Between Tradition and Automation in Special Collections: A Memoir

Eric v.d. Luft

Abstract

Insofar as my career in libraries straddled the time when “scholar librarians” dominated special collections to the time when “techie librarians” had pretty much taken over, and as I was in the middle of this change at several institutions, I would like to offer a few observations on this radical transition in special collections librarianship.

Early Days

My first library job was in 1973 in the cataloging department of Bowdoin College. A few weeks after I started, this library entered the computer age by acquiring its first OCLC terminal. OCLC had been founded in 1967 as the Ohio College Library . . .

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