulated by the same programs. The service is a joint effort of the LC Cataloging Division, the MARC Development Office, and the Cataloging Distribution Service.

While automation of LC’s catalogs has been a topic of discussion at the Library of Congress and throughout the library world, current Cataloging Distribution Service Chief David Remington has assured librarians that LC has no plans to discontinue distributing printed cards or publications. “As long as there is sufficient demand to support the distribution of these services financially,” he said, “the library will continue to provide them.”

• The H. Raymond Danforth Library at New England College was dedicated October 17 in a formal ceremony held at the college’s New Science Building.

Danforth, 71, a native of Concord, N.H., served as superintendent of schools in Concord, Nashua, Epping, and Foxboro, Mass., and as a teacher and principal in the Keene and Claremont school systems before becoming New England College’s fourth president in 1958.

Dan Huntington Fenn, Jr., director of the J. F. Kennedy Library in Waltham, Mass., was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree during the ceremony, which was followed by a reception in the Danforth Library. Some 150 faculty, trustees, and friends of New England College were in attendance.

H. Raymond Danforth served as New England College’s president from 1958 until 1969. The four-year liberal arts college received its accreditation under his administration in 1967.

• Nominations for the 1977 Robert B. Downs Award for outstanding contributions to intellectual freedom in libraries are now being accepted by the Graduate School of Library Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

The award was established in 1968 to honor Downs, now dean emeritus of library administration at Illinois, on his 25th anniversary with the university.

The $500 award will be presented by the UIUC library school alumni during the fall of 1977.

Herbert Goldhor, director of the school, said the award may go to a library board member, a nonprofessional staff member, a professional librarian, a government official, or anyone who has worked to further intellectual freedom and the cause of truth in any type of library.

Nominations may be placed by librarians or laymen, he said.

Though preference will be given to U.S. nominees, candidates from other countries will be considered, Goldhor said. The faculty of the school will select the winner or may decide that no one qualifies.

Letters of nomination will be considered until April 15 and should be sent to Goldhor at the Graduate School of Library Science, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801.

• WESTEX is the Western Continuing Education (CE) Information Exchange and Network coordinated by WILCO (Western Interstate Library Coordinating Organization). The purpose of WESTEX is to provide a centralized place in the West where continuing education planners can come when they need assistance to (a) locate current and complete information on continuing education resources (courses, programs, seminars, etc., and personnel), (b) evaluate the effectiveness and impact of continuing education resources, and (c) utilize existing resources or develop new ones.

By sharing information on programs and their impact on those who have experienced them, the goal is to reduce redundant or irrelevant development and improve the quality of continuing education. By having a continuing staff resource at WESTEX, the goal is to save time for those responsible for continuing education programs at the state, local, or regional level in any type of library, media, or information center.

For more information, contact Eleanor A. Montague, Director, WILCO, Western Interstate Commission on Higher Education, P.O. Drawer P, Boulder, CO 80302; (303 ) 492- 7317 or 492-8188.

• The University of Illinois Graduate School of Library Science will sponsor a four-week course at the Newberry Library in Chicago from Monday, July 11, through Friday, August 5, on “The Conservation of Research Library Materials.” The course has been offered in alternate years since 1971 and will be taught by Paul N. Banks, conservator of the Newberry Library since 1964.

Designed for those who are responsible for the physical care of rare, research-type books and manuscripts, this course emphasizes the considerations involved in making decisions about the care of collections. It is not a workshop course in restoration or book repair. The class will meet at the Newberry Library, 60 W. Walton St., Chicago, for four hours a day, four days a week, with field trips on the fifth day.

Tuition will be $88, and the course carries one unit of graduate credit.

For an application for admission and for information on housing, write Richard F. Casper, University of Illinois Office of Continuing Education, 300 W. Golf Rd., Mt. Prospect, IL 60056, (312 ) 255-3320.

