21st Polar Libraries Colloquy - Monday, May 8th, 2006

Today was the beginning of the 21st Polar Libraries Colloquy, hosted at the National Research Council in Rome. About 60 people attended and represented a great diversity of nations--Italy, United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Norway, Denmark, Finland--to name a few.

The Conference began with welcoming remarks that concerned Italian research efforts in Antarctica, which is also celebrating its 21st year of activities.

Because the conference proceedings will be published, I will offer only some highlights.

Deidre Stamm provided an informative and entertaining overview of early efforts at networking information that took the forms of books, newspapers published during the expeditions, and even pre-printed forms to be left in caches to indicate events and destinations.

A second paper by Mary Katherine Jones also addressed early networking but concerned itself with efforts as early as cartography in 1290. Particularly noteworthy was the statement that the custom of the leader of the expedition publishing first was not common until after Martin Frobisher.

Three papers ended the day. Laura Kissel presented a case study of declassification of materials in the papers of Admiral Richard E. Byrd at The Ohio State University. She pointed to the difficulties of finding the right federal office (Information Security Oversight Office) and the challenges of receiving a timely response.

Irene Piippola of Finland presented a colorful presentation concerning early maps of Lapland and used the website "Travellers in Lapland. " Finally, Vibeke Sloth Jakobsen and Kirsten Lkuver of the Danish Polar Center discussed the centennial of the Danish Expedition to Greenland, 1906 to 1908. Although lives were lost on the expedition, it was successful in mapping the unknown coast of Northern Greenland. An exhibit will soon appear on the website of the Danish Polar Center.

The day ended with an open discussion of the University of the Arctic. All in all, this was a very informative day that also allowed people to meet and talk with each other--to network at a polar conference with the theme "Building Polar Networks."

Raimund E. Goerler
Ohio State University