In November the ALA Archives received a very generous donation of over 6,000 library postcards from Daniel Lester, now called the Daniel W. Lester Library Postcard Collection. The postcards made a cross country journey, courtesy of Larry Nix, from Mr. Lester’s home to the ALA Archives where they are now open for researchers to access. Continue reading “Daniel W. Lester Library Postcard Collection”
The ALA Archives is always pleased when our records are used in publishing new historical research, and today is the official release date for the book When Books Went to War: The Stories that Helped Us Win World War II by Molly Manning, which includes research from records held at the ALA Archives. The book tells the story of the revival of mass-organized library services for the armed forces, which had been premiered during World War I but fallen into neglect during peacetime. The Victory Book Campaign was a joint effort from librarians, booksellers, publishers, and the US armed forces to not just rekindle the library program, but to greatly expand it. Librarians focused their efforts on organizing book donation drives, as demonstrated with this poster to the right.
Ms. Manning used the papers of Althea B. Warren, ALA President 1943-44, when researching this book. The ALA Archives holds additional records related to its work in the Victory Book Campaign, including reports, correspondence, and scrapbooks.
The American Library Association Annual Conference is often a much anticipated event for librarians. In 1876, 103 people attended the first conference in Philadelphia; last year alone over 26,000 people attended the Annual Conference in Chicago.[1] Needless to say, the conference has grown a bit.
Amongst all of the exhibits, sessions, speakers, and free swag, there is one item that is essential to get around any conference: the program. The program is the guide that allows people to navigate the conference, select which events to go to, which speakers to listen to, and where to obtain a free lunch. Throughout the years, the Annual Conference Program has become thicker as the conference has expanded, and it has changed its appearance. Early conference programs continue to be a valuable resource to the archives, but they were not nearly as aesthetically pleasing as the ones the ALA produces today. Continue reading “Ode to the Conference Program”
The ALA Archives has been busy working on large accessions of records sent to us by American Libraries magazine and the ALA Library. These new accessions will total up to 40 bankers boxes once all of them have been shipped over, and the archives staff is excited to receive them.
The archives staff is currently working on boxes sent to us from the ALA Library. These records are a rich collection of photograph vertical files that not only document the history of the ALA, but of the librarian profession itself. There are of course photos and negatives of various ALA conferences, events, and staff, but there are also photographs of bookmobiles, libraries, exhibits, various library technologies, and even book trucks! Continue reading “New Accessions at the Archives”
While the battles, uniforms, and weapons that made up a World War I serviceman’s life are very well documented in the history books, the day-to-day monotony of a soldier’s life doesn’t often get as much attention. The ALA Archives has recently migrated our collection of digitized lantern slides from World War I into the CONTENTdm system, which shows one way these men filled their downtime: reading.
View the complete Library War Service images collection here.
Continue reading “Library War Service slides collection now online and browsable”
Often when we think of archives, we automatically think of the paper items which document the decisions and actions of an organization or individual; be they correspondence, agendas, or photographs. But the ALA Archives also contains audiovisual materials, which can bring can bring a living action to past events.
Within the ALA Archives, we have many historic films on library services and literacy such as “Help Yourself,” a 1950 film about library services by the Cambria County Public Library. This and other films can be found in Record Series 18/1/13.
One of the most recently processed acquisitions was from the Public Relations Office (Record Series 12/3/63), which included videos and films promoting the @ Your Library campaign, interviews with ALA Presidents, public service announcements featuring celebrities such as Whoopi Goldberg and Patrick Stewart, and the American Library Association as featured on local and national news broadcast.
Another recently digitized item in our collection is “Loss and Recovery: Librarians Bear Witness to September 11, 2001,” oral histories by New York Librarians describing their experience during the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 from Record Series 18/2/13.
Although the challenge most often faced when accessing audiovisual material is the ability to navigate obsolete media formats, these materials are preserved with the goal of access. We are currently working with the University of Illinois Library Media Preservation Program to digitize our materials by request, and will be happy to assist you in accessing our holdings.
