Longtime HBI/LBI Friend Jan Merrill Oldham Has DiedLongtime HBI/LBI friend and advocate of library binding, Jan Merrill Oldham, passed away on Wednesday evening, October 5. Jan co-authored the "Guide to the Library Binding Standard" with Paul Parisi and was actively involved over the years teaching others about the importance of library binding. An ALA Professional Development Grant was recently created in Jan's name and HBI/LBI is funding this. She was loved by many and will be greatly missed. A moment of silence was held for Jan during the HBI/LBI fall meeting, on Friday, October 7. The following message about Jan is on the ALA ALCTS Preservation and Administrators Listserv: It is with great sadness that I report to you that Jan Merrill-Oldham died peacefully at her home in Cambridge, Massachusetts on October 5th 2011. Jan was an inspiring colleague, mentor, and friend to so many of us in preservation and conservation. She will be deeply missed. Below is an excerpt from her obituary. As the Malloy-Rabinowitz Preservation Librarian at Harvard University, Jan directed the Weissman Preservation Center in the Harvard University Library and the Preservation & Imaging Services Department in the Harvard College Library from November 1995 to February 2010. She created and administered a comprehensive program to preserve and enhance access to the 16.5 million volumes and extensive special collections and archives held in Harvard's more than 70 libraries. Jan became interested in the preservation of library collections while working in the bindery at the University of Connecticut Library. In 1979, a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship at the Yale University Library allowed Jan to undertake formal training in library and archives preservation. She went on to earn a Masters in Library Science from the University of Rhode Island and to establish the University of Connecticut Libraries' Preservation Department. Over the course of 30 years, Jan became a recognized national and international leader in the field of library and archives preservation. Eager to learn and insatiably curious, she was an extraordinary teacher, mentor, author and administrator. Early on, her vision for libraries led her to move beyond the work of simply preserving collections to reformatting them for access via the Internet. Jan exercised her formidable powers of persuasion with university administrators, commercial suppliers, and by serving on key committees within the American Library Association (ALA), the Association of Research Libraries, the Council on Library and Information Resources, the National Information Standards Organization and many others. She authored and edited more than 40 publications. Jan's powerful influence within her profession was widely recognized. In 2011, the Association of Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS) and the Preservation and Reformatting Section (PARS) of ALA created a professional development grant in her honor. She also received the ALA/ALCTS Ross Atkinson Lifetime Achievement Award (2011), the ALA/PARS Banks Harris Award (1994), a University of Connecticut Distinguished Service Award (1994) and the ALA/PARS Esther Piercy Award (1990). Jan was one of those rare people who not only changed her profession but also the lives of the many family members, friends and colleagues who came to love and respect her. She is survived by her husband Peter Merrill-Oldham of Cambridge, her mother and father, Alice Cecarelli Merrill and James Hershy Merrill of Milford, CT, and her brother James Wallace Merrill of West Haven, CT. Donations in Jan's memory may be made to the Circle of Caring at Hospice of the Good Shepherd http://www.hospicegoodshepherd.org/ ***************** Brenda Bernier |