News Archives

  • RBS Mourns the Passing of Jay T. Last

    It is with great sadness that we acknowledge the passing of Jay T. Last, friend and benefactor of Rare Book School. He died in Los Angeles on 11 November 2021; he was 92.

    As a physicist and entrepreneur, Jay Last is renowned as one of the founders of the Fairchild Semiconductor Corporation, the origin of Silicon Valley. As an art collector, publisher, scholar, author, and philanthropist, Jay’s legacy of support for the arts, art history, and education will endure for many years to come. A collector of West and Central African Art, Jay, along with his wife Deborah, […]

    Posted by RBS
  • Head, Department of Distinctive Collections — MIT Libraries

    Our colleagues at MIT Libraries are hiring for the position of Head of Department of Distinctive Collections (DDC). Reporting to the Associate Director for Collections, Erin Stalberg, the DDC Head will be an integral part of the Collections Directorate. Leading and developing a team of sixteen staff, the DDC Head will work across the Libraries to share MIT’s distinctive collections with the world. Success in the role will be characterized by the building of a strong, collaborative team; by the use of collections and technology to implement strategies of equity, diversity, and openness; and by realizing DDC’s potential to be a partner and a platform that catalyzes discoveries in, […]

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  • RBS Mourns the Passing of William P. Barlow, Jr.

    It is with great sadness that we acknowledge the passing of William P. Barlow, Jr., former Rare Book School faculty member and Treasurer of the School’s Board of Directors.

    Barlow died in San Francisco on 21 October 2021 after a heart attack; he was 87.

    Barlow began collecting books seriously as an undergraduate at the California Institute of Technology, continuing to collect when he transferred to the University of California at Berkeley, and thereafter for the rest of his life. He had the greatest collection of the works of the English printer John Baskerville in private hands, a superb collection of antiquarian bibliography, and many other collecting interests, including the Daniel Press and various private presses, restaurant ephemera, postal history, books on food and wine, and water skiing.

    Posted by RBS