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Report of the President REPORT of the PRESIDENT REPORT of THE 1 Report of the President REPORT OF THEREPORT PRESIDENT Refl ections on Encounters With Three Cultures by Vartan Gregorian ceiver and a giver—and every step of the way has Introduction made for an exhilarating and inspiring journey. At fi rst as a foreign student, then as an 1764, 1895 and 1911. Those dates represent immigrant, then as a citizen who was born and quite a span of time. The fi rst is the year that raised in Iran and spent his secondary school Brown University was founded; the second is years in Lebanon, I was always keenly aware the year that The New York Public Library of being an outsider, even though, over time, was established and the third is the year that I gradually became an “insider,” too. During Andrew Carnegie created the philanthropic the past fi fty years, since I attended Stanford foundation he named Carnegie Corporation of University as a freshman, I have always been New York. interested not only in the outward, visible It has been my privilege to serve the three structure of organizations, but also their tex- above-named institutions, each representative ture, their idiosyncrasies, and their individual of a different nonprofi t culture, each with a dif- institutional cultures. Furthermore, my career ferent structure, different history, and different has been such that I have seen institutions both dynamics. While serving these institutions I from below and above, from the trenches to have been both an observer and a participant, a the helm, which allowed me to observe not spectator and an actor, a reader and a lender, a re- only their individual segments but also to un- derstand how all the parts fi t together to form important commonality, though, is that all were their whole structure and support their overall founded to serve our society and our democ- mission. In writing this essay, it is my inten- racy, and all remain dedicated to that purpose. tion to share my observations, and to refl ect Synthesizing what I have observed and on and analyze the nature of the three cultures learned over decades of service in three differ- in which I have spent my career: libraries, the ent cultures provides a major challenge. Hence, academy, and the fi eld of philanthropy. These though I cannot promise to be brief, I will do refl ections are based primarily on my experi- my best to be thorough. ences as the head of The New York Public Library, Brown University and now, Carnegie Corporation of New York. I hope that some of my observations as an outsider/insider will pro- vide useful insights and the kind of fi rst-hand knowledge that may assist those who have taken or will take similar journeys especially now, when the role of nonprofi ts is so essential to the advancement of progress in our nation’s 3 social, cultural, and economic domains and when the role of foundations, in particular, seems to be in the national spotlight. Naturally, I have not drawn my observa- tions exclusively from the three institutions that I have headed. I have also relied on my previous experiences and impressions during the years that I was a professor at San Francisco State College, the University of California at Los Angeles, the University of Texas at Austin, and the University of Pennsylvania. However, I have organized this essay along chronologi- The New York Public Library cal lines, from my time at that most iconic of American libraries, The New York Public One’s opening lines are always indicative of Library, followed by Brown University. Finally, what one thinks of the character of an institu- I will examine the nature and scope of philan- tion. For me, The New York Public Library thropy in the United States as seen through is much more than a cultural institution; I the lens of Carnegie Corporation of New York, consider libraries to be among the central edu- which I joined as president in 1997. cational resources of any civilization, includ- ing ours, which is why, in 1981, when I fi rst The experiences and knowledge I have addressed the staff of the Library as their new acquired at each institution have had an impact president,1 I called them “my fellow educators.” on my experiences at the next. While each is Walking into the Library that morning I had different from the others, they do have com- mon traits, common problems, and they often 1 Vartan Gregorian served as president of The New York confront common issues. Perhaps their most Public Library from 1981 to 1989. thought about the important role that libraries As to the many subjects I studied over the had played in my life and about my respect for years, while I felt that I was caught between librarians, not simply as keepers of books and dilettantism and expertise, my unwavering collections of materials but as true dissemina- interest in each and all of them made libraries a tors—even champions—of knowledge. Along natural habitat for someone like me. The New with teachers and other public servants, they York Public Library provided a nearly perfect are modest, unsung civic heroes, who day after home replete with seemingly endless opportu- day, year after year, answer questions, provide nities to satisfy my intellectual curiosity. At the guidance along the pathways of research and same time, I came to appreciate the obvious literature, and catalogue, organize and analyze differences between the world of the university, information, turning what might seem like which I had just left, and the world of librar- ordinary tasks into something sublime. ies. To begin with, no one can graduate from a library. There are no entrance or exit exams. In- I have always been in awe of libraries and dividuals come and go, doing their work, their have been in love with books since I was a research, or just reading for pleasure. It was child. Later, I became a regular habitué of fascinating for me to walk through the Library bookstores particularly those that sell used and see all the different individuals who used 4 books, an addiction that I know I share with the different collections—it was like having a many people around the world for whom window onto a true microcosm of humanity. prowling the aisles of a used bookstore is some- People of different ages, genders, races, appear- thing close to going on a great treasure hunt. ance and dress took up almost every chair in When I arrived at The New York Public the Library or were bent over a book, a docu- Library from the University of Pennsylvania, ment or other material at almost every table. where I had served in both academic and Unlike universities, whose constituents are administrative positions from 1972 until 1981, fi nite, The New York Public Library’s constitu- I was no stranger to libraries. After all, as an ents were, potentially, everybody. The Library undergraduate and graduate student at Stan- did not have any specifi c or particular groups ford University, I had more or less lived in the or individuals as its clientele: those who used library as I pursued my education, which fo- the Library’s facilities were an ever-changing cused on history and the humanities. In subse- cross-section of humanity who came from the quent years, as my interests widened to include city, from all across the country as well as from fi elds such as European intellectual history, the many foreign nations. In that connection, one history of the Middle East and of the modern of the many features of the Research Library Caucasus, not to mention Afghanistan, my ap- that I found extraordinary was that one did preciation for the scope, range and richness of not have to produce scholarly credentials, iden- library collections grew. When I became dean tifi cation, or show citizenship status in order to of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at the Uni- read a book or an article, or see a photograph versity of Pennsylvania, the university libraries or some other item. It was anyone’s right to became a much-beloved responsibility for me, look at and learn from the Library’s materials. as my concern was not only the quality and Even noncitizens had this same right because, breadth of material and services they offered when you walked into the Library, nobody but ensuring their future, as well. asked your status in terms of American citizen- ship, occupation, or residency. Just the fact that resources of the Library far outweighed their you showed up at the front door gave you the meager pay. When he was young, the late New right to use the Library and all its resources York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan spent and connections to the rest of the world. his Saturday afternoons shining shoes on 42nd Street and afterwards, would make his way to The Library universalized everybody. the Library’s Main Reading Room. “It was the By that I mean it served as a bridge between fi rst time I was taught that I was welcome in the individual and anything they wanted or a place of education and learning,’’ he said. “I needed to know about anything under the would go into that great marble palace and I sun—or beyond it—that human beings had would check my shoeshine box. A gentleman written, dreamed of or speculated about. I in a brown cotton jacket would take it as if I’d thought about that notion even more than I passed over an umbrella and a bowler hat.’’3 had in the past after the Library’s card cata- logue was computerized because I realized, Because the Library had so many grateful then, that whether a person was in the Main benefi ciaries, I knew we did not have to rely Research Library on 42nd Street or at any local only on our talented public affairs and develop- branch library, they could look for material ment offi cers to tell the Library’s story.
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