To browse more of our audiovisual collection, please click the following links:
ALA Archives database search: “audiovisual”
ALA Archives database search: “video”
If you’re a dedicated reader of our blog, you may know that during World War I the ALA sent over 10 million books and magazines to camp libraries and overseas for the use of servicemen. The collection development of these libraries was focused on having material that could help the men prepare for a job back home, such as books about business, engines, plumbing, carpentry, cement, and trains, but they also recognized that the servicemen needed entertainment, and stocked the libraries with magazines and “good, live fiction.” These library services still supported the servicemen after the armistice as well.
But what happened to all those books when the servicemen came home? The post-war life of the War Service books was very practical: ALA-managed libraries were transformed into military-managed libraries after the war. And as these military librarians eventually weeded them out of the collection or otherwise discarded them, War Service books were sold into private hands or distributed to public libraries for further use.
The ALA Archives holds a small selection of former War Service books as examples of how these books were marked and circulated during this important early ALA campaign. Here are a few pictures from the books in our collection:
Continue reading ““Give the Next Man a Chance!” The Circulating Books of World War I”
The American Library Association Archives is pleased to announce the digitization of the Chinese American Librarians Association newsletters and conference programs!
Within the newsletters (1982-2000) are messages from the President; chapter, committee, and individual member announcements; administrative updates; essays on Chinese and East-Asian librarianship; narratives of CALA events; obituaries and tributes; conference itineraries; job and scholarship postings; and publication announcements and reviews.
The CALA newsletters, membership directories, and conference programs are found at the ALA Archives in Record Series 85/4/30
These digitized documents can be found here.
Chinese-American Librarians Association website
Another significant collection at the American Library Association Archives is the Library Building Photographs, Record Series 99/1/15.
Compiled from numerous creators and spanning over one hundred years of documentation, these images offer both a broad geographic and historical perspective of libraries. These buildings range from magnificent classic libraries to quirky traveling book mobiles.
As a graduate student at the University of Illinois, I was intrigued to find a photograph of the University Library.
With sweeping columns and arches, it bears no resemblance to our current Library. Was it before a remodel? According to the Mathematics Department’s history page, the University Library moved to its new building (our current Library) in 1926 and Altgeld Hall was divided between the Department of Mathematics and the Law School, before completely transferring to the Mathematics Department in the mid-1950s.[2]
Undergoing several additions and renovations, the original stained glass dome of the rotunda was replaced in the early forties by a plaster dome inscribed with the names of U. S. Chief Justices of the Supreme Court to that date. In the final 1956-57 addition, additional classrooms were added, “resulting in the blocking of many windows of the original structure and the enclosure of the East Reading Room. The skylight that had been over the stained glass dome was also removed at that time.” The Librarian’s Office was also converted to a Men’s Room and hallway.[3] Although compromising the original opulence of the building, the renovations itself serve as a testament to functional demands of a growing university.
For more information:
Department of Mathematics’ History of Altgeld Hall
http://www.math.illinois.edu/History/
Altgeld Past and Present Interior and Exterior Photographs http://www.library.illinois.edu/mtx/altgeld.html
Library Building Photographs Digital Collection at the ALA Archives
Other Digital Collections at the ALA Archives
Posters used by the ALA during its early history are now digitized for long-term preservation and access copies are available for viewing online. [Database currently down, 3/8/2019] Subjects covered in these posters include the ALA’s work with the Library War Service to the American military during World War I, the importance of the freedom to read used during World War II, celebrating the ALA 50 Year Anniversary (in 1926) and the Carnegie Centenary (in 1935), as well as librarianship recruitment and general library promotion during the early twentieth century. These posters provide important documentary evidence of both the work of the ALA and how the presentation of American libraries and librarianship has changed over the past century.
Continue reading “Early ALA Posters now Digitized and Online”