ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

News from the Field

Acquisitions

•Brown UniversityLibrary, Providence,Rhode Island, has established a collection of more than 1,200 items relating to Judaism, to be known as the Ernest S. Frerichs Library of Biblical and Judaic Studies, after a former Dean of the Graduate School. The foundation of the collection is a gift of Judaic Studies materials from Professor Jacob S. Neusner, emphasizing analyses and criticism of the Mishna, Talmud, Bible, Midrash and general religious thought; ancient history; archaeology and art; and general Jewish studies and thought.

♦The Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, hasacquired some important and rare historical items, including Zadock Cramer’s The Ohio and Mississippi Navigator, Third Corrected Edition. The book was a very popular guide to western rivers and went through twelve editions. Other new Society acquisitions include: Col. James Smith’s A Treatise on the Mode and Manner of Indian Warfare, printed by Joel R. Lyle in Paris, Kentucky, in 1812, an early guide to Indian fighting; and the second known copy of an unrecorded broadside of Thomas Jefferson’s inaugural speech, printed on silk by Nathaniel Willis in Chillicothe in 1801. All items are available for researchers investigating the early history of the Northwest Territory.

•Rutgers University’sArchibald Alexander Library,New Brunswick, New Jersey, has recently acquired the only known surviving copy of a French book of 1534. The little volume (3” x 4”) is a collection of the poetry of Clement Marot (1496-1544) to which he gave the title L’Adolescence Clementine. The edition was previously thought to have appeared in Paris, but is now known to have been printed in Lyons, and is the earliest known illustrated edition. The book was first published in Paris in 1532 and was followed by the Suite de L Adolescence Clementine in 1533. Although best sellers in their time, copies are now extremely rare. The Suite, also present in the newly acquired volume, was constantly added to as Marot wrote new poems, and so the successive new editions put out by enterprising publishers enable the chronology of this group of Marot’s poems to be more firmly established as his books come to light. A pirated edition, the book also gives information on the activities of a printer who evaded the equivalent of today’s copyright laws.

Grants

•Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village,Dearborn, Michigan, has received an NEH grant of more than $82,000 to establish a direct visual access system for the photograph collection in the Museum’s Archival and Library Collections. The project will make more than 30,000 images from the Ford Motor Company Photograph Collection, currently staff-serviced and largely unresearched, directly accessible to researchers. The photos illustrate products, manufacturing plants, industrial design and manufacturing processes, and labor and social history topics from 1900 to 1950. They also document many of Henry Ford’s non- automotive interests.

•Hofstra University, Hempstead, New York,has received a grant of $600,000 from the Pew Me- morial Trust to complete automation of the Uni- versity’s Libraries. With the new automation proj- ect, the Main and Law Libraries will acquire hardware and software for an automated circula- tion system, a patron access catalog, an acquisi- tions subsystem, and a periodicals control subsys- tem.

•The New York University Libraries have beenawarded a $1 million grant by the Pew Memorial Trust to develop a prototype interconnected com- puter information system. The grant will be used to develop and test a new application of standard tele- communications protocols using the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) reference model formulated by the International Standards Organization (ISO). The OSI model allows dissimilar computer systems to communicate and exchange informa- tion. This reference model will be used to link Bob- Cat and RLG’s Research Library Information Net- work (RLIN) database. The OSI model will let NYU establish the link without the intervening step NYU’s Tamiment Institute Library has also been awarded a $20,000 grant by the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA), to establish a videocassette collection of films on the history of labor and leftist politics in the United States. In several instances the makers of independent documentaries began their research in Tamiment’s book, manuscript, photograph, and oral history collections.

• Oberlin College,Ohio, h as received a$100,000 grant from the Charles E. Culpeper Foundation of New York City. The grant will support the installation of an online, automated catalog and circulation system in the Oberlin College Library system. Installation of the system is scheduled for 1987.

• Old Sturbridge Village,Sturbridge, Massachusetts,has been awarded a $10,269 Conservation Project Support Grant by the Institute of Museum Services for museum projects during 1986 and 1987. The grant, matched by Old Sturbridge Village, will fund personnel training to perform paper deacidification as part of the Museum’s library conservation program. Research methodology for the proper conservation of painted tinware and a database of paints and finishing materials used in identifying antique tinware will also be developed.

News Note

•U.S. Department of Education assistant secretaryfor educational research and improvement Chester E. Finn Jr. has named a 13-member panel to study the redesign and operation of the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC). The redesign study panel will advise on the future direction of ERIC. Finn has asked the panel, drawn primarily from the information science and education communities, to examine ERIC to determine whether it adequately meets current requests for information and is technologically prepared to meet future needs; whether its dissemination efforts effectively meet the needs of current and potential users, and whether awareness and access to ERIC can be improved; and whether its quality control procedures are adequate to assure that the materials put into the system are accurate, reliable and of high quality. Six individuals including a principal and a college president were asked to review the recommendations of the ERIC Redesign Study Panel. A final report from the panel, which meets twice, is expected in September.