LHRT Newsletter
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LHRT Newsletter NOVEMBER 2012 VOLUME 12, ISSUE 1 BERNADETTE A. LEAR, EDITOR Greetings from the Chair BAL19 @ PSU.EDU Jean-Baptiste Colbert’s tunity to be involved in is Secret State Intelligence the Library History Semi- System (University of nar. The seminar is held Michigan Press, 2009). Dr. every five years at a univer- Soll is also a recent winner sity or library and provides of fellowships from the a venue for new and im- Guggenheim and MacAr- portant scholarship in the thur Foundations The title area of library history and of his Holley lecture will be print culture. We are still “Library of Power, Library seeking a host for the 2015 of Enlightenment: Libraries Library History Seminar. as Foundations to the More information can be Modern State 1400-1800.” found on the ALA Con- nect site at http:// Bernadette Lear, vice- connect.ala.org/ chair/chair-elect, recently node/190560 or contact sent out a CFP for the Mark McCallon at LHRT Research Forum. [email protected] . You This event is a wonderful can also see the RFP in this issue of the newsletter. Mark McCallon, current chair of opportunity for scholars to present their findings in a LHRT. Image courtesy of Mark peer-reviewed forum. Sub- In closing, I want to ex- McCallon. missions are encouraged press my appreciation to all from students, practition- of the LHRT committee Hello Friends and info/lhrt. LHRT also has a ers, and LIS faculty. The members who have devot- Colleagues, facebook page at http:// broad theme this year is ed their time and efforts to www.facebook.com/ “Library History as Ameri- make this organization a It has been an honor and LibHistRoundTable. Take can History” which we success. pleasure to serve as chair- a moment to “Like Us” hope will generate submis- person for LHRT this year and post a message to our sions from a variety of I look forward to meeting and have the opportunity wall. disciplines and scholars all of you online at our to work with an excellent who are interested in the virtual midwinter meeting group of committee mem- LHRT is hard at work pre- intersections that libraries and seeing you at ALA bers who are committed to paring for events coming have with political, social annual next year in Chica- offering opportunities for up at ALA Annual Confer- and cultural movements in go. library history research and ence in Chicago, June 27th the U.S. —Mark McCallon, publication through our –July 2nd, 2013. Our pre- Abilene Christian programs and newsletter. I senter at the annual Ed- We will again host our University hope that the activities and ward G. Holley Lecture will ALA midwinter executive writings that you read be prize-winning author committee meeting online about in this issue will en- and history scholar Dr. in January 2013. We will Inside this issue: courage you to become Jacob Soll from the Univer- post the agenda and in- involved in LHRT through sity of Southern California. structions for joining the volunteering for a commit- Dr. Soll has authored two meeting on the ALA Pencil Sharpeners 2 tee and sending us a sum- books, Publishing the LHRT Listserv and the mary of research that you Prince: History, Reading, ALA Connect site http:// Michael Gorman 3 are currently working on. and the Birth of Political connect.ala.org/lhrt. All In addition to the newslet- Criticism (University of LHRT members are en- Cornell Uris Library 4-5 ter, you can also join us for Michigan Press, 2005), couraged to attend and we interesting discussions which was the winner of value your contributions. Opportunities 8-11 online through the LHRT the American Philosophical listserv. You can subscribe Society’s Barzun Prize, and Another valuable activity California Library 10 that LHRT has the oppor- at http://lists.ala.org/wws/ The Information Master: Hall of Fame LHRT NEWSLETTER Page 2 What Is It?: The Perfect Pencil Sharpener Thumbing through old Library dates for favor as the best.” a solution for busy commercial Bureau catalogs the other day, I Being a bit ham-handed, I enterprises. Thus the race was found a photograph of what readily pictured myself grinding on to patent a mechanical seemed to be an overly com- pencils to nubs, leaving shav- sharpener, as well as devices plex solution to a simple prob- ings and broken points all over appropriate for institutional lem: what to do with a dull the floor. Surely there was a use. Searching Google’s patent pencil. Melvil Dewey’s compa- better sharpener! search engine, one finds no ny was offering a desk- ‘Turns out, there may not have fewer than 1,600 different in- mounted contraption which been. As Henry Petroski de- ventions or improvements provided a sliding guide for scribed in his definitive book, dating from the 1850s to 1920s