Collections : [University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library]

The University Library system at the University of Michigan provides information resources and services to faculty, students, staff, and the public, and is comprised of undergraduate, graduate, and subject-oriented divisional collections. The record group includes administrative files of library directors, reports, committee files, financial records, photographs, and publications.

The records of the library of the University of Michigan document the development and administration of the central library. The records include topical files, miscellaneous correspondence and reports, and business record books, 1886-1916; include files of librarians/directors/deans Theodore W. Koch, William W. Bishop, Warner G. Rice, Frederick H. Wagman, Richard Dougherty, Robert M. Warner, Don Riggs, William A. Gosling, and Paul Courant; also assorted papers of earlier librarians, Andrew Ten Brook and Raymond C. Davis.

1. The records are organized into elleven subgroups:
2. Assistant Director for Technical Services, 1984 - 1999
3. Associate Director for Public Service Files, 1976 - 1998
4. Associate Director for Technical Services, 1979 - 1986
5. Associate Director's office, 1982 - 1989
6. Audio - Visual Materials, 1954 - 2001
7. Collection Development Office, 1949 - 1986
8. Deputy Director's Office, 1980 - 1991
9. Directors Office, 1905-2013
10. Human Resources, 1956 - 2001
11. Miscellaneous Records, 1837 - 1985
12. Other Offices and Programs, 1904 - 2004

Librarian at the Library of Congress, University of Michigan and Northwestern University, and bibliophile. Correspondence, articles and pamphlets, papers relating to his books and articles, and topical files relating to his interest in Carnegie Libraries, literary forgeries, the work of the American Library Association's Library War Service during World War I, library Americanization programs, 1919-1921, and the library building of University of Michigan; also photographs.

The Koch papers are very incomplete for the part of his career before he went to Northwestern. Much of the earliest correspondence deals with the gathering of material for his "A Portfolio of Carnegie Libraries," Very little material on his work at the University of Michigan has survived, although a few reports from Byron A. Finney on the operation of the library and copies of Koch's proposal for a new library in 1915 are included in the collection.

Although the collection is much larger for the years after 1919, it is apparent that even for these years many of his professional files were either retained by the Northwestern University Library or destroyed. There is surprisingly little information on the activities of the A.L.A. or other professional organizations. Much of the correspondence consists of family and personal mail rather than the activities of the Northwestern library.

A high proportion of the material from this period relates to the writing and publication of his many books and pamphlets. Although Koch's files on Carnegie libraries, literary forgeries, the A.L.A. Library War Service, and Americanization programs may be of interest to scholars, many of his publications involved the translation and publication of works aimed merely at bibliophiles. These works were often published by such groups as the Caxton Club of Chicago or the Roxburgh Club of San Francisco which are interested in printing as an art form.