NCSU Libraries Focus Online

Volume 22 number 1 - Fall 2001

On May 7, 2001, more than 100 colleagues and friends from across campus and from neighboring university libraries gathered to honor Jinnie Yeh Davis, who retired at the end of May after twenty-one remarkable years of service to the NCSU Libraries. With support from many of Davis's colleagues, family members, and friends, the library has established the Jinnie Y. Davis Endowment for Publications and Public Relations at the NCSU Libraries to honor her contributions to the library.

During the elegant high tea, senior library administrators described Davis's contributions to the Libraries and to them personally. In addition to her unrivaled institutional memory, her colleagues noted that Davis could always be counted on to provide impeccable editorial guidance.

Several distinguished faculty members who worked closely with Davis on the University Library Committee over the years, including Duncan Holthausen (College of Management) and Ross Whetten (College of Natural Resources), remembered some of her extraordinary attributes and accomplishments. Former NC State library director I. T. Littleton, who hired Davis in 1980 as assistant head of the Serials Department, described how Davis came to NC State following an ardent endorsement from the library director at Auburn University. Everyone in attendance also enjoyed a humorous slide presentation highlighting Davis's career at NC State.

Davis began her professional career at the Smithsonian Institution as an assistant librarian at the Freer Gallery of Art. Following several years in cataloging at Ohio State University and two more in acquisitions at Auburn University, Davis earned a doctorate in library science at Indiana University.

Davis, as assistant director for Planning and Research at the NCSU Libraries, helped the library to reach many goals through her talented and discreet touch. The Libraries became the first academic library in the nation to have a copyright attorney on staff as part of its Scholarly Communication Center (SCC). Under Davis's direction, the SCC has initiated and guided discourse on the rapidly changing environment of scholarly communication, and it has become the model for similar programs in research libraries across the country.

Davis also orchestrated several public relations campaigns that brought recognition to the Libraries: the CASE Award of Excellence in 1998 for the library's publication Inaugurating an Architectural Archive: the George Matsumoto Exhibition; the John Cotton Dana Library Public Relations Award in 1990 for innovatively integrating all fund-raising and publicity activities during the year-long celebration of the library's centennial; and, most notably, last year's prestigious Excellence in Academic Libraries Award presented by the Association of College and Research Libraries.

Although Davis intends to travel and devote time to writing in retirement, the library is fortunate that she has agreed to help prepare the Libraries' annual report for publication in 2002. She is also a life member of the Friends of the Library and an active volunteer in many campus activities.