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Thursday, August 11, 2016

Review—The Role of Canadian Public Libraries in Adult Education (1942) by Gordon Gourlay

The Role of Canadian Public Libraries in Adult Education, by J. W. Gordon Gourlay. University of Michigan, Department of Library Science, 1942. x, 153 leaves.

The studies of the 1930s on Canadian public libraries were mostly financed by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Very little funding came from government sources. In the 1940s, more academic degree studies on Canadian libraries begin to be conducted. Some of these were regional or local studies, others explored trends that extended across provincial boundaries. Adult education concerns had emerged as an important area for library work, first in the USA in the 1920s, then to Canada in the 1930s. William Carson, the Ontario Inspector of Public Libraries, had contributed a piece to an American Library Association study, Libraries and Adult Education, published in 1926. More than a decade later, the British Columbia Library Commission issued its Preliminary Study of Adult Education in British Columbia, 1941. Shortly after, in 1942, a national investigation appeared--one often bypassed in our library historiography.

John Wallace Gordon Gourlay, a native of Lancaster, Ontario, was the author. Gourlay had graduated from Queen's University with a B.A. in English, History, and Economics in 1940. He went on to McGill to get a B.L.S. in 1941 and then to the University of Michigan to receive his A.M.L.S. in 1942. There were no master's library programs in Canada and Michigan's reputation attracted a number of Canadians at this time. Graduating during wartime, Gourlay enlisted and saw service in the Royal Canadian Air Force and the Royal Air Force during Second World War. He returned to civilian life as a librarian at three American universities before becoming the director at Clemson University Library from 1954 to his retirement in 1980.

Although Gourlay's questions to Canadian libraries were made during the conflict with Germany and Japan, he got a reasonable good response by twenty public libraries from a mail out of thirty-five questionnaires. The responses were categorized into several groups:
  • library work with outside groups (e.g., YMCA)
  • special services (e.g., vocational assistance)
  • adult education work within the library (e.g., radio programs, book talks)
  • library publicity; and
  • library work during wartime (e.g., sending books to soldiers in training camps).

Gourlay also summarized some groups and programs that stood out in educational programming with adults: the Dominion-Provincial training programs for youths in areas such as forestry, agriculture and home crafts; Extension Departments at the University of Alberta and St. Francis Xavier; and the Canadian Association for Adult Education (established in 1935). Of course, he could not deal with every organization, e.g., he did not mention the activities of either Frontier College or Sir George Williams College in Montreal which began offering degrees in adult education in 1934. Library responses to Gourlay's survey were mostly positive. A future 1955 President of the Canadian Library Association, Anne Hume, replied "We used it at a Department Head Conference the other day. It gave us [Windsor Public Library] a chance to review our sins and omissions. For that we thank you."

Gourlay offered mostly factual evidence gathered in the course of his survey; however, he did provide a limited explanation about the difficulties encountered in the field of adult education that were shared by libraries and related organizations. Through his inquiries he found that there was a lack of co-ordination among the organizations; that distance hindered effective delivery of programs; that provincial regulation of education led to different approaches and funding for programs; and that Canada's heterogeneous, scattered population often was unrecognized and unassisted through want of proper organization for this type of work. Nonetheless, the variety of library programs in large cities such as Toronto and Vancouver, and even the contributions of smaller ones in northern or rural settings (e.g., Timmins and Lethbridge) demonstrated that libraries were alive to the need of adult learning. Gourlay's study showed that libraries had continued to develop work in the adult education field compared to an earlier national study by the Dominion Bureau of Statistics (Library Cooperation with Adult Study Groups in Survey of Libraries, 1935)

Adult education would continue to be an important topic on the agenda of Canadian libraries in the postwar period and beyond with many studies and plans being conducted at the local, regional, provincial, and federal level. However, as Gourlay discovered, the library as adult educator was a concept not easy to define and put into practice. Working with adults to identify needs, like selecting books from the universe of publications to build collections, could spin off into many directions that required funding beyond the traditional reach of library budgeting.

