Annual Report 2015 is published by the University of Toronto Libraries.
EDITORIAL TEAM Laura Anderson · Jesse Carliner · Lisa Gayhart · Maureen Morin · Margaret Wall (Editor)
DESIGNER Maureen Morin
PHOTOGRAPHY Paul Armstrong · Gordon Belray · Robert Carter · Michael James O’Brien
ROBARTS COMMON RENDERING Diamond + Schmitt Architects
COVER IMAGES, CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT Skully, the resident skeleton in the Gerstein Science Information Centre, promotes a botanical exhibition (photo: Jaime Lynn Clifton-Ross); staff from the University of Toronto Scarborough Library meet with Marc Lalonde of the Libraries’ Information Technology Services department during development of the new library website (photo: Lisa Gayhart); in a new twist on book face photos that appear in social media, Copyright Outreach Librarian Nelly Cancilla strikes a pose for UTL's Instagram account (photo: Lillian Rigling); an illuminated 3D model of Robarts Library, showing the Robarts Common (photo: Laura Anderson); a rare Chinese film from the collections of the Richard Charles Lee Canada-Hong Kong Library (photo: Johnny Guatto).
Above: Chief Librarian Larry Alford, centre, with some new members of the library staff.
Photo description: Photo of Larry Alford, Chief Librarian of the University of Torono Libraries with new library staff.
© 2015 University of Toronto Libraries
When you think about the modern academic library what comes to mind? If you were to walk in to one of our 44 libraries today you might encounter any of the following scenes:
Recently an author donated a personal computer and collection of floppy disks along with her papers to the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, leaving archivist Natalya Rattan with a significant modern problem to solve. How could she access and preserve the important files within when the computer's hardware and software had long been replaced by newer versions? Hoping to make the entirety of this author’s papers accessible to future researchers, Natalya contacted Steve. Through the use of data recovery tools, disk imaging software and historical computing emulation, they were able to gain access to the information stored on the aging floppies (which were formatted in a way unusable by modern computers), evaluate their contents and transfer them to a medium more suited to long-term storage.
The library’s web team recently spent over a year talking to U of T students, staff and faculty about their research and information needs. The result is a new mobile-friendly website that makes performing your research, discovering our collections and accessing our many services easier no matter what device you’re using.
When Banting and Best revolutionized the treatment of diabetes with their discovery of insulin in the 1920s, they carefully recorded their progress in paper lab books which remain accessible in original form and through digital surrogates. Today, academic inquiry is more likely to be recorded digitally and result in a volume of data exponentially larger than in the days when paper and pencil were the primary means of documenting findings. This digital scholarship revolution is creating new preservation and curation challenges for libraries.
This past academic year, the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library marked a milestone in its history when it welcomed a record number of visitors, due in part to interest in two extraordinary exhibitions. ‘As it is Written: Judaic Treasures from the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library’ attracted the largest crowds ever to the Fisher Library for a single exhibit. Curated by librarian Barry Walfish, ‘Judaic Treasures’ showcased items such as rare Constantinople imprints, Biblical manuscripts and works of Jewish law and liturgy spanning from the tenth century onward. The 2014 summer exhibit ‘Vesalius at 500’ commemorated the birth of Andreas Vesalius, who is considered the father of modern anatomy. Featured was a rare author-annotated copy of Vesalius’s De humani corporis fabrica, a work of historic significance in the field of medicine for its magnificent illustrations. The stunning exhibit catalogue, written by librarian Philip Oldfield and designed by Stan Bevington of Coach House Press, received a 2015 Katharine Kyes Leab and Daniel J. Leab American Book Prices Current Exhibition Catalogue Award.
In partnership with the Department of History and the Sexual and Gender Diversity Office, UTL hosted a screening and panel discussion of ‘Paris is Burning’ to mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of the landmark documentary. Rated one of the top five free events in Toronto at the time by blogTO, the screening generated so much interest that it was moved to a larger venue to accommodate the anticipated crowds.
A new display of 30 photographs that highlight the contributions of U of T faculty members in science and medicine now graces the walls of the Gerstein Science Information Centre Reading Room. Drawn from the U of T Archives, the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, the Hospital for Sick Children Archives and the collections of the grandson of Dr. John G. FitzGerald, the photos are inspiring the next generation of scientists who study under the watchful eyes of these historic greats. Visit @uoftlibraries for other library highlights.
Pioneering research is taking place right now at the University of Toronto. New discoveries made here will change lives and, because of a new Tri-Agency Open Access Policy, everyone will now have access to federally funded research results—knowledge that would simply have been inaccessible beyond the academy in the past.
A significant percentage of the Libraries’ collections budget is now devoted to electronic resources, including electronic journals, databases and streaming content. Even so, about 150,000 new print titles are added to the shelves each year. Bringing these resources to students and faculty involves the work of a large, interdisciplinary team of librarians and technicians who apply their scholarly, technical, copyright and other specialized expertise to behind-the-scenes processes which facilitate acquisitions, discovery and access.
For print collections, a significant component of the work Behzadi and his colleagues conduct on a day-to-day basis involves working with vendors who, based on criteria developed by the UTL selectors, send hundreds of thousands of books to the library each year from mainstream publishers, where they are individually evaluated by librarians before they are added to the collection. Streamlining the collection process from major publishers allows librarians to spend more time carefully researching and collecting niche titles from small publishers, even travelling internationally to purchase rare, local material that would otherwise not be available to U of T researchers. This attention to detail is part of what makes UTL’s collections truly world class.
Between May 1, 2014 and April 30, 2015, the Libraries received support from many donors in the form of cash and gifts in kind. The following lists donors of $500 or more. The University of Toronto Libraries are very grateful for their generosity, and for the contributions of all donors of funds and collections. For the list of donors to the Libraries within the Boundless Campaign, please visit 