ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

Acquisitions

The papers of Daniel Melcher (1912–1985), chairman of the board of R. R. Bowker Company from 1961–1967, have been acquired by the University of Virginia Library. Melcher was an innovator in developing professional library publications and reference services; he founded numerous standard book-trade titles, including Books in Print and American Book Publishing Record. Melcher also established the International Standard Book Numbering (ISBN) system in the mid-1960s Included among the papers are manuscripts and typescripts of Melcher’s many articles and books, his professional and personal correspondence, correspondence and working papers concerning his involvement in the Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential (IAHP), family correspondence and photographs, and manuscripts and typescripts of his mother, Marguerite Melcher.

The Ohio University Library received agrant of books valued at $8,200 from the Japan Foundation. The books, all in English, were chosen by the library from a list developed by leading Japanese and American scholars. The titles will help fill gaps in the library’s collection.

The library at the University of California, Irvine, has received 600 volumes of monographic works on Korean literature, history, and social sciences from the Creation and Criticism Company (Changjak-kwa-bipyong), a publisher of scholarly books and journals in Korea. Also included in the gift are recent issues of four journal titles: Creation and Criticism, Women and Society‚ Law and Society‚ and Critical Studies of Korean Literature.

The papers of Y. C. James Yen (1893–1990), and the archives of the organization he founded, the International Institute of Rural Reconstruction (IIRR), have been acquired by Columbia University’s Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Born in China and educated at Yale and Princeton Universities, Yen was a pioneer in promoting rural development and literacy among peasant populations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The collection dates to the 1920’s and includes personal papers, speeches, records, and correspondence with such figures as Pearl Buck, Justice William O. Douglas, Henry Luce, and Eleanor Roosevelt. It also documents seven decades of work by the IIRR and its predecessors to promote self-help on three continents. Among Yen’s personal papers are his handwritten diaries covering more than 40 years; notes of his interviews and meetings with Gen. George C. Marshall, Jawaharlal Nehru, Nelson Rockefeller, Adlai Stevenson, and Harry S Truman; and original book manuscripts, photos, newspaper clippings, and films related to his work.

A rare early printed book entitled Index Preclare Dictorumhas been acquired by the University of Notre Dame Libraries. Published in 1518, the book is the first of a four-volume set of collected works by the medieval theologian Jean Gerson. Gerson, born in 1363, was chancellor of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in France and the chancellor of the University of Paris. The book is the 2-millionth book in the library’s collection.

Six books by Harold Weisberg on theassassination of President John F. Kennedy have been acquired by the University of Kentucky library. Not commercially available, Weisberg’s books—Whitewash‚ volumes I-IV, Oswald in New Orleans, and Post Mortem—are based on 30 years of research. A former reporter and U.S. Senate investigator, Weisberg argues that the Kennedy assassination was the result of a conspiracy and that Lee Harvey Oswald was just “a convenient patsy.” Weisberg has also written about the murder of Martin Luther King.

A complete set of maps of the westernSoviet Union has been acquired by the Harvard College Library. Prepared by the Soviet military during the 1970s and 1980s, the maps include information on roads, rail lines, air fields and oil pipelines, and are among the most current and accurate maps of the former Soviet Union in the world. Designed at a scale of 1:200,000, these are topographic as opposed to planimetric. The back of each map summarizes valuable information about large and small towns, suburbs, and villages, including urban plans and descriptions of industry, buildings, utilities, water, and transportation; types and conditions of roads and rivers; and land use and agriculture including vegetation, soil, and climate. These military maps were prepared with scrupulous accuracy, in contrast to certain maps in the notorious Atlas Mira of the early 1970s, which aimed to confuse the Western military by shifting the locations of certain cities. ■