ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries


ACRL Rare Books and Manuscripts 
Section Preconference

The ACRL Rare Books and Manuscripts Sec­
tion will hold its fifteenth annual preconference
at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville,
from June 30 to July 2, 1974, prior to the ALA
Annual Conference in New York City. Special
Collections—Their Conservation and Preserva
tion is the theme for the preconference.

An all-day tour to the W. J. Barrow Research
Laboratory and the W. J. Barrow Restoration
Shop, in Richmond, Virginia, will highlight the
preconference. Meetings will feature the prob
lems and solutions of repairing and conservin
special collections materials. Among the speak
ers will be Bernard F. Walker, Barrow Re
search Laboratory; George M. Cunha, Ne
England Document Center; Jean Gunner, Hun

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Institute for Botanical Documentation; William 
Spawn, American Philosophical Society; and
Lawrence Towner, Newberry Library.

C. Waller Barrett, noted collector and former
president of the Bibliographical Society of
America, will host a dinner for the conferees at
his home. James Bear, Jr., curator and director
of Monticello, will speak on the assembling of
the Monticello Library.

Vesta Lee Gordon, of the Manuscript De­
partment at the University of Virginia Library,
is serving as chairman of the preconference
planning committee. Further information and
registration materials may be obtained from
Beverly P. Lynch, Executive Secretary, ACRL,
50 E. Huron S t, Chicago, IL 60611. ■■

 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

Inside Washington
Christopher W right 

Assistant Director
A L A  Washington Office

No funds have been requested in the
1975 budget for the college library re­
sources program, under-graduate instruc­
tional equipment, and library training
and demonstration. This is consistent
with the Office of Educations general
higher education policy of moving away
from institutional support toward student
support. . . .

— from “The Fiscal Year 1975
Budget,” The Department of
Health, Education and Welfare.

Academic librarians may be enjoying th
last fling with federal money this year if the 
ministration refuses to fund college and univ
sity library programs next year.

While Washington has never squande
much largess on academic libraries, fede
funds this year have already been pared to 
lowest amount since 1970 and in next ye
budget the White House (for the second y
in a row) has requested no money at all 
long-standing programs—the $5,000 ba
grants, the special purpose grants, library tra
ing programs and research and demonstrat
grants included under Title II of the Hig
Education Act of 1965.

To add to this picture of fiscal misery, the 
Higher Education Act, itself a bare toehold on 
Capitol Hill for academic librarians, expires in 

 1975 and will need new authorization or rewrit­
 ing. But congressional education staffers are 
 busy this session wrestling with a new elemen­
 tary and secondary education act and have few 
 thoughts to spare on higher education. Many 

staff people would seem to agree with the 
HEW  conclusion that federal assistance has 

 been “marginal” and colleges probably won t 
 miss it. Few have heard the plea of the univer­

sity library director who moaned, * if nothing 
else, it kept me from falling any further be­eir 

ad­ hind.”
Academic libraries are thus in danger of be­er­

ing caught in midstream. While few would 
quarrel with the judgment of economists Wil­red 
liam J. Baumöl and Matityahu Marcus that the ral 
evidence shows clearly “the past rates of expan­the 
sion in library expenditures, like those of educa­ar’s 
tional institutions in general, could not have ear 
been expected to continue indefinitely,” a con­for 
sensus of where to turn next is needed.1sic 

in­ 'William J. Baumöl and Matityahu Marcus, 
ion Economics of Academic Libraries (Washington, 
her D.C.: American Council on Education, 1973), 

p .l.

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