Collegial Collection Building: A Curator Remembers
Mary Jane Parrine,
Curator from 1979 to 2001
We are all successors and predecessors
in a continuum of time and effort. While French and Italian studies
collections had traditionally been a major part of Stanford’s library
holdings, their development was formalized in 1963 when the
curatorship including those fields was established. The first Curator
for Romance Languages was Paul J. Kann, who had received his Ph.D. at
Yale, served in the Department of State as vice-consul in Turkey in
the 1940s, then taught French for several years. From 1963 through
1978 Dr. Kann set sound foundations for the collections, drawing on
initiatives implemented by the first two Directors of Collection
Development in the Stanford Libraries, Elmer Grieder and Paul Mosher.
Their innovations were actively supported by the Library’s Director,
David Weber, whose views of collection expansion and management
coincided with theories developed at other institutions, notably
UCLA. There, Library Directors Lawrence Clark Powell and Robert
Vosper, encouraged by UCLA’s scholar-president Franklin Murphy, laid
similar foundations for a group of bibliographers who in 1973 gave a
freshly-minted Ph.D in European history the chance to begin a career
that led eventually to Stanford’s curators’ group. When I came to
Stanford after six years as Western European Bibliographer at UCLA,
Paul Kann had already retired, but his work had been continued in the
interim by my colleague John Rawlings, who kept the Romance Languages
office going at full speed. So I benefited from over 15 years of
intensive collection development that was itself built on fine
holdings of basic resources acquired since the University began 1891.
After Paul Mosher left for the University of Pennsylvania and David
Weber retired, the curators group had the continued good fortune to
work with subsequent library directors (Robert Street for a short
time, then Michael Keller as University Librarian since 1993) and in
collection development, Michael Ryan, Tony Angiletta, Roberto
Trujillo, and the current Associate University Librarian for
Collection Development, Assunta Pisani, who have added their own
successive innovations to the traditions begun in the 1960s.
Our collections’ strengths reflect the
varied academic programs they support, indicating in their relative
growth over time the ebb and flow of trends in scholarship, the
arrival or departures of faculty, and the beginnings or endings of
special projects. Among the major influences on collection policy
have been scholars in several disciplines, including faculty,
visiting and affiliated scholars, and students, especially the
graduate students in my yearly course on research methods taught
since 1981. It would be impossible to name all those with whom I,
Paul Kann, and John Rawlings consulted regularly, but for the record,
here are a few of the scholars whose advice has helped shape our
collections: In French history, Gordon Wright, Carolyn Lougee
Chappell, Keith Baker, Karen Offen, Mary Louise Roberts, Gabrielle
Hecht, Dena Goodman, Aron Rodrigue, and Philippe Buc; in French
literature, and French studies in general, John Lapp, Alphonse
Juilland, Pierre Saint-Amand, Marc Bertrand, Jean-Marie Apostolidès,
Brigitte Cazelles, James Winchell, Robert Greer Cohen, René
Girard, Michel Serres, Elisabeth Boyi, Joshua Landy, and Derek
Schilling; in Italian literature: John Ahern, John Freccero, Beverly
Allen, Carolyn Springer, Robert Harrison, and Jeffrey Schnapp, and in
Italian history, Judith Brown and Paula Findlen. A wide range of
scholars in Comparative Literature, English, Political Science,
Communication (Film studies) and in other departments and research
centers have provided valuable insight from the perspective of
frequent users of French and Italian resources. And through the years
when the curator’s position also involved selection in associated
humanities fields, primarily Philosophy, Classics, and Religious
Studies (1980-91), our holdings in French and Italian studies could
never have been as extensive without the collaboration of scholars in
those related fields, especially Lewis Spitz and his students in
Reformation history.
No specialized resources can be acquired or made available to
scholars without the help of our curatorial assistants or the
support of other library departments working closely with collection
development. For well over 30 years, in the various configurations
of our curators’ group, the work of highly skilled library
specialists has been a major factor in the growth of French and
Italian collections. Staff members with the longest tenure have
been a trio of outstanding staff: above all, Jane Vaden (1967-1992;
now in Acquisitions), whose full-time work for in the Romance
Languages and Humanties office was a mainstay for bibliographic
research, instruction, and office management. The two longest
term half-time library specialists, Josephine Lee (1967-1991;
now retired), and Eve Citron (1982-2000; now in Acquisitions),
also contributed greatly to both the acquisition and interpretation
of new material. For shorter terms, other half-time staff included
Peter Hirtle, Mireille Meyers Chauveinc, and Colyn Wohlmut, adding
to a stellar legacy for Nathalie Auerbach, who continues the fine
tradition set by her predecessors. A series of interns, international
stagiaires, and student assistants, among them Alison Cornish,
Aikwakwel Ibino, Françoise Schenk, Kurt de Belder, Clare
Hills-Nova, John Bennett Shank, Lara Moore, and Sarah Sussman,
have provided valuable assistance with collection evaluations,
exhibitions, and compilation of finding guides. I am indebted
as well to mentors and colleagues within the Curators Group, affiliated
resource groups, Special Collections, and throughout the various
divisions of the public and technical services departments. Mentioning
them all would practically re-write the library directory. Colleagues
in the Hoover Institution, especially Agnes Peterson and Helen
Solanum, have been instrumental in collaborative projects over
the years, both with me and with Paul Kann.
The generosity of donors has regularly
supplemented library funding for both routine and extraordinary
acquisitions, and in some cases actually allowed us to purchase
collections we would never have been able to acquire otherwise. This
is especially true in French studies, where the Andrew B. Hammond
Fund (established by Andrew H. Burnett) has been an integral part of
each year’s achievement in collection development. We have relied
greatly on other gifts as well, including the strong support of
Jean-Paul Gimon, and major endowments provided by the Perrette,
Johnson, Skinner, Rosenberg, Moulton, Offen, Kay, and Thompson funds.
It would have been impossible to
maintain close connections with faculty and students without the kind
assistance of administrative staff in key departments and research
centers, especially in the French and Italian Department where I was
a Lecturer since 1981. They consistently provided information for our
periodic program reviews and helped coordinate the many co-sponsored
visits, lectures, and projects involving the library and French and
Italian studies programs over the years. Several mainstays of the
department deserve special recognition for their work in various time
spans within the 1979-2001 period: Brix Eakin, Patricia de Castries,
Margaret Tompkins, Louise Freeman, Sylvia Wohlmut, Courtney
Quaintance, and Kellie Smith.
Since its focus is mainly on people,
this brief retrospective glance does not trace the history of our
French and Italian collections themselves. But at least the
descriptive texts in the Web site, along with the many exhibitions,
evaluations, and, most of all, the continuous use of these resources
will be a lasting witness to the work achieved since this curator’s
position was founded in 1963.
