Collections and Programs Highlights

Hal Holbrook talks with attendees at the March luncheon.

• The Mark Twain Luncheon Club featured Hal Holbrook at its third meeting on March 27th at the Berkeley City Club. CBS-TV was also there to interview Holbrook for a Sunday morning program about the Bancroft's Mark Twain Project that will be aired in the coming months. Holbrook's involvement with Mark Twain's work began with a college honors project that evolved into a one-man show, Mark Twain Tonight! Holbrook opened this show off-Broadway to critical acclaim in the 1950s, and continues to polish and perform it today. At the March luncheon, Holbrook wove recitations from Twain's work into his presentation, which included stories about performing his one-man show in the politically charged atmosphere of the 1950s and 1960s. The Mark Twain Luncheon Club was recently established in 2001 for annual donors of $1500 to the Mark Twain Project, with three distinguished co-chairs: Chancellor and Professor Emeritus Ira Michael Heyman, Vice Chancellor and Professor Emeritus M. Watson Laetsch, and Professor Robert L. Middlekauff (former director of the Huntington Library).
• The Bancroft Library unveiled two new digital Websites in April: the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute Archives, which include the best legal "briefs," transcripts, and motions in cases reported in the Civil Liberties Docket since 1955; and the Cased Photographs Project of The Bancroft Library, including digital images and detailed descriptions of daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, tintypes, and related photographs in the Bancroft collections. To access these collections go to: http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/collections/meiklejohn.html and http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/collections/casedphotos.html.
• After more than 18 months of work, the UC Berkeley's Strategic Planning Committee (SPC) has issued a draft plan intended to guide the future growth and development of the Berkeley campus. Library Advisory Board members who sit on this committee are Vice Chancellor Don McQuade and University Librarian Tom Leonard. Major themes in the draft plan include the need to foster greater academic and social interaction on campus, and the need to improve institutional support of undergraduate students. The Library, as a physical space and as an academic support program, has a major role to play in both of these areas. The Free Speech Movement Café is named in the draft plan as an existing successful enterprise that has taken the campus in the right direction. The importance of The Teaching Library to the undergraduate program is emphasized, and a closer relationship between the faculty and this program is encouraged. It is also suggested that the Library pursue demonstration projects in team-based learning that can be used to inform the direction of future capital projects. To read the draft plan and to learn more about the SPC, please go to http://spc.vcbf.berkeley.edu/ and select the tab "About Us."
• Berkeley's Faculty Club celebrated its 100th birthday on Friday, March 15, in the Faculty Club Library. The celebration included an academic colloquium, "The Idea of a Community of Scholars," chaired by Martin Trow, professor emeritus of public policy, and a faculty panel consisting of Ann Kilmer, former chair of Near Eastern Studies; Walter Alvarez, professor of earth and planetary sciences; and Richard Muller, professor of physics. Professor Alvarez is our featured author in this edition, presenting excerpts from his talk.
• March 15th was Charter Day, which celebrated the University's 134th birthday. U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta '53 was named the CAA 2001 Alumnus of the Year. President of Costa Rica Miguel Angel Rodriguez Echeverria '66 received the 2001 Elise and Walter A. Haas International Award, in recognition of his lifetime of service to Costa Rica. Maxine Hong Kingston received the 2002 California State Library Gold Medal for Excellence in the Humanities and Science. Kingston is an award-winning author and a senior lecturer in the UC Berkeley English department. Joanna Lennon received the 2001 Peter E. Haas Public Service Award for founding the East Bay Conservation Corps, a nonprofit organization in Oakland that encourages youth to participate in community service.
• e-Berkeley services (www.givetocal.berkeley.edu/) are gaining in variety and popularity. Since its launch in May 2000, this gateway has brought in $335,000 in gifts from alumni and friends to more than 100 campus units, including the Library. This site is in second place, behind Princeton, for number of dollars raised in the first year. All online donations via credit card are processed instantaneously through a secure site.
• A free evening course, "Issues in U.S. Foreign Policy Since 9/11," featuring distinguished campus faculty and visitors, is available for viewing online. To see these International and Area Studies lectures, go to webcast.berkeley.edu/ and select "IAS 180." Student Library Advisory Board member Monica Morrill is on the student panel participating in the lecture with Noam Chomsky on March 18.
• The Campanile will be closed temporarily until the fall for tower elevator modernization.