Staff Profile

King of the Road: An Appreciation of Russell Maylone

By Vince McCoy
Russell Maylone, Curator of the Charles Deering McCormick Library of Special Collections for the past 37 years, long-time member of Caxton Club of Chicago, and respected Chicago area bibliophile, may be the last person you’d expect to have had a vagabond youth. But one summer when he was a college student at Syracuse University, he and a buddy decided to jump freight cars out to the west coast. They were able to get all the way from Rochester, New York to Kankakee, Illinois for free by riding the rails. In Kankakee they were able to hitch a ride further west to Twin Falls, Idaho. They were two college boys on a quest to reach Washington State, where Russell had a vague promise of a summer job at a small lumber company now known as the International Paper Company. Russell had no idea what the actual job would be, but the opportunity for a cross-country adventure was just too good to pass up. The job turned out to be deep in the forest making telephone poles. Russell loved the work, and he loved the Pacific Northwest. He returned to Washington State the following summer to work for Weyerhaeuser as a choker setter up on Mount St. Helens.

So how does a young man who loved mountain climbing and working outdoors with his hands end up as a rare-book librarian? Russell had an accident one day out in the woods and ended up in the hospital for several months. When he returned to school at Syracuse University, he was still a little fragile, and asked the Dean of the Library School, who was the father of one of his best friends, if he could have a study carrel in the closed stacks of the library. The Dean granted his request and Russell was allowed into the inner sanctum of the Syracuse library where students, and probably most faculty members, were never allowed to go. Russell explained how that experience in the stacks had an impact on his career: “At Syracuse we had the library of Leopold von Ranke, who was a 19th-century German historian who founded modern historiography. This collection of Venetian manuscripts and early printed books was in ruins. I was walking around one day and just walked right into it. I discovered what an amazing place it was and what amazing things old books were because it’s not the sort of thing that everybody got to see.” A bibliophile was born.

Russell didn’t start library school right away. After college he worked for a year for a man named Manny Slutzker whom Russell considers to be his mentor. From Russell’s description, Manny seemed like quite a character. He sold the rather unlikely combination of pipes, suit coats, and books … in that order. After taking one course in Library Science at Syracuse University, Russell decided he wanted to pursue a career as a rare book librarian. The Pacific Northwest again called to him, but this time to go to Library School at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Russell was recruited for Northwestern University Library in 1969 by Richard Press, then head of Collection Development. They met at Russell’s first job in 1965 at the Free Library of Philadelphia, where Russell’s boss had been Ellen Shafer, one of the great doyens of rare books in America. Richard Press was a frequent visitor at the Free Library. Russell recalls that his job interview at Northwestern was in Deering Library in a room in Special Collections now known as the Angling Room, but at that time it was University Librarian Thomas Buckman’s office. Looking out the large window that faces east, Russell could see the plaza and the three towers of the new University Library building still under construction. In his 37-year career at Northwestern, Russell has worked with four different University Librarians: Buckman, John McGowan, David Bishop, and Sarah Pritchard.

The aspect of his job that Russell most enjoys is talking with students and faculty members about materials in the collection. He encourages faculty members to bring their classes into Special Collections to view materials that could not otherwise leave the building either because of their value or because of the size or format of the materials. On the day I was interviewing him, Russell was expecting several students from art history professor David van Zanten’s class. They were interested in seeing materials from the collection about Paris. Russell and fellow staff member Scott Krafft would pull the books from the stacks ahead of time and have them waiting on tables for the students to examine.

During his tenure at Northwestern, Russell has had a major hand in shaping Special Collections into what it is today. When I asked what he considered to be the most significant purchase or collection he acquired during his years at Northwestern, he almost immediately replied: the creation of the women’s collection and the alternative collection. “That collection started out with the anti-war movement against the Vietnam war," Russell said. "You couldn’t walk down Sherman Ave without someone handing you something: leaflets, handouts, or flyers. We now have 8,000 titles of women’s materials. We also have files and files of anti-war materials and sexual freedom materials (gay and lesbian). We have 4,000 periodicals in the alternative collection that were mostly free at the time. After a while we developed a reputation and organizations would send us their materials unsolicited because they knew we would preserve them. So now we have an enormous archive of materials on the 1970s. It hasn’t really been fully exploited yet, but I think it will be as time goes on. It’s a unique documentation of the period.”

Russell is retiring from Northwestern at the end of this month. I first met him in the spring of 1971, when I was an 18-year-old Northwestern freshman. I regularly came into Special Collections to read gay liberation newspapers from the alternative collection. I was such a regular that Russell and the other Special Collections staff, such as Bonnie Jo Sedlak, the first curator of the women’s collection, got to know me very well. I can still make Russell blush when I remind him of the time that he inadvertently outed me in front of a full reading room by yelling across the room, “Hey Vince, have you got the April issue of Fag Rag over there!” I remember blushing furiously at the time but we can both laugh about it now, especially since Kent, the other student who was asking about that fateful issue, ended up becoming my first college boyfriend. So overall that was a pretty good day for me.

