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WPRC Library receives extensive rhesus monkey data archive
Posted 12/3/2002
MADISON, Wis.--UW-Madison's Wisconsin Primate Research Center Library and Information Services now houses an invaluable collection of research data on rhesus monkey families thanks to a generous donation in the name of the late June Northrop Barker, a research physiologist at New York University.
The June Northrop Barker Archive Room holds 30 years of records on rhesus monkeys. The extensive compilation includes hundreds of audio and video observation tapes; records on nutrition and water intake; dated pregnancies, births and deaths; studies of motor and behavioral activities; reports on geriatric afflictions; autopsy videos; and notes on play and vocalizations.
"The archive also includes June's fascinating annual reports on exceptional and unanticipated developments," said Richard Barker, June Northrop Barker's husband. "I am hopeful that the Wisconsin archive of June's collected data will soon come to be recognized as a valuable and exciting new resource for the study of nonhuman primates."
The collection includes not only June Northrop Barker's original observational data, but also source material from well-respected books on primates. UW-Madison journalism professor Deborah Blum's papers from "Love at Goon Park," her new biography on UW-Madison primate psychology researcher Harry Harlow, reside in the archive. The collection also contains Michigan State University professor W. Richard Dukelow's materials from his book "The Alpha Males" on the early development of the U.S. Regional Primate Research Center Program.
Rounding out the initial resources are 50,000 reprints of papers indexed in PrimateLit, a major bibliographic database for primatology; the archives of the International Primatological Society; and master copies of key audiovisual resources.
Along with the donation of his late wife's records, Richard Barker established a $100,000 endowment through the University of Wisconsin Foundation to support the work of the archive. Funds from the archive will be used, in part, to support graduate student archivists from UW-Madison's School of Library and Information Studies.
Richard Barker visited the WPRC July 12 to dedicate the archive and tour the facility. He had been working with Larry Jacobsen, WPRC Library and Information Services director, and the UW Foundation since spring 2001 to arrange the contribution and transfer of documents. According to Jacobsen, the WPRC's reputation for excellent research and the library's Internet-based services to the international primatological community encouraged Richard Barker's bestowment of the gift.
"For us at the Primate Center, [the June Northrop Barker Archive] represents a wonderful contribution," Jacobsen said. "It will help us … build this important resource."