those who wished to scrape The Pencil: A History of De- relating to pencil sharpeners. their pencils across a file. Mar- sign and Circumstance (Knopf, The small “prism” style item keted as “the Perfect Pencil 1989), until the turn of the that some people carry in their Sharpener,” the Library Bureau century the most common way pockets today creates a point promised that it would “[save] of sharpening a pencil was to when the user rotates his or her soiled fingers and much time whittle it by hand with a knife. pencil against a single blade. where lead pencils are used to In fact, early scout manuals Conversely, the hand-cranked any extent.” For one dollar, the instructed boys in sharpening model typically screwed into buyer could obtain this item their pencils effectively and schoolroom or workshop walls “selected from all the candi- safely. Yet whittling was hardly involves two sharp cones or cylinders that rotate around the pencil. These two types eventu- ally won the twentieth-century marketplace, but for a long time there were many other devices. I have been unable to deter- mine who invented or manu- factured the model preferred by the Library Bureau, which appeared in the 1891 and 1900 (but not in the 1902 or 1909) catalogs. The Library Bureau description does not refer to a manufacturer or patent num- ber. Visiting the web site of the — continued, page 6 “The Perfect Pencil Sharpener,” featured on pg. 119 of the 1900 Library Bureau catalog. Image courtesy of the author. PUBLISHING STATEMENT LHRT Newsletter (ISSN forthcoming) is the official newsletter of the Library History Round Table of the American Library Association. LHRT’s mission is to encourage research and publication on the history of libraries and promote awareness and discussion of historical issues in librarianship. LHRT Newslet- ter is an open-access, semi-annual publication, available free of charge at http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/rts/lhrt/popularresources/lhrtnewsletters/ lhrtnewsletters.cfm . LHRT members may obtain a paper copy upon request by contacting ALA’s Office for Research and Statistics, American Library Asso- ciation, 60 E. Huron St., Chicago, IL, 60611 (phone: 1-800-545-2433, extension 4283). LHRT Newsletter is not currently indexed in Library Literature or other databases. All submissions are subject to editorial review, but authors are responsible for facts and opinions expressed in their articles. Views expressed in LHRT Newsletter do not necessarily reflect official LHRT or ALA policies and positions. Contact the editor, Bernadette A. Lear ([email protected]), with queries about advertising, submissions, and other concerns. Page 3 VOLUME 12, ISSUE 1 Member Spotlight: Michael Gorman Editor’s Note: The “Member Spot- that field and my first Great light” section usually provides inter- Librarian. It was there that I views with talented but perhaps not first thought that library work so well-known members of LHRT. must be an excellent thing. Michael Gorman, the focus of this semester’s interview, is certainly a BAL: How and why did you get well-known persona in ALA, but involved with libraries? If you are a many are unaware that he is also a library employee or retiree, where member of LHRT. have you worked and what positions have you held over the course of your BAL: Tell us a little bit about career? yourself: your town/state, your occu- pation, your educational background, MG: I left school at 16 under and other things to introduce yourself. less than auspicious circum- stances and was lucky to get a MG: I was born in Witney, notably ill-paid job as a junior Oxfordshire, England in 1941. assistant in Hampstead Public After World War II, my family Library in the days (alas, now moved to London and I spent in their death throes) when the next 30+ years there, be- London’s public libraries were fore moving to the US in 1977. one of the cultural treasures of I worked in the University of Britain. After a hiatus in Paris Illinois Library and the library as a would-be starving writer (I Caption: Michael Gorman, LHRT nailed the starving part), I of the California State Univer- member and former ALA president. sity, Fresno, before retiring in worked in another London PL Image courtesy of Michael Gorman. 2007 and moving to Chicago, (in Ealing). After library in which I now live. I went to school (at which I contracted library school in what is now my career long interest in cata- the University of the Thames loguing) I worked for the Brit- terested in post-World War II Valley in London from 1964 to ish National Bibliography, then British public libraries and the 1966. in the newly formed British laws that govern them. I wrote Library before moving to the on the scant history of writings BAL: Please share a fond, early USA.