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by Christopher J. J. Thiry, Map Librarian, Arthur Lakes Library, Colorado School of Mines.  March 1998.  Updated October 2000.

The Colorado School of Mines is one of the world’s premier natural resource management universities. The Map Room at the Arthur Lakes Library serves the needs of the campus by not only aiding research, but, also, instructing students. Also, the map collection is heavily used by geologic research and mineral prospecting companies. We answer more than 600 reference questions a year. More than double that use the collection. Nearly 70% of our reference questions deal with geology or mining.

95% of our maps are cataloged and available through our on-line system, VOYAGER. Included in this are some unique items, such as blueline copies of original mining claims maps.

The Map Room is a working collection--our maps are checked out, and used in the field. They don’t just sit in locked map cases, never seeing the light of day. Our cases are never locked. Our maps may be retrieved through interlibrary loan. Our maps show signs of wear and tear. Our maps are used and loved to death, and I like it that way. Our patrons come back again and again to use our collection. It is a fantastic place to work.

How did this great collection of 189,000 maps and 6,100 books and atlases come about? How did one of the smallest public universities in the Rocky Mountains come to have one of the better map collections in the region?

EARLY

The Colorado School of Mines was founded in 1874 to meet the territory's growing demand for mining engineers. The Library was founded shortly after. In the early 1900's the Library moved to a permanent location with the new Guggenheim Building on campus. It remained there until 1955.

The collection within the Library was and still is small and very specialized. Geology and mining materials form the core of the collection. Maps play and important role in these two subject areas. In the early part of this century, few non-topographic maps were available. Most geologic and mineral maps were included in other publications, such as bulletins, reports and papers. The state geological surveys and the United States Geological Survey produced few items that were strictly geologic maps. The most noteworthy exception was the Geological Atlas of the United States (or Folios). These items began to be produced in 1894 and ceased in 1945. The Library at the Colorado School of Mines collected these folios. Some were purchased (between $.25 and $1.00) and many were received as gifts--some from Simon Guggenheim.

It is a curious note that upon examining the accession books from the early part of the century, I find no indication of the Library acquiring topographic maps. These maps are very important for field work and often used as the base for geologic maps. I assume that one of two things was going on regarding topographic maps 1) the Library did not collect them (which I doubt) or 2) they were considered insignificant--not worthy of noting in the accession books. The latter may be possible. John Shaw Billings who, at the turn of the century, invented the classification schedule for New York Public Library felt maps that were so insignificant that he gave them no call number. This despite the fact that New York Public had close to 10,000 maps at the time. The maps were (and are to this day are) merely labeled "Map Division."

The records before the mid-1950's about the Library are sketchy. It is known, however, that in 1939 we began to participate in the Federal Depository Library Program. This is a marvelous system by which the federal government sends copies of publicly funded government information to libraries free of charge. In return, libraries must keep the information organized and available to all citizens. We continue to receive thousands of map a year, not just from USGS, but also from the CIA, NOAA, NIMA, etc.

1955-1978

By the early 1950's, the Library began to outgrow its space in the Guggenheim Building. Consequently, in 1955, the current Library was built. It was dedicated the "Arthur Lakes Library" in 1959, after the first geology professor at the School of Mines, and discoverer of dinosaur remains Colorado.

In the new building, maps were placed in their own room and placed under the purview of the Government Documents Librarian, Joy Sutherland. The new Map Room was placed under lock and key, and people needed permission to look at the maps. As one might of expected, the maps did not circulate. By 1958, the Library had 45,687 maps, of which 4,921 were geologic in nature. In 1962, the collection was heavily weeded, mostly of superseded topos, resulting in the new total of 39,741.

Around the same time, the thematic map series by USGS began to be produced. The Oil and Gas Investigation Maps (OMs) first began to appear in 1943, while the Miscellaneous Investigation Series (Is) did not begin until 1955. As of today, these 9 different series have over 9,000 different maps, most being of a geologic nature.

Concurently, the Army Mapping Service, the forerunner to the Defense Mapping Agency, began to issue in earnest topographic maps of the world. Coupled with USGS's 7.5 minute topographic maps and geologic maps, the basic building blocks of a sizable map collection were in place. New topographic maps from USGS were flowing in at a rate of 150 per month. By the late 60's, this figure had jumped to 250 per month. Today, we receive 70 topos a month. The Federal Depository Program would help double the size of the Map Room collection from 1962 to 1977.

In 1963, Joy Sutherland left the Library, and shortly there after, Margaret Smart became the Government Documents Librarian, and thus in charge of the maps.