I’ll miss you Russell, old friend. Best of luck where ever the road next leads you.

Photo by Mary Hanlon

"You just have to love it": A profile of Andrea Stamm

What you notice immediately when you talk to Andrea Stamm is her enthusiasm - and that�s with a capital "E." When Andrea Stamm has a passion or interest, she dives in, takes risks, involves herself totally in every aspect, and soars. This is evident not only in her professional career but in her own personal pursuits as well.

From contributing to the growth of Northwestern University Library�s online cataloging system, right up to her latest interest, the development of Chicago�s new Chinese American Museum, Andrea has a passion for all she does, and it shows. But let�s go back to the beginning�

After obtaining her MLIS and a master�s in French at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Andrea discovered her true love. �When I went to library school,� Andrea said, �I thought I wanted to be a bibliographer. I spent two years at UIC in their Collection Development Department before library school and I had enjoyed that work a lot. And then I went to library school and I took a class in cataloging and it was love at first sight. That was it! I had never seen anything that was so much fun as cataloging. It is like doing crossword puzzles. It�s fun. Then if you add in the element of foreign languages (which was my major)� I am delighted to be able to use the foreign languages that I worked so hard to study.�

With her MLIS under her belt, Andrea entered the world of librarianship at Illinois State University-Normal as an original cataloger, and then went back to Urbana-Champaign for her master�s in French. That accomplished, and with her sights on Chicago, Andrea landed a job in cataloging at Roosevelt University, where she also met her husband.

Andrea began her career at Northwestern University Library when she took a risk and left her permanent position at Roosevelt to work on a one-year grant to catalog in the Africana Collection �hoping that it would work out for me, and I was so lucky that it did!� Andrea made quite an impression and after three months she was offered a permanent position as Africana Cataloger. After three years, the Head of the Africana Cataloging Section left, Andrea applied and got the job. Of course, before long, we all know, Andrea worked her way up and became the head of cataloging, a tribute to her determination, passion, and abilities.

When I asked who influenced her most in her career, Andrea quipped, �Not a �who,� but a �what�...and the �what� is the excellence of this Africana collection that really brought me here. It was either directly or indirectly responsible for almost all of my professional activities since the day I got here. It is really amazing! It has been a privilege to work in our Africana Collection. My major professional accomplishments all stem back from the Africana Collection. First I became active in the African Studies Association, then I joined and became chair of the ALA Committee on Cataloging Asian and African Materials, and now for more than 10 years I have been involved with the (Dewey) Editorial Policy Committee, an international committee that advises on the development of the Dewey Decimal Classification Committee. They asked me if I would be willing to serve on that committee and I said, �Okay, sure. I think I can do this.� Well, that has been a major accomplishment in my life, because I have been on that committee for 14 years and chair for the past four years!�

Andrea has been on staff at Northwestern University Library for 26 years, and boy have things changed! �When I arrived in the Catalog Department there were just a few computer CRTs [cathode-ray tubes] and people had to share them,� said Andrea. �You had to have a schedule for when you were allowed to sit at the computer. We did not input our own cataloging online. We wrote on printed worksheets and we handed the worksheets to the input person in the data center. It was a very different process of cataloging. Our expectations about computing were very different then to what they are today.�

�When I first arrived at Northwestern University Library we had NOTIS, the first online cataloging system that was developed in-house at Northwestern. We had a lot of input into how it was developed because Velma Veneziano and Jim Aagaard were working in the building. They were constantly adding features and modules and they kept coming over all the time and would say, �Is this how you want this to work?� And so there was this real interaction between Tech Services and the people who were building NOTIS. Those were exciting times for us. Things were working the way we wanted them to work. We were very spoiled rotten by those people� it was wonderful.� Andrea was also involved in the migration from NOTIS mainframe computer technology to our present-day client server technology, Voyager. And that �voyage� continues to this day.

In her life outside of Northwestern, Andrea is once again at the start of something big with her work on the Board of Directors for the new Chinese American Museum of Chicago. From the beginning to the present day, Andrea was instrumental in the quick two-year growth of the museum from an empty brick building to two fully renovated floors with wonderful, well researched exhibits on display.

