Lecture focuses on Memorial Library's rich history

By Katie Gilbert
Library Communications

University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries Director Kenneth Frazier began his speech Sept. 17 with an anecdote. He described a conversation between former UW history professor Merle Curti and historian and author Samuel Eliot Morrison.

Morrison asked Curti how far east he needed to travel to find a good library. Curti's response: the British Museum. The audience chuckled but Frazier's lighthearted story raised a more serious topic.

"By the mid-1930s, it was not possible to say that the University of Wisconsin library--apart from the very fine collection of the Wisconsin Historical Society library--it was not possible to say that this was a great or even a good library," Frazier said.

The University of Illinois had a good library. So did the University of Minnesota, the University of Michigan and Ohio State University. Wisconsin simply did not.

With a bit of luck, a lot of support and more than 25 years of requests and demands for a larger library, the University of Wisconsin-Madison joined the ranks of its Big Ten comrades. Memorial Library opened its doors to the public Sept. 17, 1953. In the ensuing 50 years, Memorial has received two additions and built its collections to 3.5 million volumes. The system, however, has only seen six library directors, including Frazier.

In his speech titled "Remembering Our Past & Envisioning Our Future: Memorial Library at Fifty," Frazier recalled both Memorial's history and the path to its construction, dating back to the late 1920s, when Belle LaFollette and supporters of her late husband, former Wisconsin Gov. Robert LaFollette, saw the need to build a university library. Due partly to budget cuts and a Republican government that despised LaFollette and the Progressive Era, the movement was subdued. In the 1930s, the Historical Society was still the primary library but could not support an expanding collection and materials were boxed and stored in other campus locations.

In 1938 Library President Gilbert Doane called for another library, pointing out the Historical Society's inadequacy for university needs, but at the time the university took budget cuts in an economic depression. Theodore Blegen, dean of the Graduate School at the University of Minnesota, and Keyes Metcalf, director of libraries at Harvard University, conducted a report in 1942 that recognized the need for a new research library, claiming UW-Madison was lagging behind other institutions with strong research libraries. The report cited that a lack of financial support was holding the libraries back.

"For a time, the report was so, so devastating that the university was reluctant to release it and the publisher of the (Wisconsin) State Journal wrote an editorial saying 'what's the secret?' and the report was eventually put out and widely circulated in 1943, setting in motion plans for the post-war era that would place the construction of a library at the top of the list."

By the 1950s, the campus population had doubled and more than 30 buildings were constructed between 1945 and 1950 alone to accommodate former World War II soldiers arriving at college. A $300,000 purchase of rare materials in the History of Science from the estate of Chester H. Thordarson collection provided another incentive for the university to build a research library.

Finally, E.B. Fred, president of the university, received $5.9 million from Wisconsin's Legislature for a library dedicated to those who served in World War II. In 1950, a group of more than 1,000 witnessed the library's ground-breaking, a quest more than 25 years in the making. A building collapse March 16, 1951 delayed construction but the building was largely completed by Sept. 17, 1953, when the library finally opened its doors.

Since its first days in existence, Memorial Library has provided patrons with practical service while expanding to become the state's largest library. Library Director Louis Kaplan, who served from 1957-'71, is credited with expanding the library's collection and he brought in monetary donations and treasures such as the Sukov Collection. The library enjoyed many milestones, witnessing the transition from card catalogues to computerized search engines, the founding of the InterLibrary Service in 1972 and the onset of personal computers in the 1990s. Another challenging event also defined Memorial's history: a woman was attacked by a man with an axe in the stacks in 1989. As a result, access to the library changed and from then on, users were required to show photo identification to enter the building.

The library structure also changed, as two additions in 1974 and 1990 expanded the building to its current size. When the building was first completed, it included a typing room, several quiet study areas and even a smoking lounge in the basement, which was popular with the students. The first construction in 1974 expanded the collection space and the reading areas and the second addition in 1990 enlarged the building to nine stories. Memorial initially intended to add a 10th story as well but the Department of Landscape Architecture raised a debate because the extra story blocked the view of part of the Capitol. After the protest became a political issue, the additional story was removed, which later proved to be a blessing in disguise.

"The instillation of greater structural techniques permit for compact shelving, a benefit that is quite crucial in today's library," Frazier said. "It also gave us a very fine Special Collections facility on the ninth floor, an important gathering place for the university community today."

Although Frazier focused on the library's history, he projected it into the future by discussing dreams for future generations. One goal is to move the music library from the basement of Memorial to its own music facility, a center for the arts that would combine a library with a performance area, also a desire of Chancellor John Wiley's. He also talked about a possible conservation and preservation facility, such as the ones at the University of Texas-Austin and Duke University, to store and preserve rare and valuable collections.

"It seems to me that we need to start dreaming now about the kinds of facilities that we will require for future generations of students and and scholars and faculty," Frazier said. "We need to start talking about (ideas) now so that we don't have to wait for another 50 years before we have the kind of research library and teaching facilities that this great public institution will require."

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