In the Perkins Library

April/July

Uncommon Leaders: The Presidents of Duke University

Documents and photographs from the University Archives trace the history of presidential leadership at the university from 1838 until the present, with an emphasis on presidents Few through Keohane.

September/October

Clare Leighton and the American South



Master wood engraver, illustrator, and author Clare Leighton fled her native England at the onset of World War II for America, finding refuge and creative inspiration first in the rural South. Materials from the collections of Duke's Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library document her impressions of a South caught between the Civil War and Civil Rights and reveal her life-long commitment to celebrating the agrarian worker.

And in the Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library

April/July

Highlights from the Picture File

An eclectic collection of historical photographs of famous people, places, organizations and events that have been acquired over time by the Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library. Images include photographs from the Socialist Party of America, ship building in the New York Navy Yard, and missionaries photographed overseas.

August/December

Mel Rosenthal: Photographs from "In the South Bronx of America"

Bathgate Avenue, South Bronx, NY


Mel Rosenthal's photographs document the burning of the South Bronx between1975 and 1983. The portrait photographs depict the everyday lives of residents against backdrops of rubble, abandoned buildings, and destroyed city blocks as they struggle to survive "planned shrinkage," an urban planning strategy utilized from the 1960s-1980s to raze residential buildings in older urban areas and replace them with industrial parks.

Duke's David Ferriero to Join the New York Public Library

David S. Ferriero, Rita DiGiallonardo Holloway University Librarian and vice provost for library affairs, is leaving Duke to become the New York Public Library's Andrew W. Mellon Director and chief executive of the research libraries on September 1. Ferriero came to Duke in 1996 from the libraries at MIT.

Speaking about Ferriero, President Nannerl O. Keohane said, "David has been a remarkably effective and visionary leader of our Library system since we lured him away from MIT. He is something of a Renaissance man, who combines a commitment to the life of the mind with a practical and collaborative approach to serving the diverse needs of our library clients. He has brought Duke libraries into the electronic age and helped all of us understand technology's challenging issues and opportunities, while successfully leading a major fund-raising program to expand and modernize Perkins Library. And he has done all this with charm, wit and great sensitivity to the multicultural nature of our university."

During his tenure at Duke, Ferriero promoted the innovative application of technology, launching the library's Center for Instructional Technology and the Digital Library@Duke. He led a successful capital campaign, which exceeded its goal by almost $10M, and began a massive building and renovation project. The committee that did the initial planning for that project was a recipient of the university's Teamwork Award. David Ferriero has also been known at Duke for his commitment to addressing diversity issues. The library's Diversity Working Group, recognized as a model for other university departments, received the university's Diversity Award in the year that the award was inaugurated.

Ferriero has also taken Duke and the library into the community. He was the principal investigator for a three-year AT&T grant that supported librarians' teaching Durham public school teachers to use technology in the classroom, and he has been a leader in promoting and supporting North Carolina ECHO, a project to provide greater access to the holdings of North Carolina museums, libraries, and archives. He has chaired the Access to Special Collections Work Group, the advisory board for NC ECHO.

David Ferriero will be remembered at Duke as a visionary and an effective leader, a man passionate about both books and basketball!

Business and Pleasure at the Friends Dinner

Novelist, essayist, and preservation activist Nicholson Baker captivated his audience at the 22 April annual meeting of the Friends of the Duke University Libraries when he spoke about the beauty and unique value of print editions of 19th and early 20th century American newspapers. During his speech Baker announced the transfer of the 5,000-volume American Newspaper Repository to the Duke University Libraries (See "Unusual Collection of American Newspapers Comes to the Duke Libraries" in this section.).

During the business meeting that preceded Nicholson Baker's talk, seven members and two students were elected to the Friends Executive Committee. Elected to serve three-year terms were Sarah English, Dale Gaddis, Heidi Madden, Nancy Tuttle May, Leland Phelps, Jean O'Barr (to a second three-year term), and Kimberly Pressley. Bethany Allen was elected to a two-year student term, and Kinohi Nishikawa was elected to fill an unexpired student term ending in 2005. Jean O'Barr and Philip Leinbach were re-elected to their positions of chair and vice-chair for 2004/2005. In other business, the winners of the writing contest co-sponsored by the Friends and the Gothic Bookshop were announced. Eric Dixon '04, the undergraduate winner, and Hank Kinsley, Fuqua '04, the winner in the graduate/professional category, both received $500 Gothic Bookshop gift certificates. The stories written by Dixon and Kinsley are printed in the "Writer's Page" of this issue.

A new Friends-sponsored fellowship for undergraduate students was also announced at the 22 April meeting. The Friends have inaugurated a $750 annual award to support summer research in libraries, archives, or museums by a Duke undergraduate. The Friends of the Duke University Libraries Award will be administered through Trinity College's Office of Undergraduate Research Support.

The first winner of the Friends award is Michael Boyle. Boyle, who also received funding from the Department of Theater Studies and Trinity, will do research this summer in Dublin, Ireland, where he will use literary and newspaper collections primarily in the National Library of Ireland, but also in the newspaper archives of the Dublin city libraries and in the libraries of University College of Dublin and Trinity College. Michael Boyle is an English major. His work this summer is for his senior distinction thesis on "Literature and Social Change: Writing of the Irish Revolution."

Unusual Collection of American Newspapers Comes to the Duke Libraries

A collection of 5,000 volumes of rare and historically significant 19th and 20th century American newspapers has been transferred to the Duke University Libraries. Novelist and essayist Nicholson Baker announced the transfer of the American Newspaper Repository (ANR) during an April 22 speech at Duke.

Baker founded the repository in 1999 after purchasing the bulk of the newspapers from the British Library, which, like other major libraries, removed long runs of its original edition newspapers from its holdings to rely instead on microfilm editions of the papers.

"Many of the newspapers in the collection exist nowhere else in their original print format," Baker said. "These 19th and 20th century newspapers are magnificent landmarks of American publishing. I'm thrilled that they're going to Duke. This is the best possible thing that could happen to a singular collection."

The ANR collection includes extensive runs of the Chicago Tribune, the New York Tribune and Herald Tribune and the New York World. The World, published by Joseph Pulitzer, had the largest circulation of any American newspaper in the 1890s. Short stories by O. Henry were printed in the World, as were caricatures by Al Frueh. The World also was the first newspaper to include crossword puzzles and children's activities. The ANR collection also preserves many immigrant newspapers, including the Irish World, the Yiddish Forward, and the Greek Atlantis.

According to University Librarian David Ferriero, "The papers form a documentary collection of great importance for historical and cultural studies. The Duke University Libraries are proud to serve both society and scholarship by preserving them."