(Roughly) Daily

The estimable Richard Ovenden (see here, here, here, and here) on Elyse Graham’s new Book and Dagger…

At dinner parties, it has always been a struggle to get random people to be interested in my work as a librarian. Indeed, throughout my career, I have battled with stereotypes of my profession. We are often pigeonholed as being nerdy, rules obsessed, tweed wearing, bespectacled, and, above all, “dusty.” At least “nerd” has been transformed from negative to positive since the rise of digital technologies over the past few decades. Sometimes, with strangers, I have used the term “archivist” to describe what I do, but that hasn’t helped much.

So my heart rate soared—as would that of any librarian like me—at the idea suggested by the mere title of Book and Dagger that librarians and archivists could be involved in secret and dangerous tasks in a war, risking their lives and taking an active role in fighting against an evil tyrannous oppressor. Perhaps those tweeds are just camouflage.

During World War II, as shown in Elyse Graham’s new book Book and Dagger, librarians, archivists, and scholars played an unexpected and important role in the intelligence services of the United States (and to a lesser extent, of Great Britain). She writes with verve and pace, making this book an easy and enjoyable one to read. Best of all, Graham argues that the humanities—and those librarians and scholars that came from within the discipline—brought special expertise, experience, and attributes that were critical to the direction of strategy, the ultimate victory of the war, and the defense of democracy in the face of tyranny…

[Ovenden unpacks the turf covered…]

… Graham’s study is certainly heartwarming for any librarian, archivist, or humanities scholar seeking confirmation that the skills necessary for their day jobs are directly transferrable to the defense of the realm and of democracy, gaining a utility beyond education, scholarship, and learning to that most visceral of tasks—the waging of war. Also heartwarming is the value which Graham’s account places on the infrastructure of the humanities—the libraries and archives themselves, and the sheer task of acquiring, managing, and preserving knowledge: buying books can keep us free!

Today, the humanities are in a funding crisis, and libraries and archives are being actively defunded by the state. Graham’s book is thus a timely reminder that the skills that are taught and honed in the humanities, in academic departments and in the libraries and archives that support humanistic study, are of vital importance not just to study the past. In fact, they are crucial to defend us in the present, so that we all might enjoy a secure and free future. That’s something I am willing to fight for…

The crucial roles played by unexpected combatants in World War II: “Secrets in the Stacks,” from @richove.bsky.social‬ in @publicbooks.bsky.social‬.

(Image above: source)

* “Good librarians are natural intelligence operatives. They possess all of the skills and characteristics required for that work: curiosity, wide-ranging knowledge, good memories, organization and analytical aptitude, and discretion.” – Marilyn Johnson, This Book Is Overdue!: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All

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As we check it out, we might recall that it was on this date in 1953 that the first public television station in the U.S.– KUHT, operated in Houston, Texas by the University of Houston– began operation. It was first station to broadcast under an educational non-profit license in the United States, one of the earliest member stations of National Educational Television (which was succeeded by PBS) and offered the university’s first televised college credit classes. Running 13 to 15 hours weekly, these telecasts accounted for 38 percent of the program schedule, mostly airing at night so that students who worked during the day could watch them. By the mid-1960s, with about one-third of the station’s programming devoted to educational programming, more than 100,000 semester hours had been taught on KUHT.

source