The Colorado School of Mines saw massive changes in the 1960's. By the late 1960's the campus had a permanent presence of women students. The enrollment, which had been steady since shortly after WW2, shot up from 1,048 in 1962 to 1,652 in 1966. The demand of a 60% increase in student population began to show on the Library. Repeatedly, the Director of the Library asked for more staffing and more funds for acquisitions. From 1958 to 1963, journal inflation ran at 8.3% a year. Incrementally changes were made. The Directors goal was to have 5% of the total budget of Mines go to the Library. The closest ever achieved was 4.51% in 1967. Today, the Library composes only 2% of the total expenditures of CSM. Several new staff members were added, but only at the level of "clerk."

Even though between 2 and 3,000 maps were being added every year (mostly topographic), the Map Room remained a neglected part of the Library. Margaret Smart's duties ranged beyond government documents and maps, to general reference and various campus committees. Other than statistics, the only note in any annual report or Newsletter I found regarding the Map Room just mentions "The Library's invaluable maps."

The majority of processing and filing in the Map Room was done by grad students. Volunteers (facility member's wives) did a lot of bibliographic research. Lois Hahn, wife of a professor at Mines, worked off and on over 20 years in the Map Room "preparing the cards and maintaining a card index of the Library's collection of geologic maps."

By the mid-70's the student population, fueled by the Baby-boomers, exploded once again at Mines. Enrollment had been holding steady. In 1973, it was 1,687, but by 1981, it had reached 2,918. Since that time, the cyclical nature of the natural resource market has predicted CSM's enrollment. Today, over 2,900 students (728 grads, 2,175 undergrads) are enrolled. Most do not want the numbers to go higher.

After much debate and planning, the Legislature and Board of Trustees approved the addition to the Library in 1976. It was completed in 1978. At about the same time, the Library received a $1,000,000 gift from the Boettcher Foundation. This money was used to buy books about energy, the environment, and public policy. These would be Virginia Wilcox Herald's, the Library Director, last hurrah. Her remarkable 37 career at Mines would come to end in August of 1977 when she retired. 

Then Came Mary

Shortly after Mrs. Herald's retirement, Hart Phiney was hired as the new Library Director. Mr. Phiney had a very successful honeymoon period. He was able to increase the amount the school spent of books and serials from $70,000 to $131,000. He also, (more importantly to our plot) was able to persuade the administration to create a Map Librarian position. Strong statements from the staff and the Director can be found: "The Map Room needs to have a permanent staff assigned next year."

On October 1, 1978, Mary Larsgaard became the Map Librarian at the Arthur Lakes Library. As stated in the 78/79 Annual Report, "This was a truly momentous occasion--[until now] justice had not been done the map collection due to increased use of documents and lack of help for that collection."

Mary Larsgaard was and still very much is an incredibly hard work, a prolific cataloger, writer and researcher, an expert at acquiring items for a collection and a character. Reading through all of her annual reports and memos, I have come to the conclusion that she does not sleep. She, more than any other person, made the Map Room at the Arthur Lakes Library a great collection. In her 10 years, Mary increased the size of the collection from 76,667 to 157,000 maps.

To quote her 1982 Annual report: "The Map Room has gone from an irritating appendage of the Government Documents Department (whose staff was already severely taxed simply trying to keep up with their primary charge), in a room tucked away out of sight, to a heavily used and very valuable part of the Arthur Lakes Library ... This is a logical outgrowth of the School of Mines' commitment of building space and staff time, and of the fact that it is extremely difficult to find mineral resources without a map."

In 1978, the Map Room moved to its present location in the new addition, nearly quadrupling in size from 986 square feet to 3,828 square feet. A few years late a 440 square foot office was added.

1978-79 marked the first year that an annual report and detailed statistics were made about the Map Room.

Mary was able to receive a grant to catalog Colorado maps. Within 5 years, 95% of the collection was cataloged. This is an amazing accomplishment. To this day, few libraries can boast such a high percentage. And the fact that Mary did most of the cataloging herself, is even more incredible. Having the vast majority of the maps available through our on-line catalog dramatically increases the accessibility and decreases the amount of frustration in finding maps.

In the summer of 1979, she participated in the Library of Congress' Summer Internship Program, through which, she acquired over 10,000 maps. In the later part of that year, the Map Room received a gift of over 3,000 maps from the "State Capital Attic."

