The heroic story of--librarians?

As we sat in a crowded theater waiting to hear from David McCullough and celebrate his new book The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West, I leaned over to my out-of-town guest, pointed to a woman in a blue blouse a few rows ahead of us, and said, “Now that’s what I call a hero.” A few minutes later a thousand people erupted in applause and whistles as the woman in the blue blouse walked across the stage to receive a commendation from our college president, and I had to wonder: when was the last time you saw someone earn a standing ovation just for being a really good librarian?

David McCullough's book acknowledges the assistance of a number of our college librarians, but he reserves the highest praise for Linda Showalter, who has served as what our college president called "The keeper of the treasures" down in Special Collections since 2007. McCullough described how Linda kept bringing him documents--rare books, letters, journals, and art--that opened a door into the minds and hearts of the people who established Marietta more than two hundred years ago. 

In his talk last night, McCullough returned over and over to the importance of curiosity, education, and lifelong learning, and a love for libraries serves those passions. He mentioned the Coonskin Library, established by Ephraim Cutler in the nearby village of Amesville in 1804 and funded by the sale of animal pelts, and he expressed love and appreciation for the Legacy Library, which stands at the center of the Marietta College campus living up to its name by guarding a treasure of rare documents related to the establishment of the Northwest Territory.

I spend a lot of time in that library--reading, writing, exploring. One of my favorite activities is the library tour I lead for my freshman writing students near the beginning of every semester. We meet at the circulation desk, talk to a reference librarian, and go up to the top floor to learn how to make the shelves move to locate books, but we always end up with a visit to Special Collections, where Linda Showalter talks to my students about the collection and lets them look at and touch some rare documents that compel their interest: a local doctor's collection of  hand-written recipes for medicines, the diary of the first African-American student to attend the college, letters to and from people my students encounter in their history texts.

Some of my students will never again set foot in Special Collections, but a few will follow their curiosity back to the basement to seek out answers to questions they don't even know how to ask, and when they do, they will rely on the librarians to keep toiling away, opening doors into the past to keep the legacy alive. Those of us who work with our college librarians have always known they're heroes, but last night it felt good to stand and applaud and share that knowledge with the wider world.