"Talking to Tara was a joy, and as her best friend since we were three years old, it was one of my greatest joys to have a lifetime of conversations with her. Tara and I loved going to the library together as children and into adolescence...These trips to the library were great fun, and it was no surprise to me when Tara started working at that library. I distinctly remember her telling me she was going to library school and implored me to go as well."
Tara Lee Dirst was born on August 17, 1973, in Aurora, Illinois, to James and Sandra Dirst. She was a loving spouse to her partner, Kevin, and a new mother to their child. On March 2, 2007, while returning to her library from a lunch break during which she nursed her baby, she sustained injuries in an automobile accident that ultimately led to her death on April 8, 2007, in DeKalb, Illinois. She was only 33. Tara was an extraordinary individual with considerable musical abilities. She could pick up an instrument and become an accomplished player after only a few months of practice. She played the piano, guitar, bass guitar, tenor and alto saxophones, mandolin, accordion, banjo, and more.
Tara graduated from Waubonsee Community College with an associate degree. She then earned a B.S. in Political Science and a B.A. in History before completing an M.A. in History at Northern Illinois University while working at the library at Northern Illinois University. She completed her M.S. in Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, in 2000. She worked as the Technology Coordinator of Digital Projects at Northern Illinois University Libraries, where she supervised the creation of historical digitization projects, including the American Archives, Illinois Historical Digitization Projects, and Mark Twain's Mississippi River, and is best known for her work with Lincoln/Net, the Abraham Lincoln Historical Digitization Project. A legacy of that project is the recordings of Civil War music that she produced by pulling together musicians, playing the banjo, and recording the songs.
Tara's absence is felt by many, and her enthusiasm for librarianship led others to become librarians. She had the ability to make any day better for those around her. She loved talking about politics and the state of the world. She had a subscription to the Chicago Tribune, which she read daily from cover to cover. She read quickly and often finished a book each day, along with various political magazines. She was intelligent and informed, which made her political diatribes all the more enthralling. She seemed to know the history and political ramifications of everything and had nuanced arguments for innumerable aspects of American life.
Talking to Tara was a joy, and as her best friend since we were three years old, it was one of my greatest joys to have a lifetime of conversations with her. Tara and I loved going to the library together as children and into adolescence. Later, we graduated from high school a year earlier than our class and went to community college together. During that time, we started going to the library at Northern Illinois University. We bought copy cards, hunted for journal articles, and copied them. These trips to the library were great fun, and it was no surprise to me when Tara started working at that library. I distinctly remember her telling me she was going to library school and implored me to go as well. I had taken a different path and was studying biology, but she exclaimed that the world needed science librarians and that I would be a great science librarian. Until that point, I had not considered attending library school, but that conversation changed my life and career path forever. We both attended library school at UIUC and began our careers around the same time. I never expected to live the greater part of my adult life without her. She had always been there as a best friend, confidant, and career coach.
Tara Lee Dirst had so much to offer the world. She made it a better place in so many ways with her consistent emphasis on social justice, which she brought to her work as a librarian and her service commitments within the American Library Association. She was especially passionate about creating an inclusive campus and was extremely active in the Presidential Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity. She would often say, "Today is the best day ever," and she said it almost daily. She lived life to the fullest; every day, she made a difference in everything she did. I miss her. The profession has lost a great librarian and advocate. To steal a line from Carly Simon, she was "one who is touched by the sun."
By Catherine Wong
Assistant Professor
Engineering & Physical Sciences Librarian
University of New Hampshire
------------------------------------------------
In honor of the Sesquicentennial (150th Anniversary of ALA) in 2026, the Library History Round Table is hosting Librarians We Have Lost, Sesquicentennial Memories -1976-2026. This collage of tributes seeks to honor librarians who died between 1976-2026. The tributes are published to ALA Connect, a digital memorial on LHRT News & Notes, and ALAIR (ALA's institutional repository).
We invite tributes from anyone about any library worker who passed away between 1976-2026. To submit a tribute, please use the form at https://lhrt.news/librarians-we-have-lost-sesquicentennial-memories-1976-2026-2/
For questions or comments, please reach out to Dr. Kathleen McCook (kmccook@usf.edu) or Brett Spencer (dbs21@psu.edu).
------------------------------
Brett Spencer
Reference Librarian
Thun Library, Penn State Berks
He/Him/His
------------------------------