The Association of Research Libraries recently released a new book, Celebrating Research. The book includes UF’s Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature, among many others as a
compendium is a sampling of the remarkable abundance of collections available for use in the member libraries of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL). It is not a comprehensive view or a directory but instead an array of profiles that exemplify a spectrum of rare and special collections in research libraries. Special collections have been broadly construed to encompass the distinctive, the rare and unique, emerging media, born-digital, digitized materials, uncommon, non-standard, primary, and heritage materials. (“Preface”)
While many of these rare materials are available in reprint or online, far more are not available other than in physical form. This compendium is like a traveling guide, highlighting only some of the particular treasures held by research libraries. For those interested in seeing some of the Baldwin Library’s gems, we’re continuously working to digitizing more materials for the Baldwin Library Digital Collection. However despite our work, many more books remain in the closed stacks, some of which aren’t even haven’t even made it to being listed in the library catalog.