Further reading

The Role of Canadian Public Libraries in Adult Education is available full text at Hathi Trust.
American Library Association, Libraries and Adult Education (Chicago, 1926) at the Internet Archive site.
 British Columbia Public Library Commission, A Preliminary Study of Adult Education in British Columbia, 1941 (Victoria, 1942) at Hathi Trust site.

Sunday, August 07, 2016

CROSS COUNTRY CHECKUP AND THE LIBRARY OF FUTURE (CIRCA 1995)

Duncan McCue begins hosting the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Radio One's call-in show, Cross Country Checkup, on a regular basis at the start of August 2016. This popular show has been on air for more than fifty years. Long-time commentator and author, Rex Murphy, hosted this show for more than twenty years. He often scheduled programs and issues related to books, reading, and libraries in a lively debate mode from the mid-1990s to 2015.

I had the opportunity to be interviewed by Mr. Murphy way back in March 1995 when the future of libraries and books, seemingly overwhelmed in the coming age of the Internet, was often questioned.
  • Could libraries stay relevant in the age of the Information Highway?
  • Would they wither way and leave half-empty buildings behind, even disappear?
  • Could they transition to Virtual Libraries - Libraries Without Walls - Electronic Libraries - Digital Libraries, whatever they might be called in the 21st century?
Robert Fulford spoke on the same program about the use of electronic reference media in a library setting and how important these kinds of resources were. He was not worried about the passing of the traditional role of libraries any time soon.

Of course, Rex Murphy is a skilled interviewer and put me on the spot more than once. But after re-listening to my spontaneous responses in support of libraries as brick and concrete community resource spaces and accessible places where people and students could find mediators to help locate information, I think most of what I said remains valid twenty years on. The printed book is still with us as a staple in the library along with other media formats. But e-books are great too and they are a lot easier to use now. There are lots of non-print materials --digital resources -- in libraries.

The issues about of how libraries have been transformed from storage sites to information providers have been raised and debated many times since the early 1990s. In fact, this question dates to the use of computers in libraries beginning in the 1960s. Now, the prospects for the 21st century 'library' -- Library 2.0 - are front and center. But, users are still the focus: libraries change in relation to user needs and demands and how 'publishers' and the 'public' create content in a multiplicity of ways. There are many types of publishers and many types of public. There are many varieties of libraries, too.

My interview with Mr. Murphy was recorded more than twenty years ago as a .wav file, so click this link and turn up your audio volume if you are interested in going back to 1995.

My interview with Mr. Murphy was recorded more than twenty years ago as a .wav file, so click this link and turn up your audio volume if you are interested in going back to 1995.

If you prefer to read the transcription for the session interview, following along below.


TRANSCRIPTION FOR REX MURPHY--LORNE BRUCE INTERVIEW ON CROSS COUNTRY CHECKUP, CBC RADIO, SUNDAY AFTERNOON, MARCH 19, 1995