Three major concerns dominated Mary's reports--the lack of map cases, the need for an assistant, and the concern about items being stolen. Slowly map cases were acquired. Some were bought, others came as gifts. A 1/2 time assistant arrived in 1984. Finally, maps were not being stolen at as high as a rate as was feared. This concern had run so high, it was suggested that the Map Room be walled off.

Mary wrote a number of books while at Mines, including Map Librarianship: An Introduction and its second edition. Other works include Topographic mapping of the Americas, Australia and New Zealand, and Alphabetical index to geologic maps of Colorado.

In 1984, Mary was made Assistant Director for Special Collections. The duties of this job included not only responsibility over the Map Room, but also government documents, the vault and the Colorado Room.

The mid-80's were crisis years in Colorado. The petroleum and mineral industry crash sent the state into a tailspin. Unemployment was high. Enrollment was down. State revenue was down. There was both a hiring and salary freeze. In 1984-85, the Arthur Lakes Library spent $64 on maps. The book collection suffered worse. One year, the Library bought exactly 2 books. Because of retirements, increasing stress was put on the Library staff. The Library lost most of creditability on campus. A combination of these and other factors, lead to forced resignation of the Director in 1988. Shortly after this incident, Mary left CSM for sunny Santa Barbara.

To the Present

Buddy Rooney began as the Map Librarian in 1988. Buddy continued to expand the size of and access to the collection. During her 6 years, Buddy acquired 2 major gifts: one from the Anaconda Mining Company and the other from Cypruss/Amax Minerals. Both of these companies shut down libraries in the Denver area, and the Colorado School of Mines acquired them. Included in the gifts were many, hitherto unaffordable, geologic maps of foreign countries.

Buddy also published Mining in Colorado: A selected bibliography. She retired in October 1994.

I began my reign as the Map Librarian in July 1995. Some of my noteworthy achievements have included weeding the collection of all its nautical charts (not really needed in Colorado), acquiring new map cases, shifting the entire collection and using the internet for acquisitions. I consider myself very lucky to follow in such footprints as Mary and Buddy. In continuing with their tradition, I am prolific cataloger, very knowledgeable about how the electronic age can enhance the Map Room, and I have become very good at acquiring items for our collection. The best example of the last is our interaction with USGS during their Inventory Reduction. In the past couple of years, USGS has been dramatically reducing their inventory from 50 million to about 27 million items. Most of the reduction went straight into the recycle bin. However, through a lot of phone calls and smooth talking, we were able to acquire over 8,000 thematic maps--most geology.

The Map Room has had a presence on the World Wide Web for about 2 years. Currently, I have mounted 113 pages. This review by Chris Hodge from Mercator's World, 1996 says it all: "The ... Map Room of the Colorado School of Mines is a great example of an on-line academic map library. The introductory pages have minimal graphics, which means you can get in and find what you are looking for without delays. A guide to finding materials at the site has been included. A FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) is attached. And the library has also posted its collection development policy, which, as almost any map librarian will tell you, can be an invaluable resource. The ... Map Room focuses on topographic, mining, and geological maps, and the ratio of original materials to linked resources is extremely high. In other words, this is meant to be a resource, not simply a link to other links that may take you to the information you are looking for."

Future

What does the future hold for the maps at the Arthur Lakes Library. My goal is perfection. I want to have every map cataloged. I want a graphical index to every set and those indexes mounted on the web. I want the collection in perfect condition so that a patron walking in can easily find what they are looking for. I intend to keep the Map Room a working collection.

To accomplish these goals, we need more map cases. Plain and simple. Overcrowding not only destroys the maps, but discourages patrons.

Access is far more important than preservation, however, it is hoped that we can better preserve our collection. Currently we deacidify and encapsulate in mylar our maps. In the future, we hope to scan or digitize some of our unique mining and geological maps.

While paper maps are not going to go away any time soon, we are being asked more and more about digital map information. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and GIS formatted data are becoming more and more prevalent in Libraries. Consequently, CSM has acquired a site license for ArcView 3.2; this program may now be accessed throughout campus.   This program gives access to certain data--particularly government data, which deals mostly with transportation, rather than topography or geology. In the future, I expect to see a rise in demand for digital geologic information and corresponding rise in the production of that data.

Conclusion

The Map Room at the Colorado School of Mines is an important collection. It is used constantly for geologic and mineral research. We play a vital role in teaching new generations of geology students.

Through careful purchases, the depository program, great personnel and luck, the Arthur Lakes Library has been able to assemble an excellent collection, with emphasis on geologic and mining maps. I plan to continue this tradition by building and maintaining our collection for future users.