AKICILJ: the library edition

[mrissa]

Okay, people who know stuff: if a friend of mine was looking to donate a large-ish collection of good-condition vintage SF, what libraries have the sorts of collections that might want such a thing?

Comments

[guppiecat]

I believe that the University of Iowa library might be interested. They bought a pile of fanzines recently.

You might also want to see if Clarion has an opinion on this matter.

[jenett]

Outside of academic collections, it might be worth checking out the MIT Science Fiction Society library. (they have an actual physical collection, some of which circulates, some of which doesn't) and they have an extensive back run of magazines and other things, too.

(They are a student org, but have been a generally pretty stable one. http://web.mit.edu/mitsfs/)

[michaeldthomas.livejournal.com]

Northern Illinois University has a large collection of SF/F, including the archives of over 55 authors:

http://www.ulib.niu.edu/rarebooks/index.cfm
http://www.ulib.niu.edu/rarebooks/sciencefiction.cfm

Here's the Locus interview with Curator Lynne M. Thomas:
http://www.locusmag.com/Perspectives/2010/11/spotlight-on-lynne-m-thomas-archivist/

[swords-and-pens.livejournal.com]

This was my first thought (although I'm biased ;).

[michaeldthomas.livejournal.com]

And I'm not? ;-)

[pameladean]

You beat me to it!

P.

[aamcnamara.livejournal.com]

UC Riverside has a collection in their rare books room, I know.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

The Cushing Library at Texas A&M (alma mater of Steve Gould, Martha Wells, and me).

[nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com]

Stony Brook University has a student-run SF library. Founded by James Frenkel it birthed, among other people, meeeeeeee.

http://www.sf4m.org/

[orangemike.livejournal.com]

Where are they physically now? What are the vintages? What is the paperback/hardback distribution?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

They are in Minnesota, and they are from the 1950s. I'm not sure beyond that.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

Harvard has some in their rare books and manuscripts library, but when I was there, they were not on the priority list for preservation or publicizing.

I will dig around some and also ask my librarian friends...

[skwirly.livejournal.com]

The University of Maryland, Baltimore County has an SF special collection that was (or so I hear) founded by Steve Miller. It's pretty awesome.

The Azriel Rosenfeld Science Fiction Research Collection (http://aok.lib.umbc.edu/specoll/books.php) is a growing collection currently holding approximately 8,000 books and 4,000 issues of science fiction & fantasy periodicals, science fiction criticism and reference works. For those with an interest in the "Golden Age" of science fiction, the collection has extensive holdings of science fiction "pulps" from the 1920's - 1950's plus original manuscripts, personal papers and a large collection of amateur press "fanzines."

[thomasbull.livejournal.com]

Further away, there's the MSFC Library (http://msfc.sf.org.au/?page=library) in Melbourne, Australia, and the UniSFA Library (http://www.unisfa.gu.uwa.edu.au/library/index.php3) in Perth, Western Australia.

Via Meteor Incorporated (http://www.meteor.org.au/), I have heard mention of the Eaton Collection (http://eaton.ucr.edu/) at the University of California, Riverside.

[thomasbull.livejournal.com]

I should also mention the Murdoch University Library (http://library.murdoch.edu.au/Our-services/Support-for-researchers/Special-Collections/Speculative-Fiction-Collections/) over in Perth.