{"id":5968,"date":"2010-11-27T06:50:00","date_gmt":"2010-11-27T14:50:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/slisgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-descriptor\/?p=216"},"modified":"2010-11-27T06:50:00","modified_gmt":"2010-11-27T14:50:00","slug":"tour-of-the-margaret-herrick-library-in-beverly-hills","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/tour-of-the-margaret-herrick-library-in-beverly-hills\/","title":{"rendered":"Tour of the Margaret Herrick Library in Beverly Hills"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
by Alison Leonard<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/div>\n
In June,the SJSU Society of American Archivists Student Chapter organized a tour for students at the Margaret Herrick Library in Beverly Hills. The Library is part of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, otherwise known as the Oscars. <\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Altogether the Academy is housed in three buildings in Los Angeles. The first is the Douglas Fairbanks Center, where the Library is located. Fairbanks,a leading cinematic actor in the 1920s, was  a founding member of the Academy (founded in 1927) and served as its first president. The Library was established a year later in 1928. The second building is the Pickford Center in Hollywood, where the Academy\u2019s film archive is housed. The Pickford Centeris named for Fairbanks one-time-spouse,Mary Pickford. Pickford was also a leading actor in early cinema and a crusader of film preservation. .  Finally, the Academy Headquarters, in Beverly Hills, is where the executive offices are, as well as the Samuel Goldwyn Theater.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n
The Academy describes its institution as, “the world\u2019s preeminent movie-related organization, with a membership of more than 6,000 of the most accomplished men and women working in cinema.\u201d The Academy goes on to state that \u201cby 1941, the Academy library had gained acclaim for having one of the most complete motion picture-related collections in the world.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span>
The Library http:\/\/www.oscars.org\/library\/index.html<\/a> describes itself as \u201cthe World\u2019s Preeminent Cinema Research Facility\u201d and it may just well be.  Margaret Herrick, whom the library is named after, was the Academy\u2019s first librarian and long-time executive director. Her long and important career with the Academy spanned from 1940 until 1971. <\/span>

<\/span><\/div>\n
Cinema researchers from all over the world use the private, non-circulating library by appointment only. There are two reading rooms contained within the library: the first is the Cecil B. DeMille Reading Room named for the American film director and producer; the second is the Katharine Hepburn Special Collections Reading Room for manuscript and other archival material. <\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Our hosts were library staff members Barbara Hall, Research Archivist, and Ann Coco, Graphic Arts Librarian. They did a super job preparing for our visit by having so many wonderful special collections on display for us to see.<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
The Academy subscribes to about 60-70 film publications, some of which have gone completely online. This includes publications for people in the industry, theater owners, industry insiders, as well as for the movie going audience, (i.e. fan magazines.) Barbara and Ann said that most researchers request materials from writers, directors and actors. We learned that many researchers like to start their research by looking at scrapbooks, which can provide background on an individual\u2019s family and other important people in their lives. Many researchers ask to see a specific film script or materials on a specific person. The typical library users are students, film scholars, historians, and industry personnel. Film scripts are one of the many items the library collects. Interestingly enough, when the Academy requests scripts from writers, they often submit their favorite version, not the final version that appears on screen.<\/span><\/div>\n
The Graphic Arts Collection within the library has an extensive poster collection, including a collection that traces the history of African-Americans in cinema from 1921 to 1995. Digitizing the poster collection is a first priority of the library, and the staff has done a good job of making information about the collections available online<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
The library holds more that 1,000 special collections including reviews, articles, press releases, lobby cards, and personal correspondence for Katharine Hepburn, Alfred Hitchcock, George Stevens, John Huston, and Gregory Peck. . The library also holds costume design sketches, and production design drawings. Special Collections are broken down into several categories includingPersonal Papers of directors and performers, Studio Records such as MGM or Paramount, Association Records, and Collectors Records. Collectors Records are acquired by the Academy from fans or writers.<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
One of the most requested collections is the Production Code collection from the 1930s.This self-imposed arm of the industry served to approve all films in Hollywood. As a result scripts were reviewed for violence and morality and changes were suggested in order to quash public criticism of Hollywood. The Code lasted about thiry years.<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
It was exciting to see a telegram from Billy Wilder to Arthur Miller complaining about Marilyn Monroe\u2019s bad behavior on the set of \u201cSome Like it Hot.\u201d One passage stated, \u201cThe fact is that the company pampered her, coddled her and acceded to all her whims. The only one who showed any lack of consideration was Marilyn, in her treatment of her co-stars and co-workers\u2026Her chronic tardiness and unpreparedness cost us eighteen shooting days, hundreds of thousand of dollars, and countless heartaches.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
\n
Alison has a background in fundraising with international organizations including Meridian International Center-a contractor for the U.S. Department of State and WNVC International Public Television. Alison holds an undergraduate degree in history from Virginia Tech, and a Masters in International Transactions from George Mason, which included study abroad at Oxford in England. She enjoys swimming laps, biking and hiking. She has visited over 90 national parks in the U.S. She has run into bears on the trail but thankfully no mountain lions.<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Alison Leonard In June,the SJSU Society of American Archivists Student Chapter organized a tour for students at the Margaret Herrick Library in Beverly Hills. The Library is part of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":52,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[253,254],"tags":[381],"class_list":["post-5968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-descriptor-news","category-november-2010","tag-tours","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5968","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/52"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5968"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5968\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ischoolgroups.sjsu.edu\/alasc\/wp-students\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}