notes.husk.org/likes images.

thelifeguardlibrarian:

With all the excitement, here’s just a note on the history of librarianship and the gay rights movement:

While I did know a bit about librarian activist Barbara Gittings (pictured above and featured here in My Daguerreotype Librarian) and I knew about the American Library Association’s GLBT Round Table, I did not realize the GLBTRT was founded as the very first lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender professional organization:

From Wikipedia:

In 1970, the ALA founded the first lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender professional organization, called the “Task Force on Gay Liberation”, now known as the GLBT Round Table. In the early 1970s, the Task Force on Gay Liberation campaigned to have books about the gay liberation movement at the Library of Congress reclassified from HQ 71–471 (“Abnormal Sexual Relations, Including Sexual Crimes”). In 1972, after receiving a letter requesting the reclassification, the Library of Congress agreed to make the shift, reclassifying those books into a newly created category, HQ 76.5 (“Homosexuality, Lesbianism—Gay Liberation Movement, Homophile Movement”).”

Today, from ALA:

The Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender (GLBT) Round Table of the American Library Association is committed to serving the information needs of the GLBT professional library community, and the GLBT information and access needs of individuals at large.  We are committed to encouraging and supporting the free and necessary access to all information, as reflected by the missions of the American Library Association.

I’m feeling pretty decent about being a librarian today. And a member of ALA, at that. Let’s keep being allies. Let’s keep trying. Let’s try harder. OK?

(And h/t to John Chrastka over at EveryLibrary for enlightening me to all this good stuff.)