Rex Murphy: Obviously we're talking about books we have at some point to talk about libraries. Libraries have long been the bearers of the torch much like the monasteries in the Middle Ages, but they've also been quick in this new age to adapt to the new technology. Mr. Lorne Bruce is a librarian at the University of Guelph and he's written a book called "Free Books for All" published by Dundurn Press. I spoke with Mr. Bruce earlier today. RM: Mr. Bruce because of your association, at least to my knowledge, is primarily with libraries I mean to put this kind of question to you. Is the library as a central social institution anywhere near as central as it was even 10 or 15 or 20 years ago? What the question means is has all this new kind of information and new ways of gathering information displaced libraries as places where books are kept as things important in people's lives? Lorne Bruce: Well, I think there has been a move away from print, a print type of culture in Canada, certainly during this century with a lot of multimedia, but I think libraries have tried to keep up, tried to remain central to offering a variety of information and also a knowledge base for citizens so that they can come into the library and find information. Talk to librarians who are essentially mediators in the process of information and building knowledge. And I think that the various provincial governments or municipal governments have tried to show [this] for example in some of their advertising campaigns. There was one here in Ontario about 10 years ago, "More than Meets the Eye," that libraries do do computer searches. They do have cd [roms]. They're using multimedia. RM: Yeah, but here's my point. Once the libraries walk away from the core of collected books that are there for people to pick up and take home and to read, once they offered a full gallery and menu of other information services even though you keep the name how much have you ceased to be a library? LB: Well, it's still a library. I mean a library is multimedia. RM: It is? LB: It is, yes, there are multimedia libraries and the public library has always tried to have [these] in addition to books other types of formats. RM: OK, maybe I can put the question to your plainer. LB: I would say that they're not trying to abandon or walk away from print media, but they're trying to incorporate these other types of formats. RM: And when you say the print media, do you mean books? LB: Yes. LB: What do you call them [books] again? I am not being annoyingly saucy. Why you call them print media? LB: Well, I think in the library world there are different types of formats and print format is essentially fiction-nonfiction [publications]. Electronic formats are things like cd roms, computerized searches from databases which are remote in the United States. And, of course, then there's music and recordings and so on, 16-millimeter films, videos ... RM: Can I ask the question. If the libraries at the present day or if the libraries that you are familiar with had in them nothing else but books for this just as a hypothetical situation nothing but books, how many people will be going to it compared to the number of people that are going to now? LB: Oh, it's very difficult to estimate in terms of percentages and numbers, but certainly it would be a smaller number of people coming into the library. RM: Drastically? LB: At a university? No, not drastically, not drastic cuts in numbers, but certainly I think maybe public libraries would be able to keep say 75 percent of the base of people are coming in.
RM: Can you tell me from your own experience outside of a university context as well, has the type of person who is now visiting a library call him a client or her client, is that type of person a different person from what he or she was 20 years ago? LB: Well ... that is a difficult question! Studies show that basically the people who continue to come into libraries are more highly educated. They have more specific demands. Perhaps there has been a trend away with these new electronic sources and so on in special libraries and in business libraries and even in public libraries for people to move away from recreational reading and there's more of a function towards providing information services. That's more of a component. RM: I was going to ask whether the cd roms, whether the information retrieval, whether the ability to connect up with online services and things were the popcorn to get people in to watch the movie. But it sounds like I am misreading it. So, it sounds like they are the movie and the books are the popcorn. LB: Well, I think yes. Books are still the bread and butter. Let's not call it the popcorn. But, certainly, for years and years libraries [and] public libraries have tried to promote computerized searches. And it brings up a variety of issues in the context of downsizing and so on in the last 15 years, of fees for service. And I think these are some of the issues that we're seeing, for example in some of the western cities, not so much in Ontario. RM: Yeah, but there's another question as we make it pretty close to the end. Do you think that libraries as centers should be there be there in this kind of field? And one of the great advantages for computer claims, the kinds of information that can be accessed via a computer, is that you don't need a big central building. You don't need a warehouse full of people. You simply stay at home typing a few numbers or a few letters and haul it up yourself. LB: Well, you're assuming there that people have the ability to search and manipulate information in these remote databases and go onto the Internet and use Gophers and web servers and so on. I think that will always be a role for the mediator there, and I think a good place is the public library. Good heavens, a lot of the Internet services are public library catalogues, university catalogues, and that's where people are going to to try and get information. RM: Would it be right to say that previously a library was a repository for information and now it's an interface. LB: I would think so. There's definitely a service component and not the storage component that was so, so obvious for many years ... especially in the nineteenth century! RM: Which library would you prefer? A nineteenth-century libary or a twentieth-century library? LB: Oh, [I] much rather a twentieth-century library because there will be a broader range of services! There is a better service component. Obviously, there's more to read and more to look at and [more] to search. RM: OK, Mr. Bruce, thank you very much for coming in. LB: Thank you very much for having me.

Thursday, July 21, 2016

Review—Library Science for Canadians (1936)

Library Science for Canadians, Beatrice Welling and Catherine Campbell. Toronto: Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons Ltd., 1936.  xi, 151 p., illus., index. Three editions to 1958.