• The University of Illinois Graduate School of Library Science will offer a course on “Medical Literature and Reference Work” in the 1977 summer session from Monday, June 20, through Friday, July 22. The instructor will be Professor Lorraine Hìrschfeld, head of information services, Library of the Health Sciences, University of Illinois Medical Center, Chicago.

Detailed consideration will be given to bibliographical and reference materials in the health sciences (dentistry, pharmacy, public health, etc.) including government documents, computerized retrieval systems, and audiovisual materials. Course assignments will include visits to nearby medical and scientific libraries, hands-on experience with Medline, and practical problems utilizing typical reference sources.

The course carries one unit of graduate credit, and the tuition will be $88. Housing is available in dormitories on the medical center campus. For further information or an application blank write Richard F. Casper, Office of Continuing Education, University of Illinois, 300 W. Golf Rd., Mt. Prospect, IL 60056, (312) 255-3320.

PUBLICATIONS

• Arabic Historical Writing, 1974: An Annotated Bibliography of Books in History from All Parts of the Arab World, compiled and annotated by Fawzi Abdulrazak, intern (Arabic specialist) in the Middle Eastern Department of the Harvard College Library, recently has been published by the Harvard University Library. Mr. Abdulrazak’s Arabic Historical Writing, 1973 appeared last year, and compilation of a volume for 1975 is currently under way.

• The resources of 290 Virginia libraries are described in A Directory of Virginia Library Resources, compiled by the Task Force on Library Resources of the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. The entry for each library consists of a description of identified resources, including collection size, subject strengths, and special collections, as well as a statement of service policies and means of access. Use of the directory is enhanced by three indexes: an index of institution or corporate names, an index of special collections (including many manuscript and nonprint holdings), and an index of subjects. It is particularly valuable for the many U.S. government agency libraries that are listed. The 245-page directory is available free of charge from: John E. Molnar, Library Planning Coordinator, State Council of Higher Education for Virginia, 700 Fidelity Building, 9th and Main Streets, Richmond, VA 23219.

• The Canadian Library Association’s microfilm program has been very active since November 1947. Since its beginning, 232 Canadian newspapers have been filmed spanning the years from 1752 to 1928. Also 27 periodicals, journals, and studies have been microfilmed.

In early 1973, there was some indication that provincial studies were about to assume a place of importance in Canadian scholarship. For this reason, a microfilm program entitled Early Provincial Government Documents on Microfilm was begun.

The first phase of the provincial document filming has now been completed and covers the period from .1867 to 1900. The microfilm includes legislative assembly and council journals, which recorded the business of each session; sessional papers (departmental reports); statutes and revised statutes (laws); and debates and proceedings. Phase 2 (1901-1920) is now in progress.

The list of provincial government documents is available from the Microfilm Program of the Canadian Library Association, 151 Sparks St., Ottawa, Ontario. Prices quoted are for complete provincial sets. However, individual reels may be purchased for $30 each.

• The Continuing Library Education Network and Exchange (CLENE) has published a final report of its activities during the year of its funding by the U.S. Office of Education. From June 15, 1975, to June 30, 1976, CLENE operated under a planning grant from the Office of Libraries and Learning Resources, Title II-B fund from the Higher Education Act. The year of planning included four major objectives: creation of a permanent administrative structure for CLENE; establishment of a dues and fees structure; development of operational mechanisms required for the implementation of CLENE; identification of funding sources and preparation of proposals. The final report summarizes what CLENE has achieved in light of these four objectives.

Some of the major achievements are:

1. A computer-based information network that gives information, in print or on-line, about continuing education opportunities —their content, location, time, objectives, costs, leadership.

2. A directory of CLENE members that helps to find the leaders with the expertise, experience, and education to support continuing education programs.

3. Two CLENE Assemblies, with published proceedings, which have sought to develop innovative solutions to national concerns related to continuing education.

4. The CLENExchange newsletter to keep readers current on what’s happening in continuing education circles.

5. A continuing, multiprofessional, annotated bibliography that gives users a quick way of pinpointing resources to assist them in solving their problems.

