A Fugitive Truth: An Emma Fielding Mystery - By Dana Cameron Page 0,20
collection, and he laughed politely at my expression. Fortunately, he received a call, and by the time his assistant came in with a couple of cardboard cartons with our food, I was able to compose myself. Whitlow looked at the labels on the sandwiches and said, “If you don’t mind, I’ll take the roast beef. My wife would kill me if she knew—cholesterol through the roof, you know—but as long as she doesn’t see…” He shrugged again, then promptly tore into his forbidden sandwich with gusto.
I bit into my sandwich and was surprised by how good it was. Then I sighed and realized I hadn’t been for anything like a proper run since I’d been here and would have to make up for that shortly. If the amount of homemade mayonnaise was any indication, the director wouldn’t have been off the hook with his wife if he had chosen the chicken salad either.
After a couple of bites, the director resumed our discussion. “I was hired, just a couple of years ago, now, to get the foundation known, to improve the bottom line, to expand the possibilities of the place. I haven’t got time, and frankly, I haven’t got the interest, to get too involved in the collections.
“As you know, the foundation started out as a Shrewsbury family hobby, collecting Americana to share. The family would compete with each other, spending the timbering fortune their grandfather had made in Monroe, to see who could bring home the most important, the most antique, or the most curious documents of American history. It developed into some pretty serious collecting and connoisseurship; the sons hired a librarian to keep track of the family passion after a while, but he was a bit of an antique himself, and it took years before things were catalogued properly. When the old man died at the beginning of this century, the family began to invite upper-echelon scholars—you know, the more respectable sort from among their social set—to look at the stuff, and word began to spread. Other researchers began to ask to use parts of the collection, and the foundation was established to make the most of the collection. It was a coup for the Shrewsbury family, who wanted to come off like the big-time philanthropists. In its early days, the foundation had been sort of cozy, unofficial, and unstructured, and that’s fine, but these days, there are certain realities that need to be addressed that can be handled without compromising that intimate atmosphere too much, we hope. It’s a new world out there, and even such venerable institutions as the foundation can’t afford to get too hidebound about traditional approaches that just don’t work today.”
Whitlow finished half his sandwich and picked up his cup of fruit salad, frowning slightly. He was obviously wishing he’d ordered the chips instead. I munched on my sandwich, thinking about what I’d heard from others of their time working at Shrewsbury. The principal charm of the place was that in addition to the really important early editions of Americana, the Shrewsburys had also gathered the odd, the comic, or the rare. The materials that had appealed to the whimsy of the collectors proved to be so valuable later on because the collection was more eclectic, perhaps in some ways, a more complete record of early America, than a more educated or disciplined approach to acquisition might have provided.
“It would be a shame to sacrifice that atmosphere of…intellectual adventure for a few thousand bucks—” I began.
Whitlow protested, in an “I’m an eminently reasonable guy” way: “But nothing’s going to be denigrated by trying to upgrade the library, make it into a world-class institution. We need to expand in different directions.” He shrugged. “I know it’s not a popular perspective, but I have high hopes that my approach will work. The Shrewsbury family left a very generous endowment, which showed tremendous foresight, but even though it was well invested, it doesn’t measure up to what our goals are today—”
I silently wondered what would make an already superb collection “world class.” It sounded like a vague bit of business-speak, to me. “How are you going to raise the money?” I asked.
Whitlow didn’t even blink. “There will of course be an appeal to our more forward-minded donors, but there will also be a reorganization of the staff and some selective, prioritized deaccessioning.”
My jaw dropped. “You mean you’re going to sell some of the holdings?”
Whitlow put up his hand to forestall my reaction. “Cut away some of