'Library Science' became an emerging field of study in Canada in the 1930s linked with formal professional education of librarians and with patrons who used libraries on a regular basis. In universities there were two streams of development: library instruction (user education) and library education (professional training) that sometimes intertwined. The historiography of Canadian library science has mostly been devoted to the creation of library schools for training and educational achievement in this period, especially McGill and Toronto. In the 1930s both McGill and Toronto began to issue Bachelor of Library Science (BLS) degrees which were accredited by the American Library Association. But another thread, library science courses for students with academic credit at the undergraduate level, has an interesting history of its own, involving as it does librarians at various university libraries. This was the thrust of Library Science for Canadians when it first appeared in 1936, the result of a joint effort by two University of Western Ontario librarians, Beatrice W. Welling and Catherine Campbell.

Western was not the first Canadian university to appoint librarians with the rank of teaching instructors. As early as 1911, Acadia introduced an elective library course in the BA program; by 1920 it was offering two credit courses taught by Mary Kinley Ingraham, who continued lecturing and leading laboratory classes until her retirement in 1944. The Acadia courses for undergrads continued into the 1980s. These were designed to encourage student interest in librarianship and to provide basic information on library methods, history, selection, reference, and administration. Western followed this model in the 1920s to the 1960s but adapted it for mostly for first-year undergraduates as a required course with credit to a bachelor's degree. Students interested in librarianship as a career could use these introductory courses to gain experience for acquiring a specialized, professional degree in Canada or the United States.

Courses with varying credit status began at Western in the early 1920s under Marjorie Ross, then library director Fred Landon (who also taught history). General instruction in the use of books and libraries and common reference works became a required course. Major electives included cataloguing, classification, and reference work. Until 1928, students could select Library Science as a major, but only a handful chose this option. After a 1930 survey of 200 incoming students revealed their lack of library knowledge, the required course was expanded for entry students and electives reduced. By the mid-1930s, courses were also being taught at Western's two affiliate colleges, Assumption (now University of Windsor) and Waterloo (now Wilfrid Laurier) where Mabel Dunham, Kitchener's chief librarian often taught. During this time, there were lectures and and assigned readings on the use of books. The general reference course dealt with the use of standard tools to identify topics and bibliographic sources. At a more intensive level, two lectures and three hours of practice per week provided two credits that could be used in the Secretarial Science program. Bachelor of Arts graduates could use these courses as a springboard to graduate education at library schools.

To complement the coursework, two of Western’s librarians authored the first Canadian text on library science in 1936. This book continued in print until the late 1950s. The text was designed to make university library research understandable for students and show them how to use library resources advantageously. One author, Beatrice W. Welling, was the more seasoned librarian. A native of New Brunswick, she earned a Bachelor's at the University of New Brunswick in 1909 and her MA at Radcliffe College in 1912. She attended library school at Simmons College in 1914-15 and began cataloguing at the University of Chicago before returning to work in Canada as a special librarian in the Arthur D. Little Co. in Montreal and then the  Honorary Advisory Council for Scientific and Industrial Research in Ottawa (later know as the National Research Council). She was particularly interested in government documents and began working at the Vancouver Public Library and subsequently at the Western library in 1926 as Fred Landon's assistant. Catherine Campbell began working in 1923 shortly after attaining her BA at Western in 1922.

Together, the two librarians devised a basic text that served Western students for a quarter century. Separate chapters dealt with classification (normally LC and Dewey); the card catalogue, the parts of a book (indexes, half-titles, etc.); 'How to Judge a Book;' periodicals and newspapers; 'Union Lists and Other Title Lists' (e.g., scientific periodicals and regional lists); the vertical file; 'Bibliography;' and a lengthy section of selected reference works (dictionaries, almanacs, and leading tools in subject areas such as business and commerce) which was attributed to Beatrice Welling.

Welling and Campbell were certain that basic training was valuable for students, not only at university but in their later work or profession.

This training in the use of a library should give the reader confidence in his ability to take advantage of the resources of any library, and by removing obstacles to the acquisition of knowledge, should tend to increase the delights of reading and induce the habit of study. (p. 1)

The authors felt that a better understanding of the merits of systematic use rather than browsing and knowledge of inter-library loans had many benefits. Helping students learn to help themselves was not only practical but also a knowledgeable endeavour for learners. Their points about judging reference works followed a systematic pattern: authority, scope, bias, currency, quality of arrangement, format, and additional bibliography remain standard elements today. (p. 40-41).