�At this point many of my interests are moving into China,� Andrea says. �Going from my first love of Africana to China, now most of my activities revolve around Chinese culture. I was always interested in Chinese culture. That started even as a small child, when my parents would take me to New York�s Chinatown and we went for dim sum. It is my favorite food.�

Andrea�s interest in Chinese food gradually moved on to Chinese art. �When I was at UIC, I audited a class in Chinese Art and it was just so wonderful. The program took us on a field trip to the Art Institute. And I got to see the bronzes and the archaic jade and I said, �My god, is this incredible!��

Andrea now collects jade. �Through the jade connection, I met someone about two years ago who was setting up a new museum in Chinatown, The Chinese American Museum of Chicago. It opened in May 2005. She got me involved in that organization and I am now on the Board of Directors and chair of the Collections and Research Committee. We approve the gifts and donations that come into the museum. Then we have to catalog them, put them into the museum software. There is a lot of interesting work for us there.�

Andrea served as co-curator of a new exhibit called �Two World Fairs: The Untold Asian Story,� which is now open and will be until the end of May 2007. (The museum is located in Chinatown at 238 W. 23rd Street, just around the corner from lively Wentworth Avenue.) For more information on the museum and the exhibit check out their website at http://www.ccamuseum.org/Index.html

Andrea�s mention of the World�s Fairs piqued my interest, because my father was a guide at the Century of Progress World�s Fair in 1933. I mentioned to her that I still have his scrapbook and souvenir books from his days working there. Andrea was thrilled to hear this and asked if she could see the books and perhaps borrow some items for the exhibit. I happily agreed and am now proud to mention that my father�s scrapbook and guide badge are part of this lovely exhibit.

I was invited to the opening of the new exhibit and attended on June 10, 2006. I was �wowed� with the craftsmanship of the brand-new exhibit space and the liveliness of the exhibit. It drew you in as you walked up the stairs and entered the room next to a large photograph of the famous Ferris wheel at the World�s Columbian Exposition of 1893. As you look up you are lured around the corner with a splash of brilliant color from the miniature replica of the 1933-34 Century of Progress World�s Fair�s �Avenue of Flags.� Your eye is drawn along an informative wall of images, towards the multiple glass exhibit cases, where exquisite artifacts are displayed, and then on to a colorful artist�s rendition of the Golden Temple in China. You can�t help but be completely absorbed. What was most notable that day was the pride, the smiles, and the positive comments from the members of the Chinese community in attendance. A job well done, Andrea!

It doesn�t end there for Andrea. The museum�s long-term plan is to continue renovating the remaining two floors and begin the organization of a new library�.which is why Andrea was originally recruited! Andrea has also been selected as the Kaplan Center for the Humanities fellow for next year and will continue her research on the two World�s Fairs. When I asked how she manages to be so involved in so many projects and so many organizations, Andrea replied, �You just have to love it, I guess.�

Article and photos by:

Mary Bradley
Department Assistant
Library Administration

Gotta Dance

At least one evening a week you�ll find Kevin Randall, head, Serials Cataloging, spinning around the dance floor with the Chi-town Squares, a Chicago square dancing club. If just reading the words �square dancing� brings to mind images of Barney Fife and Thelma Lou down at the Mayberry Grange Hall, you aren�t alone.

Traditional square dancing, also known as round dancing, is what most of us think of as square dancing. But modern western square dancing, the kind practiced by clubs like Chi-town Squares, is a totally different animal. It�s a highly disciplined form of dance that requires skill and dedication. To reach the �Mainstream� or beginning level, for example, you must master about 69 calls. Calls are the specific dance steps or sequences of steps that the �Caller,� that guy or gal up on the bandstand telling the dancers what to do, strings together to form a routine. Whenever Chi-town Squares sponsors a social dance it is designated for a particular skill level. If you attend a dance for a more advanced level than your own you won�t know most of the calls and will be totally lost.

Another common misconception about square dancing is the style of music you can dance to. �We use all kinds of music,� Kevin said. �It�s not just country western music. One of my favorite things to dance to is an instrumental version of Believe, the song made famous by Cher. It has a great beat for square dancing.�

Modern western square dancing is not a spectator sport. Kevin recalled the first time he watched a group of dancers at a square dance weekend. �It was boring," he said. "I couldn�t figure out what they were doing and to me it looked like they were just doing the same thing over and over again.� After 11 years Kevin is at the C1 level of modern western square dancing and knows several hundred calls. The highest level is C4 but Kevin says he has no desire to advance beyond his current level. Kevin still attends workshops to keep his dancing skills sharp because he says the hardest thing about square dancing is remembering all of the calls.

Kevin started at Northwestern University Library in January 1985 as a serials cataloger. He is now celebrating his 20th anniversary at Northwestern, the entire time spent in the Serials Department. Kevin discovered an interest in libraries when he was an undergraduate at Oral Roberts University (ORU) and had a student job in the Law Collection. By the time Kevin applied to library school at the University of Illinois he knew not only that he wanted to be a librarian, but that he specifically wanted to be a serials cataloger. When I asked what he likes about cataloging serials, Kevin replied, �It�s like a puzzle. I like tracking down and solving something. The record for a serial is a living thing in the catalog. Once you catalog a monograph the record is dead. But serials are alive. As one of my teachers in library school used to say, serials are just like people. They are born, they get married, and they have children. They also die but sometimes they can be resurrected.�

If you have attended a NULSA Halloween party in the past 20 years you�ll know that Kevin is famous for his Halloween costumes. His costumes can range from fanciful, like the year he came as the John Hancock building, to rude, remember his Dave Matthews Band costume that was splattered with what looked like garbage and other unmentionable debris?

