The Dean's List- Margaret Rufsvold, Pioneer

I sometimes jog with Katharine Sharp, which is to say I wear a T-shirt emblazoned with the black-and-white image of the founder of the University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science. Without the pioneering efforts of Sharp and other early female innovators, I probably would be plying a different trade—no disrespect to Melvil Dewey and his colleagues at Columbia. I certainly wouldn't be writing this column. More specifically, I owe a debt to another far-sighted lady, the late Margaret Rufsvold, who almost single-handedly brought Indiana University's (IU) School of Library and Information Science (SLIS) into being.

Rufsvold and I met twice. She was already in her eighties and slightly infirm. At the time, she spent only part of the year in Bloomington, yet she was a constant presence. A portrait hangs in the SLIS library, and the Rufsvold Fund, a permanent endowment, provides generous support annually to doctoral students.

Margaret Rufsvold died some months ago. A longstanding connection with our collective past has been broken. She joined the IU faculty in 1938, a decade before I was born. When she retired as dean of the IU Graduate Library School in 1972, I still hadn't earned my MLS.

Today, we watch as library science programs in North America and elsewhere metamorphose into generic information studies schools, trading autonomy and identity for a more robust resource base. It is an inescapable fact of the evolutionary dynamics of academic life, neither surprising nor, in any meaningful sense, regrettable. It is ironic, however, as Rufsvold is doubtless musing from the grave, given her contributions to the formation of this field.

As far as I can tell, the first tentative steps at in-house training of librarians at IU began in 1899, though institutionalization of these efforts took some time. It was not until 1947 that the Division of Library Science was established under Rufsvold's direction within the School of Education. With her at the helm, the division eventually emerged from the school to become the Graduate Library School in 1966. It retained that name until 1980 when the present title was adopted.

How things have changed. For example, the route followed by Rufsvold in the 1940s is the reverse of that chosen a few years ago by the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) for its erstwhile LIS program, which has since been folded into the UCLA School of Education and Information. Two steps forward, one step back seems to be the experience in Libraryland.

It's all too easy to downplay the achievements of one's predecessors. Library science back then was strongly vocational in character and didn't have the research base we take for granted today (pace Pierce Butler and Jesse Shera). It was all rather amateurish if well-intentioned. Formal grounding in theory and research methods and the attendant emphasis on scholarly production were not defining features of the embryonic domain.

Rufsvold came to IU with a master's degree in librarianship and relevant real-world experience. To be blunt, we probably wouldn't hire her today, but without her groundbreaking efforts we wouldn't be hiring at all today. There's more to this woman than meets the eye, as I've been discovering. In academic year 1971–72, Rufsvold chaired ten doctoral committees and served as a member of 18 others. That's pretty impressive, by any standard: indeed, it's more than the collective effort of some contemporary faculties.

When she wasn't administering, teaching, writing, or guiding research, Rufsvold was busy on both the national and international stage, raising the profile of her program and the profession. At home, she was, amongst other things, a consultant to the Office of Education in Washington, DC, and overseas, a consultant on library services to the College of Education in Bangkok, Thailand.

Her legacy is visible well beyond the confines of IU. Generations of teachers and administrators around the globe would not be where they are today but for Rufsvold's dedication and effort. She may have honed her skills in the cornfields of the Midwest, but she had, to use that overused word, vision. Unlike some so-called visionaries, she successfully translated her goals and convictions into tangible and enduring accomplishments. She didn't, in the words of an anonymous alumnus, "spend her time on hypothetical platform-making announcements."

Apparently, she was an inspiring teacher, judging by the enthusiastic testimonials provided by former students. A well-known (but unnamed) professor of library science, then a doctoral student at IU, penned the following description of Rufsvold as a classroom teacher: "She was…a strikingly handsome woman, who embodied a kind of energy that was at once recognized and respected…. I marveled at the brilliant way in which the content of her lecture was so effortlessly welded into a coherent whole—she had no notes."

I can vouchsafe for part of this encomium. The photographs in our files confirm that she was indeed a striking individual. In every respect, Margaret Rufsvold belied the popular occupational stereotype that continues to bedevil the profession.