The library and reading room of the Drexel Institute of Art, Science, and Industry opened in 1892 under the direction of librarian Alice B. Kroeger. Within its first year of operation, it had built a collection of nearly eight thousand volumes, chiefly through gifts and donations from Anthony J. Drexel and his business partner, George W. Childs. The Drexel Institute library was also responsible for running the library school, which by 1900 was enrolling twenty students per year. This collection consists of the minutes of the Trustees' Committee on the Library from 1892 to 1917; accession and inventory books listing items received and withdrawn from the collection, 1891-1947; library circulation statistics, 1891-1923, and card catalogs. It also includes a brief series of correspondence by library director Anne Wallace Howland, 1923-1930.
Drexel's Graduate School of Library Science (later the College of Information Science and Technology) was founded as the Library and Reading Room during the Drexel Institute's first year of operation in 1892. It was closed by President Hollis Godfrey in 1914 and reopened as the School of Library Science in 1922. This collection consists of two alphabetical sets of index cards containing information about graduates of the library school from the 1890s to the early 1970s. Each card contains an alumnus's address, initial job placement, and subsequent jobs held. The cards are arranged in two alphabetical sets: one from 1895 to 1914, and the other from 1924 to 1973.
This collection is largely composed of information relating to the LibQUAL+ program. Material relating to this topic includes conference booklets, survey results, brown bag presentation notes, and program comments. There is also some content specific to the Drexel University libraries, including student satisfaction surveys, closing hour exit studies for the years 1985-1988, and the 2006 and 2008 library budgets. A mini-cd, a few flyers, brochures, and informational booklets are included; most of these materials deal with the IRT department. Some Drexel-related ephemera are also included with the collection.
The archives houses a collection on the history of the book, which includes rare books dating from as early as the fifteenth century. All of these titles are accessible through the library catalog
