Peking University, Oct. 23, 2012: In 1902, it was built to store books in the Imperial University of Peking, the precursor to Peking University (PKU). Today, after renovation and expansion, it stands as one of the landmarks on PKU campus. Old, but new, the school’s library turns 110 years old this year, the ceremony of which falls on November 4, less than two weeks away.

The school's library in its earliest form

The grand looks of today's PKU Library 

A two-day international conference will be held after the ceremony, on the theme “Change and Challenge: Redefine the Future of Academic Libraries”, to share ideas and experiences and discuss how to react to the challenges posed on academic libraries brought by new environment, new technology and new demands. Mary Lee Kennedy, Senior Associate Provost for the Harvard Library is invited to give a keynote speech. The venue of the conference is in Zhongguanyuan Global Village PKU, and more information can be found on the conference website.

Preparation for the 110th anniversary started as early as the end of last year. A most important work is the development of the anniversary website, which was launched in February and co-operated by staffs from several departments. It took months of hard work to collect contents and incorporate them into the website built by staff of the library using drupal, an open source software platform. The website was officially launched on June 8 and has been functioning ever since.

The website provides numerous resources, including an album of the library’s history, stories of readers and the library, words and photos of staff, anniversary up-dates, congratulatory letters, photos of precious collections, chronology of donation and many more. Readers are welcome to visit the website, get better acquainted with the library and offer suggestions.

In a letter posted on the anniversary website, Zhu Qiang, Chief Librarian of PKU Library, shares his experience and views after working 30 years with the library. He has witnessed the transfer of the library from hand operation and only paper books to a multi-functional, digital learning and researching center. He has also taken part in combining the recourses of libraries of different universities and creating a public service system for higher education called CALIS, short for China Academic Library and Information System. The changes are overwhelming. 30 years ago, even a typewriter was so precious that it must be registered, as he recalls.

But to him, these changes are inspiring too. “The only thing that never changes is change itself.” he writes. He encourages all librarians to be willing to adapt to new situations, to be more innovative, diligent, open-minded, ambitious, and to strive for the goal that PKU Library can be a world-class academic library one day.

It is on the right track.

Extended Reading

A brief history of PKU Library

Reported by: Chen Long
Source: PKU Library