The Alvin M. and Betty Josephy Library of Western History and Culture is a private, non-circulating SAGE-affiliated library located in

Joseph, Oregon Joseph is a city in Wallowa County, Oregon, United States. Originally named Silver Lake and Lake City, the city formally named itself in 1880 for Chief Joseph (1840–1904) of the Nez Perce people. The population was 1,081 at the 2010 census. ...

, United States. It is located on the second floor of the Josephy Center for Arts and Culture. It is based on the collection and writings of historian and Native American advocate Alvin M. Josephy, Jr. and his wife Betty. In the library's own words, it "honors Alvin's work as a historian of and advocate for American Indians, and Alvin and Betty's commitment to literature, history, the arts, the West, and to the people of all colors and backgrounds who have lived in and loved the West."

History

On Alvin Josephy's death in 2005 his personal collection at

Greenwich, Connecticut Greenwich (, ) is a New England town, town in southwestern Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. At the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the town had a total population of 63,518. The largest town on Connecticut's Gold Coast (Conne ...

, and Joseph, Oregon, was divided between the

Knight Library Knight Library is the main facility of the University of Oregon's (UO) library system. It is located on the university's campus in Eugene, Oregon, United States. The library design is emblematic of the architecture of the university's older buildin ...

at the

University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc, and its co-founder, billion ...

, the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian, and

Fishtrap A fish trap is a trapping, trap used for fishing. Fish traps include fishing weir, fishing weirs, lobster trap, lobster traps, and some fishing nets such as fyke nets. Traps are culturally almost universal and seem to have been independently inv ...

: Rich Wandschneider, then director of Fishtrap, went to Connecticut to retrieve materials. When the Josephy Center was founded in the fall of 2012 the collection moved from the Fishtrap basement to its current home on the second floor of the center. The library continues to expand, with a focus on acquiring the comprehensive works of Alvin Josephy, along with an array of supplemental materials on the Nez Perce and other Native Americans of the Columbia Plateau, that will help work "towards a broad understanding of the

West West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sunset, Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic languages, German ...

Collection

The Josephy Library is based on over 2000 books, journals, and manuscripts from Josephy's home libraries. The main collection is not circulating, though it is open to the public. The library also recently started a lending shelf to loan materials that it has in duplicate. The library is cataloged through the Sage Library System of Eastern Oregon libraries administered by

Eastern Oregon University Eastern Oregon University (EOU) (officially designated as Oregon’s Rural University) is a public university in La Grande, Oregon. It was formerly part of the Oregon University System, since dissolved. EOU was founded in 1929 as a teacher’ ...

in La Grande.

Events

The library hosts bi-weekly "Brown Bag" lunch talks on a variety of topics, from the

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

in the West to

flint knapping Knapping is the shaping of flint, chert, obsidian, or other conchoidal fracturing stone through the process of lithic reduction to manufacture stone tools, strikers for flintlock firearms, or to produce flat-faced stones for building or facing ...

and Native American tools. These events are free and open to the public and held every first and fourth Tuesday of the month. Furthermore, Library Director Rich Wandschneider runs a library

blog A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order ...

, which includes book reviews, notes on library acquisitions, and Wandschneider's own observations and musings."New on the blogroll"
Ed Battistella, Literary Ashland, August 27, 2013

References

{{Authority control Joseph, Oregon Libraries in Oregon