ACRL's Fiftieth Anniversary: for Reflection, for Celebration, and for Anticipation Edward G
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50th Anniversary Feature- ACRL's Fiftieth Anniversary: For Reflection, for Celebration, and for Anticipation Edward G. Holley We want to link the past with the future, and the strong and mature professional organiza lOOth anniversary of the College Library Section tion."1 gives us an excellent opportunity for reflection, for Those were ambitious gaols, to say the celebration, and for anticipation of the next 100 least. But in retrospect it is amazing not years.-Martha A. Bowman, cochair, ACRL only that Kuhlman's aims and goals have Fifth National Conference, Research Libraries in OCLC: A Quarterly, Autumn 1987. been achieved in the last fifty years, but also how similar those aims and goals are to the current ACRL Strategic Plan. 2 In REFLECTION: deed, A. F. Kuhlman would probably be THE BIRTH OF COLLEGE & amazed, surely gratified, at how far aca RESEARCH LIBRARIES demic librarians have come since the days When A. Frederick Kuhlman edited the when he did battle with ALA Executive first issue of College & Research Libraries Secretary Carl Milam (1920-48) and the (December 1939}, he pronounced its aims ALA establishment. For Kuhlman and his in the authoritative manner that was his colleagues were anything but reticent hallmark. C&RL was to serve as the com about ALA's neglect of matters that con munications medium for the new ACRL, cerned academic librarians. but the journal was to do much more than At the heart of the disagreement was the that. The quarterly was also to publish ar ALA headquarters staff's lack of under ticles from convention speeches, to serve standing of the nature of higher education as a clearing-house for educational re and the academic library's relationship to search, to bridge the gap between college scholarship and learning. Academic li administrators/faculties and librarians, to brarians believed the way to success in the serve as a bridge with other agencies and academic library was to be more like the learned societies, to review and abstract faculty, interested in scholarship, con books of interest to ACRL members, to cerned about teaching, and devoted to re stimulate research on improving library search and publication. In that effort service and publish the research results, C&RL was to play a crucial role. As David and to "help develop the A.C.R.L. into a Kaser, one of Kuhlman's successors as ed- Edward G. Holley is Professor at the School of Information and Library Science, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27599-3360. 11 12 College & Research Libraries January 1989 itor (1963-69) later commented, '' C&RL voiced after William Warner Bishop's was a periodical intended at once to be presidency (1918-19) and the failed ALA [ACRL' s] news bulletin, scholarly journal, effort in 1919-20 to secure funds for mas and its forum. ''3 At various stages it sive improvement in library ser-Vice. This served all three functions well. Today, af ''Enlarged Library Program'' has been de ter the spin-off of the news to College & Re scribed by historian Dennis Thomison as search Libraries News in 1966, C&RL is pri ALA's short-lived experiment as a welfare marily a scholarly journal, indeed often organization. 6 the most cited and highly rated among all For the next two decades academic li the scholarly periodicals in the field of li brarians' dissatisfaction grew until it fi brarianship.4 But ACRL and C&RL have nally culminated in the birth of ACRL in been a long time reaching that eminent 1938. position. THE COLLEGE AND ACADEMIC LIBRARIANS AND ALA: REFERENCE LIBRARY SECTION THEACRLBACKGROUND From its beginning in '1889, the ALA Despite the fact that college and univer College Library Section was mainly a sity librarians had formed the first ALA small discussion group of academic library section in 1889, there is little doubt that administrators. To accommodate refer public librarians dominated the associa ence librarians, the section changed its tion's leadership well into the second half name to the College and Reference Library of the twentieth century. True, the first Section in 1897. However, though the sec three ALA presidents could be regarded tion began electing officers early in the as academ'ic types: Justin Winsor twentieth century, it remained small until (1876-85), who had been Boston public li 1923 when it adopted its first set of by brarian for nine years before transferring laws. Growth was rapid after that, from 90 his allegiance across the river to Harvard members in 1923 to 800 members in 1928, in 1877; William Frederick Poole though membership declined after 1928. (1885-87), whose strong commitment to Still, throughout the twenties, the College the public library did not preclude histori and Reference Library Section had obvi cal scholarship; and Charles Ammi Cutter ously begun to attract attention. Growth (1887-89), librarian at the Boston Athe of the section doubtless reflected both the naeum, whose ''delicate and accurate changes in American higher education scholarship" in his famous catalog was and the growth of colleges and universi well recognized in the scholarly commu ties in the first quarter of the.century. With nity. But it was chiefly to the rapidly ex larger enrollments came expanded li panding public libraries that the associa braries and more librarians. tion looked for leadership during its first 100 years; it was public library concerns that occupied most of the association's at 11Many academic librarians-both tention. behind the scenes and occasionally in Of course there were scholars who as public-began to argue for a stronger sumed the presidency of ALA during its professional organization that would first century, e.g., Reuben Gold Thwaites, William Warner Bishop, Louis Round emphasize bibliographic and schol Wilson, but their presence did not alter arly activity to meet their needs in ALA priorities. As Wayne Wiegand has serving an expanding higher educa noted, there were 45 public librarians tion community.'' among the first 100 ALA presidents (1876-1986), outnumbering academic li brarians 2.6 to 1. 5 The section's programs reflected peren After World War I academic librarians nial issues in academic librarianship: per expressed increasing disillusion with sonnel and faculty status, teaching stu ALA's neglect. Criticism began to be . dents the use of the library, standards, ACRL' s Fiftieth Anniversary 13 interlibrary loans, and on- and off-campus at all for academic librarians. Conse services. Though formal and informal dis quently a subcommittee was appointed, cussion of these issues continued until under the leadership of Charles Harvey 1938 (and indeed throughout ACRL's Brown (1875-1960}, to develop a supple fifty-year history}, many academic mentary plan for librarians in higher edu librarians-both behind the scenes and oc cation. Charlie Brown, who would later casionally in public-began to argue for a defend a higher status for academic librar stronger professional organization that ians in the "Library" section of the U.S. would emphasize bibliographic and schol Bureau of Education's massive study of arly activity to meet their needs in serving land grant colleges and universities an expanding higher education commu (1930}, went to work with typical zeal and nity. developed a separate report-Budgets, In 1921 Ernest J. Reece and his library Classification, and Compensation Plans for school students began a series of articles, University and College Libraries (1929) "College Library News," in the Library adopted as a supplement to the Telford journal. The articles offered current infor plan for public librarians. mation on personnel changes, publica By the late twenties the section began to tions, buildings, gifts, and appointments consider its future seriously. High among for the period covered. This series contin its priorities were bibliographic tools and a ued through the midforties. C&RL began publication that would address the spe publishing the series in 1943 but dropped cific needs of academic librarians. Thus it in 1945. began the short-lived College and Reference Other events in the twenties promoted a Library Yearbook (1929-31). The Yearbook sense of need for a stronger forum for aca was dropped after only three years, osten demic librarians. George Works' book, sibly because it didn't pay its way (proba College and University Library Problems bly a result of the Great Depression) but (1927}, the result of a survey financed by also because a suitable editor couldn't be the Carnegie Corporation, drew attention found. to the status of academic libraries and had The Carnegie Corporation, responsible a tremendous impact on librarians and for GLS' emergence, also expanded its in some university administrators. terest in academic libraries. 8 The Corpora The emergence of the Graduate Library tion sponsored surveys, standards, book School (GLS) at the University of Chicago, collections, and basic book lists by under another major Carnegie venture, offered writing the Charles Shaw and Foster both hope and skepticism in the library Mohrhardt predecessors to Books for Col community. GLS aimed to prepare lead lege Libraries. The corporation's efforts ers through a program of research at the gave added emphasis to the ALA's ne Ph.D. level, and thus do for librarianship glect of such matters. These activities have what Harvard had done for law and John been well covered in Neil Radford's book Hopkins for medicine, to use Carnegie The Carnegie Corporation and the Develop- fresident Keppel's phrase. ment of American College Libraries, The first significant open disagreement 1928-1941, ACRL Publications in Librari with ALA came from Frederick Telford's anship, no.44. study of library staff classification and pay Partly in response to the unrest among plans in the midtwenties.