RICHARD OFFOR
| Pages | 63-65 |
| Published date | 01 March 1947 |
| Date | 01 March 1947 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb026108 |
| Author | G. WOLEDGE |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
The Journal
of
DOCUMENTATION
Volume
III
SEPTEMBER
1947 Number 2
RICHARD
OFFOR
DR.
Richard Offor retires in 1947 from the librarianship of the University of
Leeds,
to which he was appointed in 1919. In these twenty-eight years the
Library has grown from insignificance to splendour; and in its growth,
besides the munificence of benefactors and the steady support of the Univer-
sity, not the least factors have been his skill, his insight, his enthusiasm, and
his energy.
Before coming to Leeds Offor had been first a student assistant and after-
wards an assistant hbrarian at University College, London, which in the first
quarter of
this
century under the librarianship of R. W. Chambers, experi-
menting fruitfully in the development of methods appropriate to the special
needs of a modern English university library, had become the leading such
library in the country. He remained
a
loyal son of University College, which
has honoured him by election to a fellowship; and the training he received
there in scholarship and in librarianship was a sound and characteristic basis
for his later work.
The Leeds University Library in 1919 had rather more, but not much
more,
than the 37,000 books it claimed; it had one reading-room, one store-
room, three 'seminars', and no rooms for the hbrarian or his assistant staff
of
two.
But the University realized that much needed to be done; it was
receptive of Offor's ideas and warm
in
his support; and when later the un-
paralleled Brotherton benefactions came, he had already laid a sound founda-
tion of technique and organization, achieved a high standard of service to
the university community, and made far-seeing plans for the future.
It is to be hoped that the development of the Library under Offor's head-
ship will be chronicled in full; in this place it must suffice to characterize his
individual contribution. It was marked not only by the things he brought
from University College, but also by a quick apprehension of new circum-
stances and a ready power of seizing new opportunities. He remained a
Londoner, but he became a Yorkshireman; and he quickly found a new
loyalty to the University to which he had come as a stranger. And in
his library work in particular he was outstandingly successful in answer-
ing the new demands of Leeds and in making the most of its new
opportunities.
F
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