The importance of Libraries Science for Canadians lies today not in its teachings on the use of libraries, which were changed drastically by the time Western dropped its library requirement for first year-students and by the 1960s when libraries began to automate. The book's importance lay in its national approach. Here was an up-to-date work that Canadian students could use along with the American Guide to the Use of Libraries, authored by Margaret Hutchins and Alice Johnson, which was published in many editions after 1920. Before WWII, there was scant Canadian information in the library field that could be used effectively in classrooms. Welling and Campbell filled a void and made a meaningful contribution that many Western students could appreciate. The text was particularity important for students who were denied access to library stacks and had to request books through the main circulating desk.

Welling and Campbell were motivated by the idea that the library could be an enjoyable experience. They were not simply utilitarian instructor-lecturers in the new Lawson Library which opened in 1934.

Our libraries of to-day are pleasant, friendly places where one may browse a while in peaceful surroundings, seek a quiet corner for concentrated study of a particular subject or obtain assistance in the solving of a vexing problem. (p. 1)

They believed finding information expeditiously was part of this experience. Although Library Science for Canadians and library courses in the undergraduate curriculum were eclipsed shortly before Western's new graduate School of Library and Information Science began accepting students in 1967, two generations of students had already benefited from library education in the BA program.

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

THE NATIONAL LIBRARY OF CANADA: CELEBRATING A HALF-CENTURY, 1953-2003

As the National Library of Canada (NLC) moved inexorably to its golden anniversary in 2003, it was still a viable institution despite years of cutback management. In line with neoliberal philosophy, services had been reduced or eliminated (e.g. the popular Multilingual service) but many basic functions remained that made it a recognizable national entity. Although it was aging technology, AMICUS, Canada's national database, contained 25,000,000 records for more than 1,000 Canadian libraries. The NLC's Union Catalogue was a reliable source for bibliographic information and locations for books and periodicals that could be used by other libraries. The NLC's comprehensive Canadiana collection was largely due to Legal Deposit Provisions whereby Canadian publishers were required by law to send, as a general rule, two copies of all published works in various formats. The Library's Canadian Cataloging in Publication program was a collaborative effort with publishers and other libraries that permitted books to be catalogued pre-publication. The Canadian Theses service coordinated the microfiche reproduction and loan of theses on a timely basis. The NLC's Canadian Book Exchange Centre offered a utilitarian service to libraries for the distribution and exchange of surplus publications. These, and other services, aligned the NLC with other major Canadian libraries on a reciprocal basis. Together with the Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information (CISTI), comprehensive national library services from Ottawa were available for Canadians and others working beyond Canadian borders.

For the public at large and researchers the old building on 395 Wellington Street shared with the National Archives remained a valuable service point. The second floor Reading Room allowed for consultation of 'closed-stack' resources from the general collection by retrievals submitted through an on-site AMICUS. The Music and Rare Book Divisions provided in-depth reference, referral, and consultative services to Canadian and foreign researchers, libraries and organizations. The Reference and Information Services Division provided reference in Canadiana and Canadian studies to researchers and libraries within Canada and abroad. Inter-library Loan filled requests for materials by lending a copy, providing a photocopy, or giving referrals to other libraries that might loan items.

The fourth National Librarian, Dr. Roch Carrier, appointed in October 1999, sought various improvements. He encouraged expanding the reach of the NLC to Canadians through travelling exhibitions and the newly formed Digital Library of Canada, an effort to document Canadian heritage and culture and to provide access on the NLC website. Carrier also advocated for literacy and reading through improved school libraries. His effort to stem the leaks at 395 Wellington was more successful when the roof was repaired in 2002. Two years earlier, more than 2,500 publications had been damaged after a broken pipe allowed water to enter three floors. The NLC's administration was changing and its staffing attempting to accommodate changes, such as the Internet and the advent of digital publishing. Nevertheless, ominous clouds were gathering. It wasn't just the frequent newspaper stories of water damage that were endangering Canada's national collections at '395' or the atrophied budget NLC was struggling with that were cause for alarm. The NLC's parent body, the Department of Canadian Heritage, a neoliberal creature in search of prominence, continued to take a 'fresh look' at Canada's cultural institutions and heritage.

