Madeline Faith Kripke (September 9, 1943 – April 25, 2020) was an American book collector who held one of the world's largest collections of

dictionaries A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies, p ...

Early life and education

Madeline Kripke was born on September 9, 1943, in

New London, Connecticut New London is a seaport city and a port of entry on the northeast coast of the United States, located at the mouth of the Thames River in New London County, Connecticut. It was one of the world's three busiest whaling ports for several decades ...

, to mother Dorothy Karp Kripke and father

Myer S. Kripke Myer Samuel Kripke (January 21, 1914 – April 11, 2014) was an American rabbi, scholar, and philanthropist. He was based in Omaha, Nebraska. Early life Kripke was born on January 21, 1914 in Toledo, Ohio, to parents Jacob "J. Michael" Kripke ...

, a

rabbi A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as ''semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of ...

. Kripke's brother was philosopher

Saul Kripke Saul Aaron Kripke (; November 13, 1940 – September 15, 2022) was an American philosopher and logician in the analytic tradition. He was a Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and emerit ...

, and her sister was Netta Kripke Stern, a social worker. She graduated with a bachelor's in English from

Barnard College Barnard College of Columbia University is a private women's liberal arts college in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1889 by a group of women led by young student activist Annie Nathan Meyer, who petitioned Columbia ...

Dictionary collection and career

In fifth grade, she recalled receiving a ''Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary'' from her parents, which she said "unlocked the world for me". Kripke acquired a collection of approximately 20,000 dictionaries in her two-bedroom apartment. The oldest dictionary in her collection was a Latin dictionary published in 1502 by

Ambrogio Calepino Ambrogio Calepino (Latin: ''Ambrosius Calepinus''; c. 1440–1510), commonly known by the Latin form of his name, Calepinus, was an Italian lexicographer. Calepino was born in Castelli Calepio Gigliola Soldi Rondinini, Tullio De MauroCALEPIO, A ...

. She placed a special emphasis on collecting dictionaries regarding obscure slang. Her collection includes the only known copy of ''Larks of London'' (1840), a dictionary of slang from the London underworld.

Simon Winchester Simon Winchester (born 28 September 1944) is a British-American author and journalist. In his career at ''The Guardian'' newspaper, Winchester covered numerous significant events, including Bloody Sunday and the Watergate Scandal. Winchester has ...

said that her collection of slang dictionaries represented "the very living and breathing edge of the English language".

Jesse Sheidlower Jesse Sheidlower (born August 5, 1968) is a lexicographer, editor, author, and programmer. He is past president of the American Dialect Society, was the project editor of the Random House ''Dictionary of American Slang'', and is the author of '' ...

described her collection as better than that of the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

. After graduating from college, Kripke held several jobs, including as a welfare case worker and a teacher. She eventually became an editor and a publisher, doing copyediting and proofreading. She also worked at several bookstores, eventually becoming a book dealer.

Death

Kripke died from complications of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

during the

COVID-19 pandemic in New York City The first case of the COVID-19 pandemic in New York City was confirmed on March 1, 2020, though later research showed that the novel coronavirus had been circulating in New York City since January, with cases of community transmission confirme ...

on April 25, 2020.

Awards and honors

Kripke was a founding member of the

Dictionary Society of North America The Dictionary Society of North America (DSNA) was founded in 1975 to encourage scholarly and professional activities that have to do with dictionaries and lexicography. Since 1994, DSNA has been a member of the American Council of Learned Societie ...

and attended every meeting for nearly forty years. In 2015 she was one of six Fellows elected to the Society, its highest honor, along with Anatoly Liberman and John Simpson. She received their

Richard W. Bailey Richard Weld Bailey (October 26, 1939 – April 2, 2011) was an American linguist, scholar of the English language, and the Fred Newton Scott Collegiate Professor of English at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Bailey was born in Pontia ...

Award for Distinguished Service to Lexicography and Lexicology in 2017.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kripke, Madeline Barnard College alumni People from New London, Connecticut 2020 deaths 1943 births American Jews Book and manuscript collectors Dictionaries Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in New York (state)

Madeline ''Madeline'' is a media franchise that originated as a series of children's books written and illustrated by Ludwig Bemelmans, an Austrian-American author. The books have been adapted into numerous formats, spawning telefilms, television series a ...