Wednesday, April 25, 2018
One of University of À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ Library’s only five University Librarians has passed. William (Bill) J. Watson held the post from 1969 to 1972, following À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ’s first University Librarian (UL), Doris Lewis.
Watson worked at McGill and University of British Columbia before coming to À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ. Chairman of a national committee on automation in libraries in 1969, Bill accurately predicted a time when library operations would be driven by computers, and not the card catalogues of the time.
From the Kitchener-À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ Record, July 22, 1969.
Known for having the shortest tenure of any À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ UL, Watson resigned in part out of frustration over cuts to the Library’s budget in 1971…the other part was a desire to return to the west coast climate.
, at the age of ninety and a day.