A long time dream of Kevin�s has been to make short films. When he was a student at ORU he took film production classes and the directing bug has never really left him. With the advent of 24 frame digital video cameras and computer software for editing video it�s now possible and affordable for anyone to make and edit their own films at home. Kevin explains, �There is always the dream that I will become a film director. But there is no expectation that it will ever happen. One of my ideas for a film started out in a creative writing class in college at ORU. Then 20 years later I picked it up again for a writing group and changed the story a lot because my life has changed so much in 20 years. Maybe 30 years later I�ll finally get to make my film. I�ll be totally satisfied just to be able to finish the films that I have in my mind. I have a goal of maybe 2007 to be able to do something with film.�

Vince McCoy
Technical Support Consultant
Library Information Technology Support Services

(Photo by Mary Bradley)

Congratulations to Zita Hayward

Zita Hayward, technical services assistant at the Science and Engineering Library, is profiled in this issue to help celebrate her 30 years with Northwestern University. Vince McCoy reports on Zita's accomplishments both on and off the job.

Namaste (pronounced nah-mah-stay) is the Hindu word for a yoga gesture that is usually performed at the end of every yoga practice. To perform Namaste, you place your hands together with the thumbs aligned over your heart, close your eyes, and bow your head. Namaste represents the belief that there is a Divine spark within each of us that is located in the heart chakra. The gesture is an acknowledgment of the soul in one person by the soul in another. When I�m performing Namaste I always feel a great sense of calm and peacefulness. I often get the same feeling when I�m talking with Zita Hayward (technical services assistant at the Science-Engineering Library). Her gentle smile and overall demeanor is so calming and reassuring to me. Even though Zita considers herself to be a very shy person, once she warms up to you she can be quite animated and engaging. Zita and I recently had the opportunity to sit down and share some memories about her thirty years at Northwestern.

A yoga reference is quite fitting in a profile about Zita because over the years she has been a devoted yogini. She even taught a weekly yoga class at SEL after some members of the staff expressed the desire to learn yoga but never seemed to find the time to attend a yoga class at the gym. I consider Zita to be my yoga/fitness mentor because through her support and encouragement I attended my first yoga class five years ago. Although I no longer practice yoga on a regular basis, Zita�s encouragement got me started on a regular exercise program after almost 30 years of complete physical inactivity. I now go to fitness classes four days a week and for that I�ll always be grateful to Zita.

Zita is a Chicago native who grew up in the Humboldt Park area of the city. She graduated from Tuley high school, which has now been replaced by Roberto Clemente high school. Zita remembers as a young girl going downtown every Saturday, by herself, for dance lessons at the Chicago Musical College at Roosevelt University. She studied ballet and flamenco dancing. Zita graduated from high school early and went to college her freshman year at the University of Chicago but dropped out after her first year. She explains, �I had gone to an inner city high school and I was very young when I started college. The U. of C. was a quantum leap from the minimal preparation I�d had for college. It was culture shock.� After she dropped out of U. of C., Zita worked for a while before trying college again at a succession of schools that included brief stints at Northwestern, Northern Illinois University, and finally Lake Forrest College where she earned her B.A. in English.

Zita�s first job at Northwestern was in 1974 as the circulation assistant at the Tech Institute Library, working for Bill Jones, who was the head of the Tech Library at that time. When the Seeley Mudd Library building was built in 1977 the Tech Library was moved into the new building and renamed the Science & Engineering Library (SEL). The old Tech Library was located deep in the bowels of the Technological Institute, which is still today the largest building on campus and without a doubt the most confusing building to find your way around in. There are some portions of the building that are still only accessible from a particular elevator or staircase. Zita recalls how hot and humid it got in the old library during the summer, �There was no air-conditioning, only a couple of giant floor fans. By the end of the day it smelled like a men�s locker room in there.�

Zita had the circulation assistant job for about a year but never really felt it was a very good fit for her. First of all she had to be at work everyday by 7:30 a.m., which was a major challenge since she�s not a morning person. But also in that job she had to handle problems and confrontations with angry users about overdue fines and lost books, which she did not enjoy at all. So when a job opened up at the Math Library, Zita jumped at the opportunity. She worked at the Math Library for a total of nineteen years, twelve of them spent working part-time while her two children were little. The slower pace of a small branch library greatly appealed to Zita. It was basically a one-person operation and she got to do everything from circulation to reference to shelving the books. Plus the work hours were much more conducive to the schedule of a working mother with young children. Zita left the Math Library for her current position at SEL ten years ago.

Vince McCoy
Technical Support Consultant
Library Information Technology Support Services

(Photo by Mary Bradley)

Just call me "Dorothy"

Today our �Staff Profile� features Sharon Smith, from Circulation Services, who is celebrating 25 years of employment with Northwestern University.

