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Richard Logsdon, Former Director of Columbia Libraries

Richard H. Logsdon, former director of the Columbia University Libraries and former Dean of University Libraries of the City University of New York, died Saturday, February 22, in Great Barrington, Mass., at the age of 84.

He died in the Great Barrington Rehabilitation and Nursing Center after a brief illness, said his daughter, Mary Jo Nichols. He was a resident of Morningside Heights in Manhattan and South Egremont, Mass.

Dr. Logsdon served and led the Columbia Libraries, one of the country's largest research library systems, for 22 years. He began as assistant director in 1947, was named associate director the following year and became director in 1953, holding that post until 1969. During his 16 years as director, the Libraries' holdings grew by two-thirds, increasing from 2,700,000 volumes to 4,500,000, and new law, business and engineering libraries were built.

He was Dean of University Libraries at City University from 1969 to 1971 and was professor of library science at Queens College from 1971 until his retirement in 1974.

Before he joined Columbia, Dr. Logsdon was Chief Librarian of the U.S. Office of Education and assistant director of the Veterans Administration Library Service. Earlier he had been professor of library science and head of the Department of Library Science at the University of Kentucky. Between 1934 and 1943 he was librarian and instructor in library science at Adams State Teachers College in Alamosa, Colo., and librarian and associate professor of library science at Madison College in Harrisonburg, Va.

Born in Upper Sandusky, Ohio, Richard Henry Logsdon earned bachelor's degrees in economics and library science in 1933 and 1934, respectively, from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, where his long and varied career in library teaching and administration began as a student library assistant. He was awarded the Ph.D. by the Graduate Library School of the University of Chicago in 1942.

Dr. Logsdon was chairman of the Association of Research Libraries in 1964 and president of the New York Library Association in 1965-66.

Active in promoting professional training for librarians nationally, he was chairman of the Board of Education for Librarianship of the American Library Association in 1950-51 and chairman of the American Library Association's Commission on a National Plan for Library Education in 1963-64. In 1959 he was invited by the U.S. State Department to advise university and government officials of Afghanistan on that country's library architecture, administration and archives.

With his wife, Irene K. Logsdon, he wrote Library Careers, published by Henry Z. Walck Publications in 1963. Mrs. Logsdon died in 1986.

Besides his daughter Mrs. Nichols, of Great Barrington, Dr. Logsdon is survived by a son, John, of Demarest, N.J.; daughters Elizabeth Irene Promen of Alexandria, Va., and Rachel Anne Ingalls of Stamford, Conn.; brothers Maurice of Upper Sandusky and Robert of Louisville, Ky., sister Helen Vogel of Upper Sandusky, 15 grandchildren and 8 great grandchildren.

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