Judith Henchy receives Vietnamese Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism's Medal.

--------------------
From: Judith Henchy
Date: 2009/2/19

Dear VSGers,

Firstly, I'd like to thank everyone who sent their congratulations to me in response to Christoph's message about the Ministry of Culture award for the preservation project at the National Library in Hanoi.

Secondly, I want to share with the list a bit of the history of the project, and to express some notes of appreciation of my own.

In 1994 the Southeast Asia Microform Project (SEAM), a consortium of libraries affiliated with the Center for Research Libraries in Chicago, received a very generous grant from the Henry Luce Foundation, and additional funds from the Harvard Yenching Institute to purchase microfilming equipment for the National Library in Vietnam and to train staff there in micrographics technologies and preservation. This we did in February of 1995, with the assistance of John Dean from Cornell and Bob Mottice from University Microfilms Intentional. Since then, we have been slowly working through serials and newspapers from 1910s to 1945, with a few items from the Resistance Zone materials, 1945-54. We have a copy of these materials on film at the Center for Research Libraries. Most of the materials that have been received have been catalogued for CRL and can be searched by title in their catalog: http://www.crl.edu/. CRL also used to maintain lists of newspapers by country, so some titles we filmed appear there if you browse by country: http://www.crl.edu/content.asp?l1=5&l2=23&l3=44&l4=27 There is also a separate description of the Viet Nam project, which includes a list of materials received (not updated since 2007) :http://www.crl.edu/content.asp?l1=13&l2=20&l3=36.

I hope that these materials will be of use to those of you at institutions with CRL member libraries (most US academic libraries are CRL members, but note that SEAM materials are not freely available to non SEAM member libraries;some discretionary borrowing is allowed before your library is requested to become a SEAM member).

Although some of the film reels are not of the highest quality, I think the project has been a sucess. I want to acknowledge here all those who have helped make it possible. Firstly David Marr, for introducing me to the Directors at the National Library and the General Sciences Library in 1988 and for encouraging me to work with them on a preservation project; Mary McDonnel and SSRC for funding me in 1990 to write a report on Libraries and Archives which resulted in the proposal that the Luce Foundation subsequently funded; Terry Lautz and Helena Kolenda at the Luce Foundation for their patient acceptance of the pace of progress; Directors Mr. Duc and Mrs Cuc and later Mr Khang at the National Library; John Dean and Bob Mottice who did the training; Mr Dung at the National Library and the preservation staff there. I also want to acknowledge the many of you who worked as project managers over the years. As I have said to some of you already, I think this project will enter the annals of Vietnamese Studies as a sort of rite of passage for graduate students unfortunate enough to have been on field research in Hanoi in the 1990s: Birgit Hussfeld, Michele Thompson, Van Nguyen-Marshall, Melissa Pashigian, George Dutton, Jonathan London, Gerard Sasges. There are others who got involved in one way or another as a couriers, negotiators or advisors: Brad Davies, Charles Wheeler, Oscar Salemink, Mark Sidel; and those who significantly helped me with the task of selecting materials: David Marr, Peter Zinoman, George Dutton and Chris Goscha. I also want to thank all the folks at CRL, who had to learn quickly to deal with a lot of ambiguity: Marjorie Bloss, Marlys Rudeen and James Simon; and Will Tuchrello at the Library of Congress office in Jakarta for soliciting the US Embassy's help with logistics, and Binh at the USIA Library who worked with us to get film safely to CRL.

In the early days we joked about writing the book of our experiences - perhaps some day, when we are retired!

With best wishes,

Judith

Judith Henchy, MLS, PhD,
Head, Southeast Asia Section and Special Assistant to the Dean of
University Libraries for International Programs
University of Washington Libraries

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	« Return to About the Organization Judith Henchy receives Vietnamese Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism's Medal. -------------------- From: Judith Henchy Date: 2009/2/19 Dear VSGers, Firstly, I'd like to thank everyone who sent their congratulations to me in response to Christoph's message about the Ministry of Culture award for the preservation project at the National Library in Hanoi. Secondly, I want to share with the list a bit of the history of the project, and to express some notes of appreciation of my own. In 1994 the Southeast Asia Microform Project (SEAM), a consortium of libraries affiliated with the Center for Research Libraries in Chicago, received a very generous grant from the Henry Luce Foundation, and additional funds from the Harvard Yenching Institute to purchase microfilming equipment for the National Library in Vietnam and to train staff there in micrographics technologies and preservation. This we did in February of 1995, with the assistance of John Dean from Cornell and Bob Mottice from University Microfilms Intentional. Since then, we have been slowly working through serials and newspapers from 1910s to 1945, with a few items from the Resistance Zone materials, 1945-54. We have a copy of these materials on film at the Center for Research Libraries. Most of the materials that have been received have been catalogued for CRL and can be searched by title in their catalog: http://www.crl.edu/. CRL also used to maintain lists of newspapers by country, so some titles we filmed appear there if you browse by country: http://www.crl.edu/content.asp?l1=5&l2=23&l3=44&l4=27 There is also a separate description of the Viet Nam project, which includes a list of materials received (not updated since 2007) :http://www.crl.edu/content.asp?l1=13&l2=20&l3=36. I hope that these materials will be of use to those of you at institutions with CRL member libraries (most US academic libraries are CRL members, but note that SEAM materials are not freely available to non SEAM member libraries;some discretionary borrowing is allowed before your library is requested to become a SEAM member). Although some of the film reels are not of the highest quality, I think the project has been a sucess. I want to acknowledge here all those who have helped make it possible. Firstly David Marr, for introducing me to the Directors at the National Library and the General Sciences Library in 1988 and for encouraging me to work with them on a preservation project; Mary McDonnel and SSRC for funding me in 1990 to write a report on Libraries and Archives which resulted in the proposal that the Luce Foundation subsequently funded; Terry Lautz and Helena Kolenda at the Luce Foundation for their patient acceptance of the pace of progress; Directors Mr. Duc and Mrs Cuc and later Mr Khang at the National Library; John Dean and Bob Mottice who did the training; Mr Dung at the National Library and the preservation staff there. I also want to acknowledge the many of you who worked as project managers over the years. As I have said to some of you already, I think this project will enter the annals of Vietnamese Studies as a sort of rite of passage for graduate students unfortunate enough to have been on field research in Hanoi in the 1990s: Birgit Hussfeld, Michele Thompson, Van Nguyen-Marshall, Melissa Pashigian, George Dutton, Jonathan London, Gerard Sasges. There are others who got involved in one way or another as a couriers, negotiators or advisors: Brad Davies, Charles Wheeler, Oscar Salemink, Mark Sidel; and those who significantly helped me with the task of selecting materials: David Marr, Peter Zinoman, George Dutton and Chris Goscha. I also want to thank all the folks at CRL, who had to learn quickly to deal with a lot of ambiguity: Marjorie Bloss, Marlys Rudeen and James Simon; and Will Tuchrello at the Library of Congress office in Jakarta for soliciting the US Embassy's help with logistics, and Binh at the USIA Library who worked with us to get film safely to CRL. In the early days we joked about writing the book of our experiences - perhaps some day, when we are retired! With best wishes, Judith Judith Henchy, MLS, PhD, Head, Southeast Asia Section and Special Assistant to the Dean of University Libraries for International Programs University of Washington Libraries Return to top of page