While some officials, such as Auditor-General Sheila Fraser, stated many federal heritage buildings (including the NLC) were in a poor condition and recommended the government 'do something' before cultural heritage resources might be lost to future generations, Canadian Heritage was developing new concepts. Sheila Copps, the Minister and MP for Hamilton East, preferred to ignore the problems inherent in merging the NLC with the National Archives, something the report by John English released in summer 1999 had emphasized along with his recommendations on updating mandates of the library and archives. In fact, on October 21st, 2002, the minister provided a simplistic, inaccurate rationale for MPs based on current ideas about a knowledge-based economy when she rose to explain the proposed merger in the context of reduced funding for the Canadian Archival Information Network.

"Mr. Speaker, we are of course talking about two different issues when we refer to the National Archives and the National Library. Three years ago, it was decided that it would be a good thing to merge these two institutions to present to the general public everything is part of the wealth of historical information belonging to the National Archives and the National Library. This is what we will do."

During the Parliamentary debates on the merger (Bills C-36 and its successor C-8) a few MPs actually got beyond the political obfuscation and bombastic visionary goals of a long-term plan to combine administration, storage, and preservation work in an area around the former National Archives' preservation centre in Gatineau and to establish a Portrait Gallery of Canada. Critics addressed the most obvious and long-standing problems, lack of funding and intertwined mandates. Also, NLC was a weak player in national information policy development and infrastructure. The general perception that a new administrative entity, Library and Archives Canada, would get enhanced visibility, relevance and accessibility carried the day. A single agency would allow for improved and innovative changes on a collaborative basis for the humanities and social sciences. Alternative schemes, such as combining CISTI (the country's 'other' national library) and the NLC were not considered. "Toward a New Kind of Knowledge Institution" outlined typical promotional views for Canadian heritage operations in Ottawa. All would be well in time: there would be
  • synergy of collections, skills and constituencies;
  • easier access to integrated holdings, both for researchers and for millions of ordinary Canadians;
  • enhanced service delivery to Canadians; and
  • better use of scarce resources.
Later, in summer 2004, LAC released a discussion document, Creating a New Kind of Knowledge Institution, about key future directions and initiatives to be taken. A new era was beginning--Canada proposed to be a leader in new knowledge (or memory) institution implementation with information technology as a major driver. An older era, still viable in other countries and capable of harnessing technology in its own manner (even today in 2015), was out of favour in Canada's capital. Time--perhaps a decade or two?--would reveal the wisdom behind the merger and plans for the future that might be celebrated in their own right.

Further information on post-2004 developments

Library and Archives Canada at Wikipedia
Timeline: Library and Archives Canada Service Decline after 2004 at Ex Libris Association website
Slide History of CISTI, 1924-2009 available on Internet Archive

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

THE NATIONAL LIBRARY OF CANADA IN THE 80s AND 90s: THE REALITIY OF NEOLIBERAL REFORM

By the time Guy Sylvestre retired at the end of 1983 many ideas crafted in the Future of the National Library (published in 1979) were no longer achievable. In the early 1980s, Canadian political and social life was in a state of flux. The election of a Conservative government in 1984 was a harbinger of change. In western countries the welfare state, often associated with Keynesian economics, had reached its apogee. The era of neoliberal economic reforms, also embraced often by neoconservatives such as Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, had arrived. For the majority of people, including librarians, this critical change in political decision making was at first slowly perceived. But, by the time Bill Clinton's campaign slogan "It's the economy, stupid!" helped him win the American 1992 Presidential election, everyone began to realize that market issues trumped social and cultural issues in the North America. The success of the Reform Party of Canada in the 1993 election was another indication of new national policy priorities.