6. A network of persons concerned about continuing education from a wide array of organizations and institutions with whom to share ideas and creative approaches to continuing education issues.

7. Concept papers on planning and teaching continuing education courses and on evaluating programs.

Included in the report are an evaluation of the significant aspects of the program as presented by the Panel of Review and Evaluation; a program review and planning structure for CLENE as prepared by the 1975/1976 ad hoc board of directors for the newly elected 1976/1977 board of directors; conclusions and recommendations by the project staff. An appendix includes selected items of particular relevance generated during the project year.

The final report is available from the CLENE Office, Box 1228, 620 Michigan Ave., N.E., Washington, D.C. 20064 at a cost of $2 for members and $3 for nonmembers.

• Selected Sound Recordings of American, British, and European Literature in English is a 140-page publication with 1,365 main entries of cassette tapes and disc records from 53 sources. The University Libraries at the University of Toledo announce the availability of this catalog, which is divided into 12 subject areas including Elizabethan drama, European drama, and American poetry. Unique is the fact that the titles of individual poems are listed for each recording. The compiler, Dr. Homer E. Salley, director of the Technological Media Center, has also reported purchasing information for each item: author, title, order number, distributor’s name and address. Playing time or duration is given for about 85 percent of the entries. When available, dates are given for the recording and for the original publication of the work.

The recordings are of five types: dramatizations of plays and novels, including highlights; readings by the author; readings by professional talent (e.g., James Mason, Judith Anderson); discussions of literary works by teachers and critics (e.g., Gilbert Highet, Philip Young); sound tracks from films.

The publication is available for $10. Send orders with payment to: Technological Media Center, University of Toledo, 2801 W. Bancroft St., Toledo, OH 43606.

• G. K. Hall & Co. announces the publication of Catalogues of the United Kingdom Department of the Environment Library, London, England, an outstanding reference source for the study of the environment. These catalogs are photographic reproductions of the library cards of the Department of the Environment Library in book form.

Formed by the amalgamation of the Library of the Ministry of Housing and Local Government and the Library of the Ministry of Transport, the Department of the Environment Library is one of the largest collections of its kind in the world. Approximately 250,000 books, pamphlets, and government reports, and some 2,500 current periodicals provide rich source material on all subjects pertaining to the environment.

The catalogs of the library contain approximately 580,000 bibliographic entries, offering access by author and by subject to the wealth of material in the collection. Major subject areas covered by the literature include social and environmental planning; roads, traffic, and transport; countryside and recreation; housing and local government; new towns, water, sewerage, and public hygiene; and pollution. The collection is particularly strong in postwar planning material. The scope of the collection ranges from early 19th-century local government reports to recent information on economic, parliamentary, statistical, scientific, and technical aspects of pollution.

Information about this outstanding resource may be obtained from G. K. Hall & Co., 70 Lincoln St., Boston, MA 02111, (617) 423- 3990.

• Statistical Sources on the History of France, a collection of nearly 100 extremely rare statistical works from the period of the French Revolution and the Empire has been published on microfiche by Microéditions Hachette and is being distributed in North America by Clearwater Publishing Company, 75 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10019.

Most of the titles in the collection are the responses of the various French prefects of the period to questionnaires sent from Paris. These works provide detailed statistics on the industry, agriculture, topography, demography, and health of the districts. Few libraries in the world, even in France, contain very many of the originals, including the British Museum and the Library of Congress. The collection was filmed by the Bibliothèque Nationale.

A list of the titles in the collection is available free of charge from Clearwater. The price of the complete collection is $950, from inventory in New York.

• WILCO (Western Interstate Library Coordinating Organization) is making available for general distribution and comment the fifth draft of Library Networking in the West: The Next Three Tears. The document, originally prepared by WILCO staff, has been extensively reviewed and revised by representatives from bibliographic utilities, service centers, state library agencies, academic and public libraries, and others in the library and information science profession.

