Bing Wing: A library for
all centuries
BY JAMES ROBINSON
Eighty years since it was
built and 10 years after the Loma Prieta earthquake, the
original Main Library was rededicated Tuesday as the Bing
Wing of the Cecil H. Green Library.
Under a hot sun that
caused most of the approximately 200 spectators to seek
shelter in the shade, a red ribbon was cut to symbolize
the re-entry into the community of a 1919 building
redesigned and rebuilt for the early 21st century.
The ceremony was held in
front of the Bing Wing -- an area of campus that many
recent undergraduates knew only as a cordoned-off
construction zone since the building was shuttered
following damage caused by the 1989 earthquake.
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In opening remarks,
University Librarian Michael Keller pondered the nature
and purpose of a library, saying that in addition to
being a repository of information, "a library is a
safe place for ideas -- even outrageous or heretical ones
-- to be stored and protected for repeated use and
examination."
President Gerhard Casper
used the occasion to give a 30-minute speech touching on
the history and future of libraries in general and at
Stanford in particular (see
text of speech).
Remarks were also made by
John Bender, professor of English; Judith Goldstein,
professor of political science; and Robert Bass, chairman
of the Board of Trustees.
"This project has
posed extraordinary challenges," Casper said,
recalling that when he came to Stanford in 1992, the
prospects for rebuilding the former Main Library were
somewhat grim.
Renovation costs were
estimated to be high -- and, indeed, proved to be even
higher than projected. While some Federal Emergency
Management Agency money was to become available, "I
began to wonder whether FEMA contributions to a
restoration effort notwithstanding, we would not be
better off if we demolished the building and started from
scratch with a truly modern library."
But, Casper said, there
were strong historical arguments favoring restoration.
And the university, in a strained financial situation,
needed the FEMA money that was available only for
renovations.
"Thanks largely to
the personal involvement and the care of Michael Keller,
the university librarian; Kären Nagy, his deputy; and
many other members of the library staff, we may now
celebrate an achievement that is beautiful and as
miraculous as the restoration of many historic buildings
in Europe after the destruction of World War II,"
Casper said.
"Indeed, when all the
necessary tearing down and opening up had occurred, this
library reminded me of the bombed-out buildings of my
Hamburg childhood."
Casper thanked Peter and
Helen Bing for their generous contributions to the
library restoration, and said the lead gift -- "and
the first substantial response to my pleas for help"
-- came from Melvin and Joan Lane. He also cited
contributions from Charles and Nancy Munger and Gregor
and Dion Peterson.
"To them, and all
other contributors, our deep gratitude."
Casper traced the role of
libraries within universities, noting that until the late
19th century students generally were expected to study
from only a small number of standard textbooks. At about
the same time, when Stanford was founded, Leland Stanford
originally budgeted only "four to five
thousand" dollars for books, and in Jane Stanford's
"cosmology of the Stanford universe, the church was
followed by the museum in terms of importance,"
Casper said.
But, he continued,
"from a librarian's point of view Mrs. Stanford did
redeem herself just before her death in 1905," when,
on the occasion of the laying of the cornerstone for a
library building, she directed the university trustees to
sell her jewels after her death and use the proceeds for
a library endowment fund.
But before that library
was even occupied, it perished in the 1906 earthquake.
"It is said that we should consider its demise a
blessing since the building would have turned out to be
mostly dysfunctional," Casper noted.
Opened in 1919, the former
Main Library that on Tuesday was christened the Bing Wing
was designed by well-known architects Bakewell &
Brown and reflected the newly acknowledged importance of
university libraries.
And what importance do
they have now and will they have in the future?
"I have little doubt
that, before long, the university library, as we still
assume it today, will experience extraordinary
challenges. We are in a transformation period,"
Casper said, noting, for example, that he prefers to
consult the Oxford English Dictionary's online
version over its paper edition.
The increasing digital
storage of information "is already offering us
extraordinary opportunities," he said, making
possible in scholarship "a thoroughness that was
previously unattainable. To coin a phrase: The medium is
the message."
Yet, he said that
"even the most futuristic of thinkers would have to
admit that we are likely to have physical libraries and
paper books for decades to come." Not everything is
yet on the web, whose navigational devices remain
"primitive," he added.
But the Bing Wing
satisifies the ongoing need for books -- bringing one
million volumes back to the main campus from storage --
while also providing multiple electronic resources, not
to mention majestic reading rooms where students can once
again study in "relative solitude," he said.
"In short, the Bing
Wing comprehends two worlds, the old world of printing
and the new world of digitization. It will be -- to
quote, in this year of his 250th birthday, Goethe's
metaphor for a library -- 'a large capital that quietly
pays incalculable interest.'"
For more information on
the Bing Wing, see the Stanford Report article from Oct. 6, 1999, or the
libraries' web site, http://www-sul.stanford.edu. SR
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