The concept of reduced government services--government as an enabler not a provider--and the primacy of economic market-based policies became evident in the 1980s and 90s with the privatization of crown corporations such as Air Canada, Canadian National Railway, and Petro-Canada. Politicians and public servants alike expressed less enthusiasm for the qualitative nature of the 'public good' and more interest in furthering the success of federal institutions in a market economy and the rhetoric of 'free trade.' For a service organization like the National Library (NLC), government restructuring required some different thinking about core services and a reassessment of its activities. When a national study, Report of the Federal Cultural Policy Review Committee (the Applebaum-Hébert Report) appeared in 1982, it had little to recommend about the NLC except that a more suitable building should be provided. Obviously, the new National Librarian, Marianne Scott, faced many challenges after her appointment in 1984. A new building was just one.

On the surface, the budget situation for the NLC did not seem too precarious at the outset of the 1980s. Total funding for fiscal 1981/82 was just over $21 million. By 1991 it was almost $41 million; but, adjustments for a decade of rapid inflation consumed 3/4 of new funding. The 1990s were to prove even more difficult: by 1999 the total budget had been reduced to $38 million. In real terms, over two decades, there had been no revenue growth. As a result, the NLC applied the logic of neoliberal management and businesslike trimming: it streamlined operations, reduced collection building, and approached new developments, such as internet services and new digital initiatives, with caution. The rhetoric of "'Doing more with less!'; 'Empowerment!'; 'Partnerships!'; and 'Right-sizing!" were the order of the day.

The NLC's situation was not unique, all libraries and federal organizations encountered problems, but effectively national leadership was slipping away from the NLC. Although a variety of national and regional reports still emanated from Ottawa, an internal report, Orientations: a Planning Framework for the 1990s, which appeared in 1989, focused on NLC's own core activities: the development of a decentralized Canadian library and information network; resource sharing; preservation; and a commitment to Canadian studies. This short report was very different from The Future of the National Library. It was not a surprise when The Friends of the National Library of Canada was founded in 1991 to raise awareness and encourage public support of the Library. It was a necessity.

A second study--Canadian Information Resource Sharing Strategy, released in 1994--was more consultative and client oriented. It outlined a framework for Canadian libraries to develop coordinated resource sharing systems that would allow Canadians access to information. The NLC was retiring the DOBIS system and replacing it with AMICUS for its collections and union catalogue. However, the report arrived at the very time that the "Information Highway" exploded on the library community and the world. People began to envisage different ways to get rapid, convenient access to information required for research, business or leisure purposes without libraries. Nevertheless, the NLC was one of the first Canadian libraries to establish a website in June 1995. It was 'keeping up with the times' but unable to leverage government support for new identified roles, especially in the digital environment where Industry Canada was playing an important role.

Shortly before Marianne Scott prepared to set down after fifteen years, in April 1997 the NLC submitted a brief, The Role of the National Library of Canada in Support of Culture in Canada, to a committee of the Department of Canadian Heritage, to which it now reported. Scott emphasized the NLC had a vital role to play in the nation's cultural information and communications environment. The preservation of materials in the current building was threatened by water damage in collections areas. Canadiana acquisitions were much reduced. Canadian Heritage, under the minister Sheila Copps, was reviewing its own general role and, of course, applying neoliberal standards to its activities. Ironically, the processes the NLC had assiduously applied to its own internal operations and administration would be applied to the portfolio of cultural agencies in Canadian Heritage.

On 12 March 1998, Sheila Copps announced the launch of consultations on the "future role and structure" of the National Archives of Canada and the NLC. Some people in the cultural field understood the coded language that this entailed: amalgamation. However, the subsequent report, by John English, The Role of the National Archives of Canada and the National Library of Canada, completed in 1999, looked to the future, especially in digital terms, and explicitly rejected the idea of unification. The report had many good ideas, but was obscured--sidelined in political parlance--by the prior announcement of a new appointment. Roch Carrier, an award winning author with minimal library expertise, stepped into the position of National Librarian in July 1999.

"We have to build a vision, but I'm not ready to talk about it yet," Carrier first advised the press. Then he went on a two-week cross-Canada tour to discover ideas and opinions about libraries and the NLC. "My role will be to help them [NLC staff] build the future" he wrote in the National Library Bulletin in November 1999. His 'Bridge to the 21st Century' would prove to be a short span to a barren shore.

Further Reading

The English Report recommendations are available on the web on the wayback machine at the Internet Archive.
Read news about the National Library in the late 1990s archived on the web.