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Emelie George Rubin ’02 knew when she arrived on campus as a first-year student that she wanted to enter the field of library science, but she didn’t know the specific area that best suited her. She spent four years working with Diane Shaw, College archivist and special collections librarian, making major contributions to exhibits and archival webpages.“She allowed me to choose what I was interested in regarding the collections and work with them,” Rubin recalls. “I created some exhibits to raise awareness of the collections, and it was the staff there that allowed me to take that direction. That’s rare for an undergrad. I knew then that this was what I wanted to focus on.”
She went on to become archivist at the National Agricultural Library and is now the institutional archivist for Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md. Rubin is among a number of students and alumni whom Shaw has taken under her wing and taught the principles and techniques of her discipline.
“I think we have had our best successes by emphasizing the joys and the importance of the profession, and by making clear that it is indeed a worthy profession,” says Shaw. “I once had a student who couldn’t believe that we were actually paid to do this work; he thought it was too good to be true.
“I have also tried to make sure that future archivists are able to have a variety of experiences in the department—processing, reference, exhibits, etc.—and that they have opportunities to attend conferences and programs where they can meet other professionals and see other kinds of repositories.”
As a double major in English and art, Elaine McCluskey Stomber ’89 came highly recommended to Shaw by the art department for a project to establish the College’s Historical Photograph Collection. Shaw plucked Stomber from her job on the circulation desk to start working with her at the end of her sophomore year. After graduating, Stomber established herself in the field at the Metropolitan Museum of Art before returning to Lafayette about nine years ago to work with Shaw again.
“Over the years Elaine has had her hands on most of our major collections, and they are all the better for her exceptional organizational skills,” says Shaw.
Kathy Stewart Jordan ’91, digital initiatives and web services manager at the Library of Virginia, met Shaw through her honors thesis adviser, Donald L. Miller, McCracken Professor of History, when she needed access to papers in the College’s special collections. Shaw hired her as an intern years later when Jordan was pursuing her master’s of library science at Rutgers University.
“I felt a kinship with her,” says Jordan. “She was very supportive when I went to library school. I consider her one of my mentors.”
The most important trait for these alumnae and other archivists, according to Shaw, is a deep appreciation and respect for archival materials. Also important are “people skills” for working with researchers, organizational skills for working with the materials, and creativity to envision all that can be done to develop and promote collections.
Shaw is a firm believer that the liberal arts education future archivists receive at Lafayette is a major reason for their success.
“They are all broadly educated and they’ve been taught to think analytically, so they are able to make connections and put things in context,” she says. “So this means they are able to work with any kind of collection, be it the diaries of an Arctic explorer, the papers of a U.S. senator, or the records of a charitable foundation. There is great variety in archival work and a liberal arts education is a great foundation.”
The profession of archives continues to be an exciting and dynamic one, adds Shaw, even more so now that many records begin and remain digital.
“The education and training of archivists has changed radically to keep pace with these developments,” she says. “But no matter what the format, the satisfactions of the profession in preserving and making available important human records remains undiminished.”