Sharon�s life journey began in a small northern Kansas town called Concordia, located in �Cloud County.� When asked about her Kansas roots, Sharon replied, �Just call me Dorothy!�

Sharon spent her childhood years in Concordia attending both grammar school and high school. She then enrolled at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas, home to (believe it or not) the Kansas State �Wildcats.� And, yes, their school colors are purple and white, just like NU! (Could this have been a premonition of Sharon�s future years at NU?)

Two summers before she was to finish at Kansas State University, Sharon came up to Chicago to visit a friend who was taking part in a special summer program in Hyde Park, sponsored by the American Baptist Students Association. The program focused on the problems of the inner city. Participants in the program found their own jobs and lived at the student center. Sharon was drawn to this and decided to apply for the program the next summer.

It was the summer of 1966, a time of civil unrest, the height of the hippie era and a time of emerging social reform all over the country. Sharon arrived in Chicago on the very day that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was to give a speech at the KAM Temple in Hyde Park, which is now the location of �Operation Push.� Sharon commented, �I remember thinking what an incredible time it was to hear him speak and how impressive he was. I felt that he had the answers to resolving Civil Rights problems, if only he could get his message accepted by all Americans. I was just thrilled to be listening and seeing him in person. He had such a magnificent voice that rang throughout that building.�

Sharon�s interest in social justice and activism continues today. Many of us have seen Sharon adorned with various political campaign buttons. She recently worked on Barack Obama�s U.S. Senate campaign, knocking on doors in her neighborhood, passing out literature, and attending a celebratory party for volunteers when Obama won the race.

During her Hyde Park years, Sharon made a number of career moves. She worked 5 years at a law firm as a librarian and 4 years in the Recorder�s office at John Marshall Law School. She attended Northwestern first in 1974, after meeting her husband, Jeff, then moved near the Evanston campus in 1975. She attended Northwestern�s evening school and earned her bachelor of philosophy in English in June 1980, six months after starting work at Northwestern University Library. After joining Circulation in 1985, she attended Rosary College (now Dominican University) and earned her master�s degree in library and information science in 1992.

Sharon got her start at Northwestern University Library in the Acquisitions Department (now part of MARC) and worked there five years. She then interviewed for the position of �circulation assistant for fines and overdues,� in the Circulation Department, which is the job she currently holds. Sharon is responsible for resolving problems with billed items that are returned. She places notes in the records of items with lost status. Those items are then searched in the stacks. When they are returned, Sharon adjusts the bills accordingly. She sends out warning notices in advance, works on payment plans and trains students in taking fine payments, checking out books, re-directing patrons, and more.

Sharon loves the people contact, which runs the gamut from undergrads to professors, alums, and well-known authors. She has met Howard Reich, the jazz critic for the Chicago Tribune and a Northwestern Alum, and Edith Skom, an instructor in the Writing Program in the College of Arts and Sciences who wrote The Mark Twain Murders. Sharon has an eclectic taste in books. Murder mysteries are one of her favorites. She also enjoys authors such as Salman Rushdie and Garry Wills. Buried in her �obsession� (as she calls it) with books is a love of poetry. Some of her favorite poets are Emily Dickinson, Dorothy Parker, and e.e. cummings. She likes Haiku, a Japanese form of poetry, and has experimented a little with it. Here is a sample of one of Sharon�s Haiku poems:

TO SEARCH THE STARS

Columbia gone
Seven souls lost in the air
Fragments of dust motes!

At work, Sharon uses her creative writing abilities for the Library�s staff newsletter, The Lantern. Sharon was one of the members of the Lantern committee, when the publication was called the Lantern�s Core. It was before the Internet and was the main forum for communication with the staff. At that time it was a monthly publication. Rolf Erickson, former Head of Circulation, was the editor. Sharon deeply respected Rolf and worked with him on the newsletter. Unfortunately, after Rolf�s death the publication dwindled for some time. She is most proud of helping in its rebirth and publication. Now it is back in action with a very creative team!

Sharon also was very involved in the early days of the Library's Green Committee, again working closely with Rolf Erickson, the Committee Chair. Sharon worked many years on the committee and recently resigned as chair to pursue additional interests. She continues to assist the Green Committee when time allows. She said that Rolf would be very pleased with the work the current committee has done on beautifying the Library.

In her spare time, Sharon enjoys reading, baking, and weekends at home with her husband, Jeff. Sharon has also traveled abroad. Her husband is originally from England.
Sharon and Jeff traveled there in September of 2001 and were in London when the World Trade Center towers were attacked. A rather unsettling time to be away from home, yet Sharon remembers how warm the British people were and how sincere they were in their condolences. �Such an obvious outpouring of emotion for America,� said Sharon. �It brought tears to my eyes.�

This time of year Sharon prefers to stay in Evanston for one of her favorite pastimes� NU football! She can be found most Saturdays in the 43-yard-line seats in Ryan Field, cheering on the Northwestern Wildcats. She has been an avid fan for years. Sharon got hooked when Gary Burnett (former NU Coach) was on board, and promised to take NU to Pasadena, which he did in 1995! She saw the team go to the Citrus Bowl in 1996. All in all, Sharon Smith is a true NU advocate!

