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behalf of future generations, but up to now, we haven‘t really
thought seriously about how many such generations, or how to
think about the mission in terms of thousands of years. Digital
information technologies, with their notorious instability, force
us to reassess how we go about fulflling this mission hereafter.“
For Elisabeth Niggemann, wrestling with the traditional re-
quirements of collecting and providing services in the several
locations and the many iterations of German law regarding
the mission of the DNB as well as the hyperactive growth
and difusion of digital information resources and services on
a global basis provided no rest and plenty of challenges. The
new building housing the DNB in Frankfurt had been opened
and in operation for only a couple of years. The tuning of
that building and its services to readers coming to it in person
continued well into Niggemann’s frst years in her then new
role. Almost immediately as well came the responsibilities in-
volved in specifying and then overseeing the construction of
an addition to the Deutsche Bücherei in Leipzig, the comple-
tion of which was celebrated in 2011. Collections and archives
from partner institutions were added after negotiations and
numerous meetings that practically achieved an international
diplomatic favor. Coordination and assessment of efort by
staf in three locations, Frankfurt, Berlin, and Leipzig, compli-
cated by local traditions and perquisites had to be and were
efected with fairness and tact. Issues involving metadata and
its defnitions, specifcations, and distribution were confront-
ed and solved. The presence of the DNB on the Web evolved.
Working with a dedicated set of deputies and senior adminis-
trators as well as a well-experienced middle management team,
numerous of the challenges in operations in both physical and
digital domains were confronted and solved.
The DNB’s work in metadata in traditional formats as well
as in the new ones has been well accepted for its excellence.
Linked data output from the DNB’s catalog records is a mod-
el for others to emulate and a contribution to new modes of
discovery both inside the research library community and well
beyond it. It took some courage and prophetic capacity to
engage in this transformation as early as did the DNB.
Leaders of great libraries in this age of global telecommunica-
tions facing by governments’ insistence on cost efective oper-
ations, and their own desires to maximize value to citizens and
non-citizens everywhere developed understandings that the
members of the European Community in all sectors ought
to work together. Library leaders agreed to avoid redundancy
and achieve common goals locally for the beneft of readers,
scholars, students, and consumers of information across the
continent and beyond. In this arena, Elisabeth Niggemann
has served especially well. She has also been a leader in the cir-
cles and organizations of European libraries, serving as chair
and board director of the Conference of European National
Librarians, the Europeana Foundation, the International Fed-
eration of Library Associations, and OCLC. In each case, she
has been a voice of cool rationality, even while promoting
progress in numerous programs and solving various problems
arising. All of this is admirable, unusual not just in the extent
of her commitment, but also in the efciency in the realiza-
tion of that commitment. Nothing has sufered at the DNB
due to the Director General’s involvement in international
organizations; quite the contrary, much good for Germany
and the DNB has resulted.
The agenda of concerns inherent in the Long Now 10,000
year library conference and Elisabeth Niggemann’s agenda for
action since that meeting strongly overlap. Yet there is another
role that she has undertaken that has been most valuable to
me and to Stanford. For many years, Elisabeth Niggemann
has been an informal and formal advisor to me and the Stan-
ford University Libraries. She has joined with other leaders
of national libraries, such as Lynne Brindley, one-time CEO
of the British Library, and Bruno Racine, president of the
Bibliothèque nationale de France, and with other academic
and library leaders, such as Charles Henry, president of the
Council on Library and Information Resources, Ann Oker-
son, formerly associate university librarian at Yale and now ad-
visor to the Center for Research Libraries, Karin Wittenborg,
university librarian at the University of Virginia, Dongfang
Shao, chief of the Asia Division of the Library of Congress,
and Rick Luce, dean of libraries at the University of Oklaho-
ma. These leaders in the profession of librarianship are but a
sample of the larger circle of colleagues with whom Elisabeth
Niggemann has worked so well and so efectively in addressing
long-term strategic goals.
Furthermore, since 2008 she has helped Stanford to confront
and succeed in digital library collections and functions, dig-
itization projects, academic computing services, relationship
among large libraries on a global basis, the development of
new services, planning and building new facilities, threading
a productive path in scholarly publishing and other commu-
nications, and relationships with information aggregators and
on-line information providers. These themes are ones with
which Elisabeth Niggemann has dealt efectively with col-
leagues beyond libraries and information services, colleague
leaders in the book trades, in publishing, in national and
Leaders of great libraries
developed understandings
that they ought to work
together.
international libraries, archives and museums. Moreover, her
insights and advice given to Stanford with complete candor
has gone straight to the heart of the details and dilemmas
of a long list of difcult problems for us. Typically she does
this in the scant few days she can allocate from her own busy
schedule. Remote conversations and the occasional in-person
chat at international conferences supplement those days here
at Stanford in May every year.
Finally, one must pay tribute to Elisabeth Niggemann’s un-
common elegance in speech, in her writing, and her personal
appearance. The gala opening of the addition to the Deutsche
Bücherei in 2011 that she organized, hosted, and addressed re-
mains in one’s memory particularly because of her poise, her
carefully inclusive address, and the ease with which she por-
trayed the unifcation of the three main units of the DNB that
completely belied that tensions and respectful disagreements
that had to be overcome in realizing the potential of the great
organization she leads. That the opening was attended by a
few hundred of the great and good in cultural circles in Ger-
many and Europe is testament to her success as a leader and as
a representative of those of us engaged in cultural custodian-
ship. The event in Leipzig is but one of several that has made
me all the more appreciative of Elisabeth Niggemann’s special
gifts, ones that beneft her nation, Europe, the profession of
librarianship, and her colleagues.
MICHAEL A. KELLER is the university librarian, director of aca-
demic information resources, founder/publisher of HighWire Press,
and publisher of Stanford University Press at Stanford University. He
is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and the
American Association for the Advancement of Science.