2002-2003 Catalogue
2001-2002 Catalogue

This information was last updated on: 08/11/04 1:30:05 PM

The Colby libraries consist of three libraries that provide collections, services, and space for study and research. Miller Library, the often-photographed building with the clock tower in the center of campus, houses the humanities and social science collections, the College archives, and Special Collections. The building contains a wireless network as well as some study areas and a computer cluster that are open 24 hours a day. The Art and Music Library, in the Bixler Art and Music Center, features an extensive collection of art and music books, journals, sound recordings, a computer lab/listening center, and study spaces with Internet access. The science library, in the F.W. Olin Science Center, includes books and journals to support biology, chemistry, environmental science, geology, physics, astronomy, computer science, and mathematics. Individual as well as group study areas, each complete with Internet access, are available. The Colby libraries are open from early morning until late at night throughout the academic year and during daytime hours in the summer.

An open-stack system allows easy access to a collection of more than 900,000 items, and the online catalog and the library’s electronic indexes and Internet files are available on library workstations and computers campus-wide. The collection strongly supports all curriculum areas and contains more than 1,300 currently received print journals and another 8,500 electronic journals, many long runs of retrospective periodicals of historical and scholarly value, and daily newspapers from this country and abroad. The Colby libraries are a depository for U.S. and Maine state documents.

Colby is an active participant in Maine Info Net, a statewide online catalog of more than six million items. Colby students, faculty, and staff can search and request materials from Bates, Bowdoin, the University of Maine, and many of the larger public libraries in Maine. A daily courier among libraries ensures rapid delivery of needed materials. Reference librarians and interlibrary loan staff help researchers identify and obtain resources beyond those in the Maine Info Net collections.Instruction in the use of the library and its research materials is offered throughout the curriculum, from an introduction in beginning English classes to in-depth subject searching using sophisticated tools in upper-level classes. Students, faculty, and other researchers seeking individual assistance are welcome at all reference desks.

Ten professional librarians provide research assistance to students, faculty, and outside researchers. Instruction in the use of the library and its research materials is offered throughout the curriculum, from an introduction in beginning English classes to in-depth subject searching using sophisticated tools in upper-level classes. Students, faculty, and other researchers seeking individual assistance are welcome at all reference desks.

Special collections of first editions and manuscripts in Miller Library have achieved international recognition. The Edwin Arlington Robinson Memorial Room, named for the famous Pulitzer Prize-winning Maine poet, contains his books, manuscripts, letters, and memorabilia. The Thomas Hardy Collection is one of the most extensive in the country. Other authors represented in the Robinson Room include A.E. Housman, Sarah Orne Jewett, Kenneth Roberts, Henry James, Willa Cather, John Masefield, William Dean Howells, and Thomas Mann.

The John and Catherine Healy Memorial Room contains the James Augustine Healy Collection of Modern Irish Literature, with numerous inscribed copies, manuscripts, and holograph letters of William Butler Yeats, Sean O’Casey, James Joyce, George Bernard Shaw, and many others. The Healy Collection has 7,000 primary and critical sources representing the Irish Literary Renaissance, 1880-1940.

The Alfred King Chapman Room houses the College archives, which hold more than 4,000 manuscript files pertaining to Colby alumni, faculty, and staff dating from 1813 to the present. Also included is an extensive collection of books by Colby graduates and faculty.

Detailed information about Colby's library collections and services is provided on the Colby World Wide Web site (http://www.colby.edu/library/).