So, the small town girl from Kansas has made the �City of the Big Shoulders� environs her home now. Ruby slippers have now given way to the Purple and White!

Congrats Sharon� on your 25 years at NU!

Story and photo by Mary Bradley
Department Assistant
Library Administration

James McMahon...Neither Shaken nor Stirred

The name�s McMahon � James McMahon. In another life, James, who�s known to most of us at the Library as Jake (Circulation Assistant), might have been an agent for her majesty�s secret service like his movie hero James Bond. For Jake is more than just your average James Bond fan, he�s something of an authority when it comes to Agent 007. Jake has worked as an unpaid consultant on several of the recent James Bond novels written by Chicago-area writer Raymond Benson. Benson was hired in 1995 by the late Ian Fleming�s estate to continue the Bond franchise by writing new novels and screenplays. Jake first met Benson at a spy novel convention, but he knew about him previously from James Bond Internet chat rooms.

Jake is proudest of his involvement with Benson�s novel, The Man with the Red Tattoo (G. P. Putnam�s Sons, 2002), which is set in Japan. Benson writes, in the acknowledgements to the novel, �A special thank you to the Japan National Tourist Organization for its generous contributions to the making of this book, and to James McMahon for being my �Richard Hughes� while in Japan.�

Benson knew of Jake�s interest in Japan, and of his knowledge of the Japanese language, so he invited Jake to accompany him on a three week all-expenses paid trip to Japan to help him research his novel. While Jake and Benson were in Japan, Jake served as Benson�s translator and cultural advisor. Together they scouted out locations where scenes in the novel would take place, dinned at the finest restaurants, and got to meet many local celebrities.

Jake learned to speak Japanese by auditing classes at Northwestern for years during his lunch hours. But Jake is quite modest about his Japanese language skills and says he really only knows just enough to sometimes get himself into trouble. Jake has always considered himself to be rather shy but when in Japan he�s absolutely fearless about trying out his Japanese on everyone he meets. �I apparently have a good accent so what I know how to say, I say well,� Jake explained, �Some people think then that I really know how to speak Japanese � and then I�m in trouble.� Jake has gotten out of many tricky linguistic difficulties by reciting a brief prepared statement, in Japanese, that explains how little Japanese he actually knows and that he�s still a student of the language. Jake says he�s found that people really appreciate hearing his explanation, not just because it�s the truth, but also because humility is a very Japanese trait. Jake kept a detailed diary of his trip that you can read on the James Bond web site that he maintains with several friends. You�ll find Jake�s illustrated diary of his trip to Japan at www.hmss.com/japan.

As a former U.S. Army reservist assigned to the Special Forces unit, Jake has had a fair amount of military training and it shows in his near perfect posture and general overall demeanor. He has taken a couple of military leaves of absences from his job at NU, first to go to boot camp and later to attend other advanced Army training.

The next thing you�ll notice right away about Jake is his melodious speaking voice. He has an announcer-quality voice that earned him the job as the �official voice� of the library on our public address/fire alarm system. It�s Jake�s voice that you hear announcing, in no uncertain terms, that the library building is CLOSED. Even in casual conversation Jake is extremely articulate. His words are always carefully chosen and it�s important to him to be precise and to use just the right word or phrase. Often when I�m talking with Jake I�m reminded of his mother, Marion, who was the head of copy cataloging at the NU Library in the late 70�s when I first started working full-time at the library. Jake inherited his Mom�s sense of humor and her precision with language. Jake will often slip in a joke in the midst of conversation that can really take you by surprise because he�s the perfect comedic straight man and will rarely break character or crack a smile during the delivery of his joke.

A taste for international travel was instilled in Jake at a young age. He first visited Japan when he was a young boy living in Hong Kong with his parents. Jake�s Dad was a marketing executive for several U.S. companies that did business abroad. Jake�s Dad, also named James, enjoyed working abroad and actively sought out foreign assignments. Jake was born in Mexico during one of his father�s assignments just outside of Mexico City, where his family lived until Jake was seven years old. After a brief two year stint back in the U.S. the McMahon family next moved to Hong Kong where Jake�s Dad was head of the buying office for the Far East Region of retailer Montgomery Ward. At the conclusion of his Dad�s assignment in Hong Kong the McMahon family was slated to move to Japan but Jake�s parents decided it was time to return to the U.S. for the sake of their three kids. The McMahon family moved to Wilmette where Jake attended and graduated from New Trier East High school.

