COLLEGE and RESEARCH LIBRARIES When Dr

C. C. Williamson: A Record of Service to American Librarianship N JUNE 30, 1943, Charles Clarence nomics Division at the library, and finally O Williamson brought to a close his as director of the Information Service of active professional career, including seven- the Rockefeller Foundation. The last of teen years of work as director of libraries these connections continued until 1926, and dean of the School of Library Service when he assumed his responsibilities at at Columbia University. Columbia University. Dr. Williamson's life affords one of Important as were Dr. Williamson's those examples, fortunately not rare activities in the New York Public Library among librarians, in which marked ability and in the offices of the foundations after achieves expression along an avenue which coming to New York, they were but one is unusual and unforeseen. He appeared part of the prelude to his major work. at one time to be destined for a life of col- The other part was his examination of lege teaching, but his great contribution library schools in the United States, turned out to be the organizing and ad- which was authorized by the Carnegie ministering of libraries and of a library Corporation in 1919 and reported upon in school. his Training for Library Service in 1923. Born at Salem, Ohio, in 1877, Dr. This accomplished, on a scale appropriate Williamson spent his boyhood in a rural to library schools, the kind of thing which environment and his earliest professional the surveys by Flexner, Mann, and Reed years as a public school teacher. He se- had done in the fields of medicine, engi- cured his college education at Ohio Wes- neering, and law respectively. It brought leyan University and at Western Reserve into the open the merits and weaknesses University, where in 1904 he received his of the schools; and, although many of bachelor's degree. Upon graduation he these already were familiar to librarians entered the University of Wisconsin as a and to faculties, the findings focused at- candidate for the doctorate and at the tention on what needed correcting and close of two years transferred to Colum- on what outsiders expected of the schools. bia University, which granted him in 1907, As a consequence it opened a new channel the degree of doctor of philosophy in eco- for the interest of the Carnegie Corpora- nomics. He taught economics and poli- tion in library service, challenged the tics for four years thereafter at Bryn American Library Association to exert an Mawr College. In 1911 he moved to effective influence upon library schools, New York and served successively as and led to a renovation in education for head of the Economics Division and of the librarianship. The gifts of the Carnegie Municipal Reference Branch of the New Corporation and the work of the A.L.A. York Public Library, as statistician for Board of Education for Librarianship the Americanization study of the Carnegie were the active forces in the process, but Corporation, again as chief of the Eco- the Williamson report was the fulcrum. 306 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES When Dr. Williamson took office at the demands and currents of thought in Columbia he faced two tasks. One was the library field. Evolution has been a immediate and embodied his own further keynote. The results have shown in share in making over the scheme of pro- various ways, but preeminently in the fessional preparation. It involved the scheme of courses, syllabi, and examina- transplanting and reorganizing of two tions which were instituted at the close library schools. The New York State of the school's first decade and which Library School, stemming from the orig- liberalized markedly its already extensive inal enterprise of its kind begun at offerings and rendered them more adapt- Columbia College in 1887, had been able to the individual interests of students. successful for three decades and more. Its Coordinating University Libraries position was anomalous, however, for although it operated under the Regents of The other undertaking before Dr. Wil- the University of the State of New York, liamson in 1926 was even larger and more the policy of the regents is not to conduct intricate, if less pressing. The univer- teaching agencies. The Library School sity libraries had functioned for years with of the New York Public Library also had varying degrees of effectiveness but with- established a creditable record, but, being out full coordination as regards the build- sponsored by a public library, it lacked ing of collections, the systematizing of contacts with higher education. The service, and the administering of person- transfer of these institutions to Columbia nel. The physical facilities also were a University and their consolidation there handicap at some points. The applying had been proposed incident to the desig- of remedies here was a long-term task. nation of a new director of libraries. To Gradually and over a period of years pro- Dr. Williamson these constituted an at- cedures have been reorganized ; a personnel tractive aspect of the post. His selection scheme has been introduced; staff appoint- was the signal to go ahead with the new ments have been made with a view to arrangement. He accordingly was called strengthening weak spots and stepping up upon to begin at once the assembling of a efficiency; and a new building has been faculty, the planning of a curriculum, and erected which typifies the workshop prin- the acquiring of equipment. This he did, ciple and assures adequate quarters both and in September of 1926 the School of for a large section of the library activities Library Service initiated its classes. and stock and for the School of Library The full record of the school under Service. All of these, and especially the Dr. Williamson's direction would require problems of staff and building, entailed more extended treatment than is possible major efforts and tested anew the direc- here. From the outset it embraced fea- tor's powers of organization and adminis- tures which by that time librarians were tration. coming to consider essential, such as a While discharging his heavy official du- large student body, an expanded faculty, ties, Dr. Williamson has borne an ample a diversified program, a university connec- share of work for other library organization, improved resources, and generous tions and interests. He has been the main- physical facilities. Moreover, it has spring of the annual Thanksgiving-time sought throughout to keep responsive to conferences of eastern college librarians; SEPTEMBER, 1943 2 77 he was a prime mover in marshaling sup- days as secretary to the president of West- port in the United States for the comple- ern Reserve University afforded him an tion of the printed catalog of the insight into the management and financing Bibliotheque nationale; he was president of an educational institution. His gradu- from 1929 to 1931 of the Association of ate study assured for him a thorough aca- American Library Schools; he has served demic equipment. Initiative and capacity a term on the Executive Board of the for planning and execution are strong in American Library Association; and he him, as became evident when they de- has been active in the Association of Re- manded quicker and more complete ful- search Libraries. Significant honors have filment than seemed likely to be attained come to him, particularly in the receipt in a professor's field of activity. And be- from Columbia University of the honorary hind all these are a keenness of mind, a degree of Litt.D. in 1929 and his desig- clearness of vision, a quiet but dynamic nation by the French government in the enthusiasm, an ability to wait as well as same year as Chevalier de la Legion to act, a persistence in pressing toward d'honneur, this in recognition of his help a goal, and a readiness to carry loads of on the catalog of Bibliotheque nationale. work far beyond the powers of most men, which together could not fail to make him Ingredients of Success a leader and a builder. The ingredients of success often are Dr. Williamson leaves the scene of his complex or intangible but in Dr. William- labors after setting a record of extraor- son's case some of them at least are easily dinary accomplishment and with the ac- discernible. His farm life gave him a claim of a profession which recognizes his contact with realities which many men contributions to its progress. miss. The time he devoted in college ERNEST J. REECE 308 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES Frank K. Walter in Retrospect HE RETIREMENT of Frank Keller TWalter from active administrative work as librarian of the University of Minnesota revives my respectful compas- sion for several university presidents who have cast their nets for likely librarians within the last decade but have found none suitable. Their most frequent complaint has been that young and otherwise eligible men did not know literature or were ignorant of books. Candidates might dilate upon technical processes and mass applications but exhibited a serene ig- norance of the world's great books and even had no special field in which they excelled. This presidential regret would seem justified by the fact that historically all academic enlightenment was based upon the book. Actually and at present the book, and the knowledge of books, is no exclusive criterion of a person's fitness for librarianship. Such gifts as educational interest, a talent for organization, FRANK KELLER WALTER and that instinctive academic ingenuity which makes men indispensable on the humanists who respect bibliology and campus—such gifts are, after all, more know how to apply it to organized edu- to the purpose than profound bibliological cational functions.

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