The document discusses goals for networking in the West (in the context of national library network planning) that can guide resourcesharing activities during the next three years, including a strategy, tasks, and responsibilities for each. The document is not a task list for WILCO or any single organization. It is a guide to which western librarians can contribute and commit as they all move forward in making cooperation more effective in the West and the country. Over the next several months, work can be started on each task. For a free copy, contact: Mary Haenselman, Project Secretary, WILCO, P.O. Drawer P, Boulder, CO 80302, (303 ) 492-7317.

This network-planning document must be dynamic in order to continually take into account national network planning, technological advancements, and comments from librarians and information scientists. WILCO welcomes comments and reactions and will issue new drafts as required. Please send comments to Eleanor Montague or Karl Pearson at the above address.

• The School of Library Service, Dalhousie University, has published its Occasional Paper No. 12. Entitled The Helen F. Macrae Collection, a Bibliography of Korea Relations with Canadians and other Western Peoples, it includes a checklist of documents and reports, 1898-1975.

• The Library of the University of California at Berkeley has announced the publication of a new reference work on microfiche: the Berkeley Serials Union List (ISSN: 0363- 7026). Published each month and continually updating the more than 210,000 titles held by the 41 libraries on the Berkeley campus, it is available as a subscription. Contact: The Librarians Office, General Library, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720.

• ERIC announces the publication of a free microfiche: Looking forward to 1976: A Selected Bibliography on the Functions and Contributions of Libraries in American Society, prepared for 1975 Annual Convention of the American Library Association by the Stanford Libraries and the ERIC Clearinghouse on Information Resources.

This is available from: Eric Clearinghouse on Information Resources, Stanford Center for Research and Development in Teaching, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94304. They have also published a set of 25 slides about ERIC with accompanying booklet (1976, $20) covering: Introduction to ERIC, the Thesaurus, Resources in Education, Current Index to Journals in Education, and Computer Search Strategy. This can be used to teach a variety of audiences having different levels of sophistication. Send check payable to “Box E” to Box E, School of Education, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305.

• R. R. Bowker Company announces simultaneous publication of all seven volumes of the 13th edition of American Men and Women of Science edited by Jaques Cattell Press. Publication date was October 29, 1976, marking 70 years since the inception of the one-volume first edition of the biographical directory of active scientists of North America. Reflecting on certain pivotal events in the development of three companies now part of the same corporate family, Jaques Cattell Press, R. R. Bowker Company, and Xerox Corporation, the year 1906 appears to have been an auspicious one.

• Peter Martin Associates has announced the publication of the first edition of Canadian Book Review Annual and Canadian Fiction: An Annotated Bibliography.

Canadian Book Review Annualwas conceived and prepared under the editorial direction of Dean Tudor, chairman of the Library Arts Department, Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, Toronto. CBRA provides reviews by librarians and subject specialists of all Canadian English-language trade titles published in 1975, including 1975 reprints of titles originally published before 1966, selected federal and provincial government publications, and English translations of French-Canadian titles. The concise 250-word reviews are organized by number within subject categories and provide complete ordering and bibliographical information (author, title, publisher, place and date of publication, collation, price, and ISBN).

Says Dean Tudor, “CBRA will be the basic selection aid for school, college, and university librarians, not only in Canada but abroad.”

Canadian Fiction: An Annotated Bibliographyfills the need for a comprehensive bibliographical guide to Canada’s literature. Every novel and short story collection (including translations of French-Canadian titles) is listed with a concise descriptive annotation. Each author entry lists out-of-print titles, critical and biographical studies, as well as relevant multi- media material. An invaluable index groups fiction titles under the major thematic areas of Canadian literature.

• Information Resources Press announces a new abstracting and indexing periodical, E1S: Key to Environmental Impact Statements. It indexes environmental impact statements by subject content, geographic area involved or affected, and by originating agency or organization. For further information contact: IRP, 2100 M Street N.W., Suite 316, Washington D.C. 20037. „