Jake is celebrating his 25th anniversary at the University Library, but his connection to Northwestern started several years earlier than that. On his mother�s advice Jake applied for and got his first student job (shelving books) at the library in 1972. He was still a sophomore at New Trier East. During his college years at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, where Jake majored in graphic design, he was able to earn extra money for school by working at the Northwestern library during breaks. Because Drake was on the semester system and NU is on the quarter system, Jake�s college breaks coincided very nicely with the times the Northwestern library was most in need of extra help. Jake would just stop in and see the late Eleanor Pederson, who was Jake�s supervisor for many of the years he�s worked at the Library, and she�d load him up with hours. Eleanor was grateful to get all her hard to fill hours covered, while Jake was just happy to earn the extra cash. Sometimes Jake worked up to 70 hours a week during reading and exam week, until the personnel office finally cracked down on him for working so many overtime hours per week.

To many of Circulation Services� customers Jake is the face of the department. The rest of his department has their desks behind the scenes in a private back office area. But Jake�s desk is out front, right in the middle of the action � and he wouldn�t have it any other way. I asked Jake to share some of his coping strategies when dealing with difficult customers. �I used to take it personally that they were attacking me, or my institution, my family,� Jake explained. �I�d get indignant or defensive. But then I realized they don�t know me. This isn�t personal. They usually just want to blow off steam. They want somebody to listen, so be a good listener, let them tell their story. If you keep your voice level and you stay friendly, once they have gotten it all off their shoulders they are usually in a much better mood to discuss ([the problem) reasonably.�

One amusing Northwestern story that Jake recalled during our interview is actually about Rolf Ericksen, the head of the Circulation Department for many years until his death in 1992. An NU faculty member approached the circulation desk and asked the student on duty to check on the status of a book that he needed for his research. When the faculty member was told that the book had been charged out to a study carrel for the past five years and he�d have to wait another two weeks for the book to be recalled, the faculty member just went nuts. He totally blew up at the student worker and said, �That�s outrageous! That�s unconscionable! I demand that you let me check out the book immediately, and furthermore I want this person�s carrel privileges revoked!� The poor undergraduate was totally ill equipped to deal with the wrath of a tenured faculty member under a full head of steam, so he went to get Rolf for help. Always the diplomat, Rolf very calmly approached the desk to see how he might be of assistance. After just a few minutes he had determined that the book in question was actually charged out to that faculty member�s own study carrel. After telling the faculty member what he�d discovered, Rolf totally dead panned it and without missing a beat said, �Since you�ll obviously be giving up your study carrel, would you like us to clear out the books? Or will you empty the carrel for us?� You�ve never seen such furious backpedaling as the faculty member totally shifted gears and tried to justify his behavior. At no time did the faculty member admit he was wrong or apologize for causing an unnecessary disturbance. In the end the faculty member got to keep his carrel, but Rolf kept him dancing around for a little while.

Vince McCoy
Technical Support Consultant
Library Information Technology Support Services

(Photo by Mary Bradley)

Vince McCoy�Music to our ears!

This issue of LibStaff Links features someone most of us have come to know quite well, Vince McCoy, one of our technical support consultants in the Library's Information Technology division.

Many of us met Vince during our first week at the Library, when we needed help figuring out Meeting Maker or Eudora. Other staff members had the pleasure of meeting Vince when attending one of NUL�s IT classes. You could always tell it was Vince�s class by the soothing backdrop of jazz music or other carefully selected tunes that Vince played as you entered the room.

Vince first came to Northwestern in 1968 as a high school music cherub, then continued on to earn his bachelors of music degree in music education. In the 70s and 80s, Vince was a public services assistant and then a technical services assistant, which transitioned him into the wonderful world of IT. In ISDO (the Information Systems Development Office), Vince became data center supervisor reporting to Jim Aagaard. Vince was the lead operator for the Library�s IBM mainframe computer. When the Library moved from mainframes to PC�s, Vince became the first local area network administrator for the Library. The technology shift from dumb terminals to personal computers created the need for in-house training on PC hardware and software. This is when Vince�s duties shifted from computer operations to staff training and user support, his role today.

Vince celebrated his 30th year at Northwestern University in 2004 and has seen a lot over that period of time. It was the age of hippies and Vietnam when Vince started his work here. The student government sponsored rock concerts every Friday afternoon in Deering Meadow, where many protest marches also occurred. Eva Jefferson was the student body president then, the first black student body president of a predominantly white student body. Vince was voted the first black president of the Gay Liberation Front on campus.

Vince is more than bits and bytes. Music is definitely his passion. He especially enjoys listening to jazz vocalists. Vince can also be found creating culinary masterpieces at home, watching films, and writing short stories. Vince is also a devoted Evanstonian. When not exploring unique shops in Evanston, he can be spotted at one of his favorite restaurants, including Dave�s Italian Kitchen, Lulu�s, Lupita�s Mexican Restaurant, or the Lucky Platter Diner. But of course here at Northwestern Library, his home is on the first floor in the Library IT Support Services Department. We are glad he is here!

Photo and story by Mary Bradley
Library Administration

Archivist Kevin Leonard

Throughout the year, Libstaff Links will feature profiles of Library staff members who have reached 20, 25, 30, or 35 years of service at Northwestern University. We launch this series today with a profile of Kevin Leonard, who has been with the University Archives for 25 years. Special thanks to Vince McCoy who came up with the idea for the series and will be a contributing editor.

