LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR

Challenges and Opportunities

Some of the external forces are old news. Subscription prices to scholarly journals continue to spiral upward in increments that far exceed general inflation. SIL has seen an annual average increase of 11.5 percent in journal prices since 1987, which has forced severe reductions in the numbers of journal titles we can afford. Our vendors predict a similar increase for 1998. A recent survey showed that our users gave priority to keeping a core journal collection, which has reduced funds available for purchase of scholarly monographs. SIL now purchases only half as many books as we did ten years ago. The bar chart included on this page gives graphic reality to this phenomenon.

All libraries are affected by these rising costs, of course. The situation is forcing potentially momentous change in the ways scholars and scientists share research results with their colleagues and the general public. For example, SIL now allows SI staff to read and print out articles from electronic versions of a host of scientific journals. Can we archive the electronic form the way we have preserved backruns of journals? SIL and other libraries will have to answer this question soon.

The bar chart shows something else: our purchases of electronic resources are now a measurable quantity. This is good news. Librarians have always been able to adjust to new forms of information, whether carried on microfilm, video, phonograph records, or now in cyberspace. We are used to handling the information explosion by selecting and evaluating resources, organizing them in some usable form, and providing easy access to them. Rarely has a resource so rapidly affected the general population as has the Internet, yet SI staff and the general public can rely on SIL’s home page and those of its branches to quickly find their way to reliable, important information on subjects of Smithsonian interest.

We must not ignore our responsibility to continue building our print-on-paper collections, however, in a flurry of enthusiasm over the new electronic forms. As big as the Internet is, the world of print also continues to grow. One form does not cancel out another.

Even as we rely on our traditional skills to make sense of these new forms, libraries need staff with new technical skills and expanded subject knowledge. Reference staff must have in-depth subject knowledge to be able to determine whether content from unknown and unjuried providers is authoritative and reliable. Creativity and flexibility will be highly prized characteristics, along with an eagerness to continue to learn on and off the job.

‘May you live in interesting times,’ goes the old adage. For the Smithsonian’s librarians, times have never been more interesting, challenging, or exciting.

Nancy E. Gwinn
Director

Appointment

Leslie Overstreet has been named Curator of Natural History Rare Books, Special Collections Department. She is involved in the planning and development of the projected Natural History Rare Book Library now under construction in the East Court of the National Museum of Natural History. Ms. Overstreet received her Master of Library Science degree at the University of Maryland and her B.A. and M.A. degrees from Reed College in Oregon. She came to the Smithsonian Libraries in 1980, worked in the Anthropology and Natural History Branches, and joined the Special Collections Department in 1988. Her research specialties are special collections and the bibliography of natural history literature, especially voyages of exploration. She is an active member of the Society for the History of Natural History. Mrs. Jefferson Patterson contributed funds to underwrite for three years the position which Ms. Overstreet holds.

Leslie Overstreet