Library and Information History Group Newsletter Spring 2015 Our new official logo* *Colours may vary 1 LIBRARY AND INFORMATION HISTORY NEWSLETTER The official newsletter of the Library and Information History Group, a special interest group of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) CONTENTS NEWS FROM THE CHAIR .............................................................................................................................................................. 3 LIHG DIARY ...................................................................................................................................................................................... 3 FEATURES ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 4 The Story of LEO the first business computer .................................................................................................................. 4 Heritage Libraries in Transition........................................................................................................................................ 7 WHAT’S ON .................................................................................................................................................................................. 10 Courses, lectures and events .............................................................................................................................................. 10 A walk through London’s library history – LIHG Event ................................................................................... 10 Navigating London: a time-traveller’s guide to the city – LIHG Event ....................................................... 10 Caird Archive and Library at the National Maritime Museum – LIHG Event .......................................... 10 Exhibitions ................................................................................................................................................................................ 15 Aldus Manutius events ......................................................................................................................................................... 16 NEWS ............................................................................................................................................................................................. 18 AWARDS AND OPPORTUNITIES ............................................................................................................................................. 20 Prizes Awarded................................................................................................................................................................ 20 Opportunities available ................................................................................................................................................ 20 CALLS FOR PAPERS ..................................................................................................................................................................... 22 NEW RESOURCES ........................................................................................................................................................................ 27 In Print ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 27 Online ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 30 HELP WANTED .......................................................................................................................................................................... 32 LIHG Newsletter Dates 2015 Copy Issue Summer 2015: 18 May Summer 2015: 29 May Winter 2015: 11 September Winter 2015: 25 September Copy should be sent to the newsletter editor: Anna James, Pusey House, St Giles, Oxford, OX1 2LB, [email protected] Series 4, no. 32 January 2015 ISSN 1744-3180 2 NEWS FROM THE CHAIR Welcome to the first newsletter of 2015! This is going to be a busy year for the group with a whole host of events taking place. LIHG will be participating in CILIP’s conference this year, cleverly titled CILIP Conference 2015 (they have dropped ‘Umbrella’ for all future conference titles). The conference’s theme is ‘Connect, Debate, Innovate’ and will have four streams. Booking is now open for the conference via their website: http://cilipconference2015.org.uk/. LIHG will be sending Monica Blake as our committee representa- tive and we hope to have a table at the Conference for the group. We will also be offering an LIHG member a free place at the conference, with travel expenses reimbursed as well. We will announce details on how to apply for this bursary on our website by the end of February. Later in the year we will be hosting a joint conference with the Association of Independent Libraries. Full details for this exciting venture are being organized and we hope to announce a date and call for papers by March. One of the themes we have discussed so far is that of libraries and librarians as gen- erators of scientific and professional knowledge. In 2015 we will be able to offer conference speakers a free place to attend the conference. Full details, including the CFP will appear on our website and will be circulated by email. Other events planned for 2015 include three walking tours, one of which will be held on National Li- braries Day. Full details are available on p.10. We will also be organizing another talk by Ken Worpole, and our usual range of visits. As the newsletter went to press we were still deciding on the winner of the Library History Essay Award for 2014. We had nine excellent entries for the 2014 award, and thus it is taking slightly longer than usual to read and assess all of the applicants. The winner will be announced on our website. We also awarded two Ollé prizes in 2014. Full details are announced on p.20. In 2015 we will be increas- ing our prize offers by awarding a second place Essay Award of £100 and by offering two Ollé prizes with a maximum value of £500 each. We are also looking into the possibility of offering a travel bursa- ry to the student whose LIHG conference fee Maney has sponsored. We will make a final decision about this at the January committee meeting. The Committee would like to welcome Emma Laws as our new website editor. She will be working alongside Lydia Gibbs to move all of our content over to the main CILIP website, in keeping with their new regulations for special interest groups. We will keep the lihg.org website open to use as a blog and calendar however. We would also like to welcome Lucy Gwynn to the committee. She will be tak- ing over the Secretary position as Erika Delbecque has changed roles to become the Events Coordina- tor. Renae Satterley Middle Temple Library [email protected] LIHG DIARY 19th January - 1st February 2015 ::: Online committee meeting Saturday 7 February : A walk through London's library history (free walk for National Libraries Day) Friday 17 April: Caird Archive and Library visit Thursday 26 March: Navigating London walk Summer TBC ::: LIHG Conference Friday 18 September: Walking tour: Lost libraries 2 3 FEATURES The Story of LEO the first business computer In November 1951 the world’s first computer application carrying out regular time-critical ‘commercial’, as opposed to technical tasks, was rolled out on a digital electronic computer. The task in question was the valuation of the bakery production of the food and catering giant J. Lyons & Company. It was carried out at Cadby Hall in West London, the headquarters of the company, and the digital computer was LEO ( Lyons Electronic Office), the computer built by Lyons’ itself as the first computer designed for processing business data. How did it come about that a company known for its teashops, corner houses, its catering for events like the Royal Garden Parties and the annual tennis championships at Wimbledon, its bakery products sold in corner-shops all over England, its Lyons Tea and Lyons Maid Ice Cream, its confectionary and even its own blended brand of Whiskey – Old Jolyon, had become a leading player in what is now often referred to as the ‘information age’? The remarkable story of how Lyons came to invent computer based business data processing has been documented in a number of books and papers and commemorated on television and radio. David Caminer who had been responsible for organising the application of the LEO computer to meet busi- ness requirements, in his later years, retired from ICL and Fujitsu, gathered a small band of LEO pio- neers and enthused and bullied them into turning the LEO story into the narrative of computing histo- ry. The first step was to write an account of the LEO history leavened by the personal reminiscences of many of those who had played a part in the story, Gratuitous i mage of cake courtesy of savit keawtavee at including some who had worked for LEO customers. FreeDigitalPhotos.net The book User Driven Innovation: The world’s first business computer was published by McGraw Hill in 1996, followed two years later by an American edition, LEO, the Incredible Story of the World’s