College and Research Libraries


Guest Editorial 
Small Futures? 

In 1993 The New-York Historical Soci-
ety carne close to shutting its doors for 
good. The California Historic~! Society 
ground to a halt several years ago and is 
slowly trying to resurrect itself. Small 
denominational colleges and seminaries 
continue to sell off their rare book collec-
tions. The John Crerar Library found sal-
vation, but only at the cost of its institutional 
independence, when it merged with the 
University of Chicago. More recently, the 
Annenberg Institute-formerly Dropsie 
College-has become part of the School of 
Arts and Sciences at the University of Penn-
sylvania, thus ending for now a long and 
complicated odyssey. 

And so libraries come and libraries go. 
It seems a story so familiar as to be un-
remarkable. The fate of libraries usually 
attracts little interest or attention in the 
media or in our professional literature. 
The case of The New-York Historical So-
ciety is instructive. It has garnered a few 
columns in the New York Times but little 
else. There has not been much if anything 
about it in the professional literature. As 
we fill journals and conferences with more 
and more papers on the possible obsoles-
cence of libraries in the electronic age, we 
remain oddly silent in front of the real 
situations of real institutions. We seem 
prepared to accept the demise of libraries 
as natural happenings, as natural as life 
cycles, evolution, and the free market. I 
remember once seeing plans for a new 
central library at the University of Chicago 
drawn up in the 1930s. They had space 
reserved for the Newberry Library. The 
assumption of a sort of Darwinian inevita-
bility is revealing. 

There are thousands of small, private 
institutions in this country with topical 

collections embracing medicine and the 
sciences, religion, ethnic and regional 
history, the arts and culture. A few are 
well funded and well endowed; many, 
however, exist in a twilight zone, wres-
tling with a difficult present and moving 
toward an uncertain future. Their histo-
ries and destinies, on the whole, have 
been little studied or appreciated. But it 
needs to be asked whether we as a pro-
fession, we as citizens, don't in fact have 
some larger interest in the future of these 
institutions and their collections. Why 
do they change identities or disappear 
altogether? What is lost and gained in 
such passages? More than protests or 
laments, ·analyses and evaluations · are 
needed that can be used to inform policy, 
management, and strategic thinking. 
But first we must become engaged with 
the topic. We must feel a keener sense of 
urgency about the fates of some of our 
most interesting, valuable, and irre-
placeable cultural institutions. I have no 
specific recommendations to make at 
this point, nothing to put on the table 
except a modest proposal that more at-
tention, watchfulness, and thoughtful 
consideration of institutions become 
part of our professional agenda. 

Habent sua fata libelli: books have their 
own destiny. And so do the repositories 
that house them. Created for specific 
purposes and identifiable constituen-
cies, these institutions often outlive their 
original raison d'etre and fail to find a 
new one. Constituencies disappear and 
with them interest and support. Mean-
while, policies and programs remain 
locked into place, frozen in time. The 
institution ceases to have any organic 
relationship with the world around it. In 

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388 College & Research Libraries 

effect it dies. But not quite. Library col-
lections are not easily relinquished. 
Their very materiality proclaims, "We 
exist, therefore we should exist." The 
fact that no one may be using them, that 
they are slumbering quietly on the 
shelves is less important than their sheer 
presence. As the Israelis say in another 
context, they create facts. Since the Ren-
aissance, if not earlier, books have 
served as symbols of entitlement, confir-
mations of status, proofs of position. 
And what has been true for individuals 
has been just as true for the clubs, socie-
ties, fraternal and professional organiza-
tions they have created. To have an 
organization without a library or mu-
seum, without objects and material 
presences, is to have a phantom organi-
zation. Tht,IS, patriots, true believers, 
and well-wishers see in such collections 
that symbolic capital that certifies the 
institution's right to exist. The collec-
tions become their own rationale. 

This institutional sclerosis, however, 
is usually fatal. What happens next is the 
most important part of the story, yet here 
I would argue is where professional nos-
trums are open to challenge and where 
there is a clear and pressing need . for 
sustained analysis. The worst case, we 
imagine, is dismemberment: the collec-
tions are dispersed, sold off. But is this 
necessarily a bad outcome? Bad for 
whom? For the institution, surely. But 
who else loses in this transaction? The 
community? Scholars? How and why? If 
the collection has lost its constituency in 
one venue, could not the books find life 
in other, more congenial settings? The 
compromise position-and often the 
only meaningful alternative to dismem-
berment-is merger: finding a healthy 
and sympathetic partner. Identity and 
independence may be sa~rificed, but col-
lections are retained intact. This, we 
imagine, is a desirable outcome. A small, 
struggling institution is absorbed by an 
enlightened, well-managed, cognate or-
ganization with constituencies, support, 
and clout. The assumption here is that 
collections will be better cared for when 
integrated into a larger fabric of re-
sources that will insure their use and 

September 1994 

well-being over time. Bigger is better, 
safety in size. Yet, is this always or neces-
sarily a desirable outcome? Is it not possi-
ble that sleeping collections will continue 
to sleep, only this time in the company of 
thousands and thousands of volumes? 

However, there are serious obsta-
cles to studying and appraising the 
fates of libraries. As a profession, we 
understandably tend to be more con-
cerned with those nuts-and-bolts issues 
that make up our working days. The 
destinies of institutions, unless they im-
pinge directly on us, are not topics to 
which we have devoted any significant 
attention. Moreover, the general topic is 
a sensitive one, involving delicate issues 
of management and stewardship. Yet 
such issues are aired regularly in busi-
ness publications covering the ebb and 
flow of corporations. There is no prima: 
facie reason why we could not be just as 
open. We can admit that the field may be 
sown with land mines and at the same 
try to pick our way through them. Not 
to do so is to beg the issue of account-
ability, and that, I think, truly is the 
worst case scenario-for institutions 
and for us as a profession. The most 
formidable obstacles to the study of in-
stitutions, however, are usually thrown 
up by the institutions themselves, who 
often prefer to work out their futures in 
private for fear of calling attention to 
chronic problems. While such fears are 
valid, they inhibit learning and probably 
restrict options open to the institution. 
We all lose in the process. 

Even as I write, institutions are quietly 
negotiating their futures. I know of sev-
eral here in the Philadelphia area, but-
alas-prudence and respect counsel 
discretion in discussing their situations 
publicly. I wish them all well, and yet I 
am bothered that these are simply more 
narratives unfolding out of sight, out of 
mind. Trustees and boosters will work 
among themselves to reach acceptable 
conclusions. Someday we will learn of 
the outcomes, but we will have learned 
little else. And that will be it. Books do 
indeed have their own destiny. 

MICHAEL RYAN, 
University of Pennsylvania