Dr. Dorothy Gwendolyn Williams Collings had a successful career in many areas of librarianship as librarian, administrator, professor and library consultant. Collings, nee Williams was born September 22, 1911, the second daughter to Jamaican parents Arthur and Maud Williams in New Haven, Connecticut. She received a B.A. from Hunter College, 1932; B.S.L.S. from Simmons College, 1933; M.A. from Columbia University, 1940; and Ph. D. from the Graduate Library School, University of Chicago, 1947, where she wrote her dissertation on The Treatment of the Second Roosevelt Administration in Three Popular Magazines.
Collings' early career included positions at academic and public libraries like Fisk University, Atlanta University, Samuel Huston College and the New York Public Library/Schomburg Collection between 1935-1948.
Collings held posts with UNESCO and the UN between 1948 and 1970. With UNESCO she was Chief, Documentation Centre, Educational Clearinghouse, for which she traveled extensively. Starting in 1955 Dr. Collings was Chief, Educational Liaison Section, Office of Public Information (OPI) at the United Nations for 15 years.
William Vernon Jackson's online biography describes her as "a pioneer in the field of Comparative Librarianship" stating she was the first to offer a course on the subject at the invitation of Columbia University (Jackson, 2001). Between 1956 and 1970 she gave regular seminars in that growing field.
In 1970 she took up the post as the first Head of the newly formed Department of Library Studies at the University of the West Indies, Mona Campus in Jamaica, which opened in October 1971. She remained until the first class graduated in 1974. In 1977 Dr. Collings was invited back to Jamaica to be the coordinator for the preparation of a national plan for library, archival, and information services, which resulted in the Plan for a National Documentation, Information and Library System for Jamaica.
Her numerous writings included reports, plans, reviews, conference papers, etc., related to her positions and include:
- The Role of Library Services in Fundamental Education Field Programs (1957)
- Planning Nation-wide Public Library Services in Africa (1962)
- Library education in the English-speaking Caribbean (1973)
- Library Education in the Commonwealth Caribbean (1975)
Dr. Collings passed away in Somers, N.Y. on March 6, 1991.
In memory of her work with the Department of Library Studies, now the Department of Library and Information Science (DLIS), two student awards are given in her name annually.
More:
Jackson, William Vernon. 2001. View of The Pioneers: Dorothy G. Collings (1911-1991) | World Libraries
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Simone Clunie
Cataloging Metadata Librarian
Virginia State University
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