Skip to main content

People

Appointments & Retirements

Bleisch, Elaine

Elaine Bleisch joined Lied Scottsbluff (Nebr.) Public Library as teen librarian and children’s assistant in November.

March 1, 2021
Cain, Jonathan

In January Jonathan O. Cain became associate university librarian for research and learning at Columbia University Libraries in New York City.

March 1, 2021
DeCicco-Carey, Kyle

Kyle DeCicco-Carey joined Millicent Library in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, as director October 19.

March 1, 2021
Dorr, Jessica

Jessica Dorr became director of Boise (Idaho) Public Library November 30.

March 1, 2021
Ensley, Eric

J. Eric Ensley was appointed curator of rare books and maps at University of Iowa Libraries’ Special Collections and University Archives in December.

March 1, 2021

View more

At ALA

Jarnagin, Briana

Briana Jarnagin left the Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services November 6.

March 1, 2021
Hix, Genevieve

Assistant Director for Major Gifts Genevieve Hix left ALA October 9.

January 8, 2021
Plagman, Emily

Public Library Association Manager of Impact and Advocacy Emily Plagman left ALA October 2.

January 8, 2021
Figueroa, Miguel

Miguel Figueroa, director of the Center for the Future of Libraries, left ALA September 4 to become president and chief executive officer of Amigos Library Services.

November 4, 2020
Macikas, Barbara

Barbara Macikas retired as executive director of the Public Library Association August 31.

November 4, 2020

View more

Cited

Gut, Rachel

The Better Business Bureau of Dayton and Miami Valley’s Women in Business Network named Rachel Gut, deputy director of Dayton (Ohio) Metro Library, one of its Top 25 Women of Impact.

January 8, 2021
Tang, Lydia

Lydia Tang, special collections archivist and librarian at Michigan State University in East Lansing, received the Mark A. Greene Emerging Leader Award from the Society of American Archivists.

January 8, 2021
Rhodes, Angela

State University of New York at Morrisville presented Angela Rhodes, associate systems and electronic resources librarian, with its Distinguished Librarian Award in August.

November 4, 2020
Buljung, Brianna

Brianna Buljung, teaching and learning librarian at Colorado School of Mines in Golden, has been awarded a Fulbright US Scholar Grant to lecture at China University of Mining and Technology in Xuzhou in spring 2021.

September 1, 2020
Koscielski, Roberta

Roberta Koscielski, deputy director of Peoria (Ill.) Public Library, was named Librarian of the Year by the Illinois Library Association in July.

September 1, 2020

View more

Obituaries

Cornish, Alan

Alan Cornish, 59, director of library technology services at University of Oregon in Eugene since 2018, died November 5. Prior to joining University of Oregon, he served as automation librarian at Texas A&M University Libraries in College Station; systems librarian at National Library of Medicine in Bethesda, Maryland; head of library systems at Washington State University Libraries in Pullman; and program manager for the Orbis Cascade Alliance consortium in Eugene.

March 1, 2021
Grimm, Ben

Ben Emmett Grimm, 96, director of Jersey City (N.J.) Free Public Library until his 1985 retirement, died November 9. He served as 1968-1969 president of the New Jersey Library Association, and after retirement worked as a library consultant.

March 1, 2021
Grisham, Frank

Frank P. Grisham, 92, died October 9. He served as director of Vanderbilt (Tenn.) University Library from 1968 until 1982, then as executive director of the Southeastern Library Network in Atlanta until his retirement in 1994. Grisham, who established the Vanderbilt Television News Archive in 1968, received many library awards, including the American Library Association’s (ALA) Melvil Dewey Medal and the Southeastern Library Association’s Rothrock Award.

March 1, 2021
Hauser, Janet

Janet M. Hauser, 85, who retired from Glencoe (Ill.) Public Library as children’s librarian in 2010, died December 7.

March 1, 2021
Lewis, Marjorie

Marjorie Lewis, 91, a children’s librarian in schools and public libraries in Montclair, New Jersey; Scarsdale, New York; and London, died December 7. Lewis also wrote three children’s books and coedited Waltzing on Water, an anthology of poetry by women.

March 1, 2021

View more

Send notices and photos to Amy Carlton, acarlton@ala.org.

Latest Library Links

10h

Emily Udell writes: “Before COVID-19 came along, 18-year-old Jack Miller (right), who has autism, visited the main location of Gail Borden Public Library District in Elgin, Illinois, three times a week. It would be difficult to find a library-goer whose visits haven’t been affected by COVID-19. But for Jack and many other people with disabilities, the effects are reaching even further. Losing independence, socialization, cognitive stimulation, and other library benefits is, in many cases, leading to emotional, intellectual, and other difficulties.”

American Libraries feature, Mar./Apr.
10h

ALA President Julius C. Jefferson Jr. writes: “Libraries and library workers had an important role leading up to the 2020 presidential election by encouraging and supporting voter registration, which led to more than 66% of eligible voters participating—making 2020 the most engaged election since 1900. No matter who you voted for, as an ALA member you understood the significance of engaging in our democracy and the democratic process. Participation in the democratic process and the governance of our nation is important to the citizens we serve. The governance of ALA should be equally important to our members.”

American Libraries column, Mar./Apr.
3d

Walker Caplan writes: “For all the fake news fearmongering of the last four years, we’re still very susceptible to myths presented as fact when they’re deployed with authority. February 7 saw the viral Facebook resurgence of a popular tweet from 2018 which claimed that in the event of a fire, all the oxygen is slurped out of Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library to preserve the library’s collection of over 1 million rare books—killing all the people inside.”

LitHub, Feb. 16
3d

When Penguin Random House said last year that it planned to buy Simon & Schuster for more than $2 billion, the entire publishing industry snapped to attention. The merger of two of the largest publishers in the United States—Penguin Random House is already the biggest by almost any metric—has the potential to touch every piece of the book business, including how much writers get paid, which books get priority at printing plants and how independent bookshops are run.

New York Jewish Week, Feb. 25
3d

Rebecca Torchia writes: “As schools across the nation shifted to distance learning—and then again to a hybrid model—library staff have taken creative approaches to foster student engagement and give students access to literature. From sharing digital resources with teachers to helping students in research projects, librarians around the country have found themselves going above and beyond to guide teachers and students at all grade levels, including in their efforts to engage and educate using technology solutions.”

Ed Tech, Feb. 25
3d

Researchers at Stanford University have confirmed what millions of remote workers already knew: “Zoom fatigue” causes greater stress than meeting in real life because of the “nonverbal overload” of endless video calls. A study by Jeremy Bailenson, professor of communication and founding director of the Stanford Virtual Human Interaction Lab, found that the underlying causes of Zoom fatigue include “excessive amounts of close-up eye gaze” and “increased self-evaluation from staring at video of oneself.”

Financial Times, Feb. 26
6d

In the latest edition of our online Letters of the Law column, lawyer-librarian Mary Minow explores nuances of meeting room policy affected by pandemic conditions, as well as privacy considerations and liability around tax season.

American Libraries column, Feb. 23

View more Latest Library Links