Kevin Leonard is a born archivist. He now thinks he must have been genetically predisposed to becoming an archivist because even as a young boy growing up in Phoenix, Arizona, he was always collecting things and carefully squirreling them away for safekeeping. Kevin explains, �If I received a letter in the mail that you might just look at and throw away, I always tucked it in my sock drawer. I was a pack rat from birth, some squirrel DNA must have gotten into the mix there.� As Kevin talked about his 25-plus years working for the University Archives, there was a gleam of excitement in his eyes and it seemed like he just couldn�t stop smiling. His words flowed quickly and effortlessly with very little prompting from me. Kevin spoke with the confidence and authority of a man who knows he has found his true calling and can�t really imagine doing any other kind of work.

While the University is officially recognizing Kevin for 25 years of service, his career in University Archives really began while he was a Northwestern junior in the early 1970s. Kevin began his freshman year at Northwestern in the fall of 1973 and admits that he chose Northwestern at least partly for the milder Midwestern climate: �By the time I finished high school I was sick of the heat and sun in Phoenix. I don�t like sunlight and I don�t like heat. I had heard of Northwestern maybe from a football game on TV and I knew I wanted to come to Chicago.�

Like many archivists of his generation, Kevin was completely trained on the job and became interested in the field quite by accident. Kevin had always thought he wanted to be a school teacher and his interest in archives came as a surprise to him. After all, what college kid in the 1970s had ever heard of an archive or had any idea what they do? There were no academic programs in archival management like there are today. The knowledge of the field was passed on one-on-one from the older generation of archivists to the younger generation.

Kevin, who was a history major, got his first introduction to an archive when one of his professors assigned him a class project that required him to do research in the University Archives. In the course of his research Kevin met and became friendly with University Archivist Patrick Quinn, who has worked at Northwestern for over 30 years. Patrick must have recognized an archivist-in-the-rough because as soon as he found out that Kevin had been hired by the late Bob Love (stack control supervisor for many years), he immediately stole Kevin away to work for University Archives instead. Except for a brief two-year stint as a research assistant at a Chicago law firm right after he graduated from Northwestern, Kevin has been in the University Archives.

Housed in the lower level of Deering Library, the University Archives is a Library department that also has very strong tries to the University administration and the Office of Alumni Relations. The mission of University Archives is to acquire, retain, protect, and make available the record of the University. They are the guardians of the University�s institutional memory and identity. University Archives is primarily interested in collecting materials that have long-term historical or legal value to the University. While Archives primarily collects written or printed documents, they have materials in a variety of formats like magnetic tapes, punch cards, disks, CDROMs, photographs printed on paper and past photographic processes like glass slides, daguerreotypes, amber types, tin types, glass plate negatives, and 35 mm film. Artifacts in the collection include things like architectural models, door knobs from Old College, fraternity and sorority memorabilia, tee shirts, and athletic uniforms. Perhaps the oddest item in the collection is a stuffed wildcat that was shot by a prominent Northwestern alum and donated to the alumni office.

Unlike other special collections in the Library, University Archives does not have a materials acquisitions budget because it does not purchase any of the materials in its collection. Instead the archivists must use diplomacy and persuasion to get potential donors to recognize the historical value of their records and agree to entrust the Archives with their documents for free. NU schools and departments are not mandated to deposit documents with the University Archives and the Archives staff does not have the authority to go into a department or school and seize important records they feel should be preserved. It can sometimes be a delicate tightrope for the archivists to walk between balancing the donor's desire to retain control of their documents and the real danger that important documents could be lost forever if the Archives doesn�t acquire them.

I asked Kevin to describe a typical day in University Archives: �There are lots of things that each of us have to do in the course of a given day. We go out and look for records, try to identify bodies of records that may be of significance, and then we box them up on-site and can carry them back to the Archives where we accession them, arrange and describe them, and make them available for reference use. We�re kind of a combination reference department, moving company, and scout for materials.�

One of Kevin�s favorite duties is giving campus walking tours to alumni groups who have returned to campus for class reunions in the fall and spring of each year. Kevin says alumni attending their 50-year reunions are always amazed by the appearance of the campus. Even in the 32 years since Kevin first came to Northwestern the appearance of the campus has changed dramatically. �All the plants and trees they planted on the landfill have grown up," he says. "They were just little things when I started here and I remember thinking at the time, the campus will be very beautiful in 20 years. Never knowing I�d still be here 20 years later to see it.�

When I asked Kevin for his funniest Northwestern story he just laughed and shook his head, no, and said, �I really couldn�t tell you. The really good ones are things I don�t wish to divulge. But when you get involved in dealing with personal papers and individuals who are entrusting you to maintain their legacy throughout time you can see some really funny things.�

Vincent McCoy
Technical Support Consultant
Library Information Technology Support Services

Photo by Mary Bradley