reminiscences

I thought I'd use this weblog to reflect on the changes in librarianship as I have lived through them. Interesting to me, if not anyone else. I won't mind if you think its boring.
I was born in New Zealand in 1946. This will explain the unfolding story.
I am told that my homeland was an undeveloped colony at this time - still attached to Mother England by trade and habit, with a comfortable colonial lifestyle which meant doing things for yourself, and not having imported goods. The Prime Minister's telephone number was in the Wellington phone book and anyone could ring him up - he usually answered the phone himself.

Mr Carnegie had laid his beneficent wand over New Zealand, so we had many public libraries, well supported by the communities as well as by the National Library Service, which sent loan collections of books to small towns, in order to vary the collections. The School Library Service did the same for schools.
My earliest memories of libraries was the weekly family visit to our branch library in the suburbs of Auckland. Television had not yet arrived in NZ, so reading was a great way to expand horizons, to get lost in a fantasy world outside the rather limited range of our country. Radio was also a great favourite in our family - many well known British series being available, probably years after they were made. My Word was a particular favourite.

At Auckland Girls' Grammar School I became a helper to the librarian, in order to avoid playing sport. She later arraanged for me to have an evening job in a branch library doing shelving and simple circulation tasks. Aged about 17 I also worked there in the school holidays, embarking on children's library services, and story hour.
Came the time to leave school - even at this selective entry school there were only two careers available: nursing or teaching, with the duffers being edged off into secretarial school. I didnt fancy any of those and University was never mentioned (to me, at least), so I carried on in library work, at the same branch in which I had begun as a shelver.
Wait for the next enthralling episode.....