Things we love about Illinois: Rare Book Room’s Valerie Hotchkiss
One of our favorite things about our favorite institution of higher education.
(Image courtesy of Valerie Hotchkiss) One of our favorite things about our favorite institution of higher education.
Rare Book Room’s Valerie Hotchkiss
For 20 years, Valerie Hotchkiss, Andrew S.G. Turyn Endowed Professor and UI’s director of the Rare Book and Manuscript Library, has transformed three campus libraries into places of unexpected delight. No mere bookworm, Hotchkiss has hosted birthday parties for William Shakespeare and celebrations of June 16’s Bloomsday, when Dubliners retrace a walk taken by the fictional Leopold Bloom of James Joyce’s Ulysses. When not presiding over seminars or discussions, Hotchkiss champions issues of access and public programming. In addition to implementing an online library system, she has raised more than $16 million for endowments.
Did we miss one? For more in this series, search “Things we love about Illinois.”
