- unittitle
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{"value"=>"Harry Miller Lydenberg records"}
- physdesc
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{"format"=>"simple", "value"=>"6.25 linear feet (6 boxes, 2 volumes)"}
- repository
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{"value"=>"The <span class=\"corpname\">New York Public Library Archives.</span> <div class=\"address\"> <span class=\"addressline\">5th Avenue and 42nd Street, New York, New York 10018-2788</span></div>"}
- abstract
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{"value"=>"Records of Harry Miller Lydenberg, Director of The New York Public Library from 1934-1941. Collection spans the years 1926-1970 (bulk 1926-1944), covering his term as Director and also his participation in numerous professional associations."}
- langmaterial
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{"value"=>"English"}
- prefercite
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{"value"=>"<p>Harry Miller Lydenberg Records, The New York Public Library Archives, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations.</p>"}
- bioghist
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{"value"=>"<p>Harry Miller Lydenberg became the third director of The New York Public Library in 1934, after nearly forty years of employment with The Library. Born in Dayton, Ohio, on Nov. 18, 1876, he graduated from Harvard in 1896, and began work as a cataloger in the Lenox Library. From 1896 to 1899, he headed the Lenox's Manuscripts Division, and from 1899 to 1908, served as administrative assistant to John Shaw Billings, helping to plan the Central Building for the newly-consolidated New York Public Library. He was the Library's chief reference librarian from 1908 to 1927, and in that capacity spent much of his time increasing and strengthening its various reference collections. In 1928, he became assistant director under Edwin H. Anderson, assuming the directorship after Anderson's retirement at the end of October 1934.</p> <p>As Director, Lydenberg continued his work in building up the reference collections, and began expanding the branch library system. He was also active in a number of professional organizations, most notably the American Library Association, the American National Committee on International Intellectual Cooperation, and the Social Science Research Council's Joint Committee on Materials for Research.</p> <p>After retiring from The New York Public Library in September 1941, Lydenberg organized and headed the Biblioteca Benjamin Franklin in Mexico City, a library of information on the United States jointly sponsored by a the American Library Association (ALA) and the Coordinator on Inter-American Affairs. In 1943, he became director of the ALA's Board on International Relations, and in 1946, participated in the Library of Congress's Purchasing Mission to Germany, procuring materials that had been unavailable during World War II for American research libraries.</p> <p>In November 1946, Lydenberg retired formally from library work. He moved first to Greensboro, North Carolina, and then to Westerville, Ohio in 1956. He died in Westerville on April 16, 1960.</p> <p>Lydenberg married Madeleine Day in 1912. The couple had two children, John (b. 1913) and Mary (b. 1915).</p>"}
- scopecontent
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{"value"=>"<p>The Harry Miller Lydenberg Records span the years 1926-1970, covering his seven-year term as library director and also his participation in numerous professional associations. The bulk of this material is from the years 1926-1944 and consists of correspondence, reports, minutes of meetings, informational pamphlets and brochures, and newspaper clippings. Subject files contain correspondence and other materials pertaining to the operation of The New York Public Library and Lydenberg's involvement in national and international library matters. Of particular interest are materials, 1938-1970, concerning the role of an American Library Association committee on which Lydenberg served in the search for Librarian of Congress in 1939. Many librarians opposed the ultimate choice, Archibald MacLeish.</p> <p>Additional materials pertaining to the career of Harry Miller Lydenberg can be found in the Edwin H. Anderson Records and the Lydenberg, Hopper and Beals General Correspondence, both held by NYPL Archives; and in the Harry Miller Lydenberg Papers held by the NYPL Manuscripts Division.</p>"}
