Christopher Barbour is the curator of rare books at Tisch Library. During his years at Tufts University, he has preserved and considerably expanded the university’s collection of rare books, allowing it a level of care and attention not previously received. Barbour said his work has changed the way that he thinks about the history of books and writing, but more than anything, it has been a tool to connect with others from the past and present.
Tufts Daily (TD): What is your professional background? How did you get to where you are today?
Christopher Barbour (CB): It’s not a straight line. When I was an undergraduate studying medieval and early modern history, I wasn’t thinking about becoming a librarian, and when I went to library school a couple years later, I wasn’t thinking about becoming a special collections librarian. But in the course of time … I found myself working at Brandeis University in the library there, and there was opportunity for, a need for, extra hands [to work] with the rare books collection, and that’s where I got my feet wet with rare books, and also where I got an excellent introduction to preservation of rare materials from the preservation officer there, Leslie Reicher, who was superb in her job. And those experiences and skills I brought to Tufts after 10 years.
TD: What were your first experiences with rare books like? What kinds of texts did you work with?
CB: My first experience was helping to mount an exhibit of the university’s Baldwin collection of Shakespeariana, and in addition to having this library of [Scholar Thomas Whitfield Baldwin’s] books, Brandeis also held the first Folio of Shakespeare and several of the Quartos. And I remember working late one evening typing up exhibit labels at a time when we didn’t have word processors, nervously making mistakes … It was a long evening.
But the exhibit was very satisfying to work with. I was working with the head of special collections, who was also the Judaica librarian, and taught in the doctoral program in near eastern Judaic Studies. So he had two full-time jobs, and … that’s why extra hands were needed. Later, some cataloguing projects were undertaken there, particularly in the McKew-Parr collection, which was focused on the era of Europe’s discovery of the rest of the Western Hemisphere. So, gradually I began to wake up to this kind of material, and to learn about it, and … [When I came to Tufts], there was a rare books collection here that had not had the attention of a rare books librarian at any time in the past, so it was a wonderful opportunity.
TD: What sort of work do you do here at Tufts?
CB: The collection really started to come together in 1953 when an alumnus of the class of ‘28, Walter F. Welch Jr., began donating rare books … with the intention of providing Tufts students with examples of the history of writing through the development of print, and even up to then-current day with examples of 20th century fine-press books ... He wanted to share his love for the history of writing and the history of books with current Tufts students. And between 1953 and the late 1960s, he … built a collection of medieval manuscripts, early printed books, books about the history of the book … writing, calligraphy and many other items. In 1965 when the Wessell Library opened, a special collections department was built which occupied half of present Level 3 in Tisch Library. There were other collections … [including] a [Universalist] book collection. Universalists were founders and backers of Tufts and there was a school of theology here, the Crane School of Theology, for a long time. Hosea Ballou’s collection may have been part of what was here at that time, and there were university archives — you know, the records of the university. From 1965 to the time I came here, the sole staff position responsible for the special collection was the university archivist. University Archives is a full-time job … So the rare books collection didn’t really get very much attention. It starts in the Eaton Library. Walter Welch’s gifts were there, occasionally displayed, but never really accessible. They [came] to Wessell, [but] many items, especially items in Latin, were never catalogued. There was a lot of work to do once we got our hands on it.
I think there’s a human desire for everything to be perfect right now, but the evolution and the stories make life more interesting. I was very lucky to begin working with this collection, and I was very lucky to have professors who were enthusiastic to work with me, and over time we started small with one or two items in a class [or] one class visit. We evolved, [and] more professors came on board in different disciplines. We organized more of the collection, catalogued more of the collection and we began to expand the collection to build on Walter Welch’s work. And we’ve reached a point now where classes can be taught focused on the collection in the library every week. I want to cite especially three professors that any story about special collections should mention: Karen Overbey, Cristelle Baskins … and Alisha Rankin, who teaches history of the book and history of medicine. These were three key figures who helped me build the collection, and brought their classes, brought their students. And once the students get hold of rare books, they take off, because oftentimes they excite their imaginations. The books — they will change their way of thinking by showing us how people different from us think, work, live, what they fought over, what they believed in. This is very inspiring, and I’ve seen this time and again with students — once they latch onto something, it can change the course of their education … A major figure in the rare books field, Michael Suarez, who is the director of the Rare Books School … once told me, “Your job at Tufts is to create wonder.”... And professors also have been working with this collection, and some have changed the way they teach. So it’s been a remarkable experience here, and it’s thriving.
TD: What would you say to students if they felt intimidated by rare book collections?
CB: I can remember being 18 years old and walking into an antiquarian book shop for the first time and I had exactly that reaction. I grew up with books, but not books like these … my first reaction was, “This is interesting, but this is interesting to other people. I’m happy with the Penguin paperback edition.”... I didn’t know what they meant. And now, when I go into a classroom, my 18-year-old self is there with me. Because … You know, it’s a book. It may be large and beautiful, but even then, how do you understand what it is? One of my jobs is to help students understand that books are reflective of the people who make them who are not only the author … There are scribes, there are illuminators, there are rubricators, there are the people who made the parchment, there are the binders. All of them do have a profound effect on the book we end up looking at. We could pick up a book that was published a month ago, and that would tell you a lot about how people work in our society [today]. It’s possible now to print a book by pushing a button or pressing some keystrokes, and a machine does the rest. But that tells us a lot … There’s a lot to learn. I’m learning all the time as well, along with students and professors. It’s very inspiring work, for me as well as for students and professors.
TD: How can students begin to engage with rare books at Tufts?
CB: There is a research guide on the Tisch website about special collections that tells a bit about our operation … We have published a new website, and right now special collections’ presence as we have created it so far on the new website is under the header ‘Uniquely Tufts.’ It’s not an extensive site, and there are a number of us talking about and planning a more extensive website. For now you can go to Tufts research guides and look for special collections. That is a brief introduction to it. We hope, next year, perhaps in the spring or fall, to open a space devoted to special collections in the Tisch Library proper, as well as to incorporate programs and items to exhibit from the SMFA’s library, which has special collections devoted mainly to artist books, and special collections at the Lilly Music Library as well. This effort is not simply to focus on a space in the library, but to make this space the occasion to have more social media presence, to have items on exhibit, and to have visibility … There’s also a Flickr page, if someone searches Flickr for Tisch Library special collections … They can see images of a number of our books. There are even complete images of a number of our medieval manuscripts. That’s not the ideal format to look at them, but certainly you can see the highlights there. The digital scriptorium, which is easily found on Google, can be searched, and there are at least two of our medieval manuscripts there in complete images … I talk a lot about medieval manuscripts because we put a lot of effort into that collection, both to unveil what Walter Welch gave to us and also to expand it. In 2016, an exhibition entitled “Beyond Words,” a collaboration of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Houghton Library at Harvard [University] and the McMullen Museum at Boston College mounted over 200 manuscripts from Boston-area collections, and Tufts was for the first time represented on a stage of international stature [there]. We’re also occasionally posting on Tisch instagram. If one were to go to Instagram and search the hashtag #tischrarebooks, it would be easy to find a series of posts over four or five weeks last fall in which I gave an introduction.
