Oral Histories

Interview of Page Ackerman

UCLA university librarian and UCLA professor of library and information science.
Subtitle:
As Luck Would Have It
Series:
Z: Orphan Interviews pre 1999
Topic:
UCLA and University of California History
UCLA Librarians
Biographical Note:
UCLA university librarian and UCLA professor of library and information science.
Interviewer:
Treleven, Dale E.
Interviewee:
Ackerman, Page
Supporting Documents:
Records relating to the interview are located in the office of the UCLA Library's Center for Oral History Research.
Language:
English
Copyright:
Regents of the University of California, UCLA Library.
Abstract:
Childhood in Evanston, Illinois; attends UCLA; transfers to Agnes Scott College; employed as a social worker for the Federal Emergency Relief Administration's Atlanta Transient Bureau; positions with the Works Progress Administration (WPA); memories of the Depression and the New Deal; studies librarianship at University of Southern California and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; catalogs at the Columbia Theological Seminary library; enlists in the United States Army Library Service; serves as post librarian at Aberdeen Proving Ground; hired as cataloger at Union Theological Seminary in Richmond, Virginia; Robert G. Vosper offers Ackerman a job at UCLA; involvement in professional organizations; organizing the School of Social Welfare library at UCLA; the Library Staff Association; Lawrence Clark Powell; the American Library Association; joins the California State Employees Association (CSEA); Andrew H. Horn; appointed assistant university librarian for budget, personnel, and branches; acquisitions for the branch libraries; the library budget; restructuring personnel classifications and raising the salary scale for librarians; Vosper's push to gain faculty status for librarians; the impact of the Master Plan for Higher Education in the State of California, 1960-1975; CSEA sues the University of California Board of Regents; librarianship as a "women's profession"; Paul M. Miles; library expansion creates space and staffing problems; planning to build a research library; impact of the University Research Library on the branch libraries; coping with budget cuts of the sixties; Franklin D. Murphy; creation of the Library Task Force; sharing library resources with other University of California campuses; Vosper steps down as university librarian; library staff discontent and the Lademann Report; creating the library administrative network; James R. Cox; discrimination issues in the library; Ackerman becomes university librarian; enhancing library automation; Charles J. Hitch and the budget crisis of 1971-72; Ackerman retires; Russell M. Shank becomes university librarian; the Management Review and Analysis Program; the possibility of institutional discrimination against women; Charles E. Young's support of the library; selecting OCLC (Online Computer Library Center) as a database system for the library; development of the Graduate School of Library and Information Service; teaching responsibilities; decline of public school libraries in California; involvement in the Association of College and Research Libraries; consulting activities at other university libraries.