NCSU Libraries Focus Online
Volume 23 number 2 - Winter 2003
Library History Highlight: A Tribute to Helen Abel Brown
By I. T. Littleton, Director Emeritus, NCSU Libraries
Helen Abel Brown, a life member of the NCSU Friends of the Library and former
head librarian of St. Mary's college in Raleigh, celebrated her one-hundredth
birthday on July 6, 2002, at a gala with friends and family. Brown, who was
born in 1902 in Naugatuck, Connecticut, enjoyed a wonderful marriage for forty-seven
years to Harlan C. Brown, associate director and then director of the D. H.
Hill Library from 1939 to 1971. Harlan Brown provided the leadership needed
to develop the library from a small college library into a major university
library. Mrs. Brown, who has been a supporter of the NCSU Libraries for sixty-five
years, established the Harlan and Helen Brown Incubator Endowment at the Libraries
in 1982 after her husband's death.
Helen Brown had a distinguished career as an educator and librarian. She graduated cum
laude with high honors in Spanish from Middlebury College, Vermont,
where she also earned a master's degree in Spanish. She began her career
by teaching Spanish at the Freeport Long Island High School, and she also
taught two years in Mexico before earning her degree in library science at
the University of Michigan in 1935. She worked as head librarian at Russell
Sage College in Troy, New York, before coming to Raleigh to serve as head
librarian of St. Mary's College from 1937 until her retirement in 1971. She
was a member of the North Carolina Library Association and of the American
Library Association (ALA), having served as secretary of the Junior College
Section of ALA.
Helen Brown's remarkable intellectual curiosity sparked a broad range of hobbies
and interests. She traveled extensively, visiting among other places Mexico,
Canada, most European countries, Russia, and China. Her interest in people
from other cultures led her to teach classes in English as a second language
for ten years. She befriended many students and faculty from other countries,
finding them places to live and work. For many years, she participated in the
Triangle Radio Reading Service, reading poetry for the visually impaired. She
and her husband were well-known animal lovers, who avidly supported the SPCA,
the North Carolina Zoological Park, and the College of Veterinary Medicine
at NC State University.
In addition to generous contributions to the NCSU Libraries, Brown established
several other memorials in her husband's name, reflecting the couple's broad
range of interests. These included a scholarship in the College of Veterinary
Medicine; a bench in the aviary at the North Carolina Zoological Park; and
a bas-relief mural by Alice Pohl Proctor for the Community United Church of
Christ in Raleigh.
Brown is a life member not only of the NCSU Friends of Library but also of
the Friends of the St. Mary's College Library, the North Carolina Zoological
Society, and the NCSU College of Veterinary Medicine. She has been a member
of the North Carolina Museum of Art, the NCSU Woman's Club, the Dickens Fellowship,
and Alpha Xi Delta Sorority.
Helen Brown's many friends and colleagues give thanks for her distinguished
career and for her many contributions to the NCSU Libraries. We congratulate
her for living one hundred interesting and productive years!
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