Harvard's home for rare books and manuscripts opened in 1942, and thanks to the energy of a small group of librarians and the creativity and generosity of its benefactor, Arthur Houghton, it quickly emerged as a center of inquiry and memory without equal. This 1992 volume, compiled by senior Houghton librarians, blends documentary with oral history to look back on the library's origins, the growth of its collections, and the activities of the staff who made it a home for precious books and original scholarship.

Hugh Amory was Senior Cataloguer at the Houghton Library of the Harvard College Library.

Elizabeth A. Falsey is Reader Services Librarian at Houghton Library of the Harvard College Library.

Nancy Finlay is former Assistant Curator of Printing and Graphic Arts at Houghton Library of the Harvard College Library.

Read More by Hugh Amory:

• New Books by Fielding: An Exhibition of the Hyde Collection
• First Impressions: Printing in Cambridge, 1639. An Exhibition at the Houghton Library and the Harvard Law School Library October 6 through October 27, 1989
• Henry Fielding: An Institute of Pleas of the Crown. An Exhibition of the Hyde Collection at the Houghton Library, 1987

Read More by Elizabeth A. Falsey:

• The Marks in the Fields: Essays on the Uses of Manuscripts
• The Art of Adding and the Art of Taking Away: Selections from John Updike's Manuscripts

Read More by Nancy Finlay: