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1960s
The copying scheme: Reynolds and Joseph C. Wolf, curator at Chicago's Newberry Library, devised the scheme that filled the department's shelves without buying a single rare book outright: genealogy collections held by other libraries were trucked to Fort Wayne in station wagons and photocopied twice onto acid-free paper, one copy staying in Fort Wayne. The centennial history puts the take at 15,000 to 30,000 books; Tom Castaldi of the History Center, writing in Fort Wayne Monthly in March 2011, says as many as 37,000 volumes. Both figures are carried here; the sources do not reconcile them. Partner libraries included the DAR's national library, the Iowa State Library, the National Genealogical Society, and the public libraries of Flint, Michigan, and Wichita, Kansas. In November 1966 the library board declined the LDS Church's request to make the department a branch of its Family History Library system.
Census and Polk: By 1965 the department had gathered in all the county histories it could find and had purchased all available United States federal census microfilm. That same year brought the R.L. Polk depository agreement: Polk shipped the library 1,000 to 1,500 city directories a year for the cost of shipping. The arrangement still runs; it made Fort Wayne's the second-largest collection of Polk directories anywhere, behind only the Library of Congress. Curt Witcher's handouts count more than 66,000 Polk directories received from about 1964 and describe the library as among the last remaining Polk repository libraries.
Sources:
- Slater-Putt, Beyond Books (1995), ch. 3 — the copying scheme and its range of figures, the 1966 decision, the 1965 census and Polk milestones.
- Tom Castaldi, History Center blog (from Fort Wayne Monthly, March 2011) — the 37,000-volume figure.
- Curt B. Witcher, Genealogy Center handouts (FamilySearch/Kentucky Genealogical Society) — the Polk directory count and repository standing.