LAPL Central Map Librarian Retires

[cahwyguy]

While reading the news, I came across this article about the retirement of LA Public Library librarian Glen Creason: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2021-10-15/los-angeles-public-library-map-librarian-glen-creason-retired

One interesting paragraph caught my eye. If I had the time (translation: perhaps after I retire in a few years -- I'm only 61), I'd be downtown to the stacks in a flash.

Containing thousands of items, the collection was donated in 2012 when the real estate agent of a large home on a ravine in Mount Washington said the library could take what it wished. Creason gets a similar call about once a month and sometimes he finds treasure, like Disneyland maps or a 1932 Olympics map. A thrift store in Temple City also keeps an eye out for him.

"Anything pictorial about L.A., my assigned specialist area, we put in our collection,"  he says. "But this? It was absolutely mind-boggling. Even recently, the new owner found four more boxes of maps under the floorboards."

He recently finished cataloging the huge number of Feathers' California-related items, which included "a complete set of Thomas Guides, which even the company didn't have, Rennie Guides, Gillespie Guides going back to the 1920s, fold-out maps, road atlases from before we had a highway system, travelogues, a four-volume set about soils in Iowa. I even found his library card and driving license."

It looks like you have to go in person. From the article:

After grumbling that the map collection doesn't have a working, professional scanner – "Boston and New York Public (libraries) have thousands of maps digitized, and we have about 70 – It's a disgrace"  – he returns quietly to thoughts of his imminent departure.

Daniel