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标题：Linda J. Walton Medical Library Association President, 2014–2015
本地全文：下载
作者：James Shedlock
期刊名称：Bulletin of the Medical Library Association
印刷版ISSN：0025-7338
出版年度：2014
卷号：102
期号：3
页码：149-152
DOI：10.3163/1536-5050.102.3.003
出版社：Medical Library Association
摘要：Linda J. Walton, the Medical Li-brary Association's (MLA's) 2014–2015 president, is a great person toknow. I have been privileged toknow her via MLA, through herwork in two Regional MedicalLibrary (RML) programs, and onthe job (she served as associatedirector at the Galter Health Scienc-es Library when I served as thelibrary director). She has energy,warmth, humor, and a smart senseabout people and is practical, al-most to a fault. She is a committedprofessional with genuine concernsabout issues facing librarianship ingeneral and the medical libraryprofession in particular. A tellingcharacteristic is that she speaksher mind, usually in a way that alistener can appreciate (once theyget over the shock of her startlingquestions or comments). This politebluntness often advances the pointof the conversation because morethan anything else, Linda is allabout getting things done. Moreon these characteristics later, butfirst it is worthwhile to understandwhere MLA's next president camefrom and what produced thesespecial characteristics.Linda is a true child of the Mid-west. A native of Crawfordsville,Indiana, Linda's roots are pureAmerican on both sides of thefamily. While she is not into gene-alogical research, she knows herfamilies' lineages go back genera-tions to colonial times. Like recentMLA presidents (Dixie A. Jones,AHIP, Ruth Holst, AHIP, FMLA,and Mark E. Funk, AHIP, FMLA),Linda hails from small-town Amer-ica. Crawfordsville is in west cen-tral Indiana, and even though it is asmall town (the city governmentbrags that it regularly appears inthe list of ''the top 100 best smalltowns in America'' [1]), it hasseveral claims to fame: it is thehome of Wabash College, a highlyranked, all male (still!) liberal artscollege; it is the home of LewWallace, author of Ben-Hur: A Taleof the Christ; and more importantlyto basketball fans, Crawfordsvillelays claim to hosting Indiana's firstofficial basketball game in 1894 andthe state's first intercollegiate bas-ketball game (Wabash versus Pur-due), also in 1894 [2]. (For thosewho don't know, basketball isIndiana's state ''religion.'') In otherwords, Crawfordsville is not a badplace to live. Still, Linda wasn'tbuying it: she wanted to get out oftown so she could see the world.Education was her exit route