{"value"=>"<p class='list-head'>The Harry Miller Lydenberg records are arranged in three series:</p>\n<ul class='arrangement series-descriptions'>\n<li><div class='series-title'><a href='/nypla/4946#c636533'>Series I. Correspondence</a></div>\n<div class='series-date'>1934-1939</div>\n<div class='series-extent'>2 boxes</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>Letters congratulating Lydenberg on his appointment as director; and incoming and outgoing correspondence and internal memoranda to and from Lydenberg and other NYPL staff members, pertaining to acquisitions, cataloging procedures, exhibitions, and similar library-related matters. Only a small portion of Lydenberg's 1934-1941 director's correspondence has survived, chiefly alphabetical files from Th to Z. (Some additional correspondence from these years can be found in the Lydenberg, Hopper and Beals General Correspondence, 1934-1954, also held by NYPL Archives.) Of note in Series I are materials from the survey committee of a user study of Westchester County libraries, on which Lydenberg served (Box 2, folders 2-5); correspondence with the historian Mary Beard concerning the proposed World Center for Women's Archives and the possible placement of the Center with The New York Public Library (Box 2, folder 15); and letters to and from the Yale University Library staff about a variety of matters (Box 2, folders 20-22).</p></div></li><li><div class='series-title'><a href='/nypla/4946#c636585'>Series II. Subject Files</a></div>\n<div class='series-date'>1926-1970</div>\n<div class='series-extent'>4 boxes, 1 volume</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>This series is comprised of two subseries: A. New York Public Library; B. Professional Activities.</p></div></li><li><div class='series-title'><a href='/nypla/4946#c636692'>Series III. William Haygood. Survey of the Patrons of the New York Public Library</a></div>\n<div class='series-date'>1937</div>\n<div class='series-extent'>1 volume</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>Haygood, of the Graduate Library School of the University of Chicago, undertook a survey of users of both the Reference and Circulation Departments. After a preliminary survey in 1934, this report tabulated 19,595 questionnaires and created what was described as the largest sample of urban library patrons in the United States. The survey compiled data from both the Circulation Department (16,540 questionnaires) and the Reference Department (3,055 questionnaires). Its particular interest was the age, gender, education level and occupation of the users as well as amount of use of the Library, activities within The Library, use of the catalog, materials used, satisfaction levels, complaints, and suggestions for improvement. There are numerous tables which correlate these various data against one another. An unusual feature of the survey is the list of Most Widely Read books cited by The Library's users. It should be noted that this typescript has some missing tables. Among its findings were that the largest category of users in the Circulation Department were students (38%) while the largest category for the Reference Department were professionals (59%). For users of the Reference Department, it found the motivation to be broken down into the following three categories: Intellectual (48.7%), Vocational (38.7%) and Recreational (11.3%). It found that males comprised 70% of the users.</p></div></li></ul>\n", "type"=>"arrangement"}
- arrangement
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{"value"=>"<p>The Records are arranged in the following series and subseries: Series I.Correspondence, 1934-1939: Subseries A. Congratulatory Correspondence, 1934-1935 and Subseries B. General Correspondence, 1934-1939; Series II. Subject Files, 1926-1970: Subseries A. New York Public Library, 1926-1941 and Subseries B. Professional Activities, 1929-1970 (bulk 1929-1944); Series III. William Haygood. Survey of the Patrons of The New York Public Library, 1937</p>", "supress_display"=>true}
- accessrestrict
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{"value"=>"<p>Access to the collection is restricted to qualified scholars and researchers through the Office of Special Collections, Room 316.</p>"}
- unitid
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{"value"=>"MssArc 4946", "type"=>"local_call"}
{"value"=>"4946", "type"=>"local_mss"}
- unitdate
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{"value"=>"1926-1970", "type"=>"inclusive", "normal"=>"1926/1970"}
{"value"=>"1926-1944", "type"=>"bulk", "normal"=>"1926/1944"}
- physloc
-
{"value"=>"RG 6", "type"=>"local_call", "supress_display"=>true}
- date_inclusive_start
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1926
- date_inclusive_end
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1970
- origination
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{"value"=>"New York Public Library. Central Administration. Director's Office", "type"=>"corpname"}
- acqinfo
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{"accession_number"=>"ARC"}
{"materials"=>"Records"}
- userestrict
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{"value"=>"<p>All rights reserved. Permission to quote must be obtained in writing from the New York Public Library</p>"}
- relatedmaterial
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{"value"=>"<p>Lydenberg's personal papers are located in Rare Books and Manuscripts Division at the New York Public Library</p>"}
{"value"=>"<p></p>", "type"=>"host"}
- keydate
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1926
- processinfo
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{"value"=>"<p>Compiled by Laura O'Keefe; machine-readable finding aid created by Jim Moske.</p>"}
- date_start
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1926
- date_end
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1970
- date_bulk_start
-
1926
- date_bulk_end
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1944