Linderman Library Exhibit Celebrates STEPS Opening

A new exhibit, planned to celebrate the opening of the STEPS building, premiered in Linderman Library on August 26. “Environmental Steps: Environmental Education and Action at Lehigh”, guest curated by Lehigh’s Humanities Librarian Melissa Grafe, features selected works in science, technology, the environment, and policy to represent work supporting the mission of STEPS.

The exhibit is located on the ground, first, third, and fourth floors of Linderman Library and runs through December 17, 2010. Please visit the Special Collections website for news of the online version of this exhibit located here.

The opening of STEPS was viewed by Special Collections Curator Lois Black as an opportunity to showcase Lehigh’s rich environmental history collections. While the Lehigh community focuses its attention on the new environmental sciences building, the exhibit is the perfect opportunity to educate and inform visitors and the Lehigh community alike about historical resources associated with science, the environment, policy, and society.

Grafe undertook background research for the exhibit during her tenure as a Council for Library and Information Resources (CLIR) post doctoral fellow. She tackled an analysis of collections, identifying historical material relevant to aspects of environmental science and its history taught across Lehigh’s curriculum.

In addition to seminal works in the field, she identified supporting materials, such as photographs and ephemeral artifacts and publications. The current exhibition is the first in a series featuring these resources: a second show centered around travel narratives and exploration will open in Linderman this spring.

Visitors are encouraged not to miss a single part of this exhibit as they travel throughout Linderman to see the sights through the eyes of early environmentalists. Featured in the Café Gallery on the ground floor of Linderman are materials selected in support of environmental education and action at Lehigh.

The work of Francis Trembley, an ecologist on the Lehigh faculty whose work influenced several generations of students, is represented through photographs, publications, as well as botanical specimens collected on research trips and now preserved by the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences. Also on display in the Café Gallery are images detailing the construction of STEPS and selected publications by STEPS faculty.

Highlights of the environmental history collection are displayed in the first floor reading room and in the Linderman Library lobby, where even Audubon’s magnificent Birds of America plays a role in educating visitors about the impact man has had on driving ornithological species to extinction.

The current plate on display is that of the now extinct Passenger Pigeon, formerly one of the most abundant species in the world then driven to extinction by reckless hunting for sport for decades, until the last example died in a zoo in 1914. In addition, two exhibit cases in the main reading room display and contextualize iconic works including Ralph Waldo Emerson's Nature, Henry David Thoreau's Walden, or Life in the Woods, and Rachel Carson's Silent Spring.

The Bayer Galleria exhibition case illustrates current research by STEPS faculty, while the fourth floor Parents Gallery features regional examples of crisis and subsequent recovery in the environment. Among the venues explored are the Three Mile Island nuclear disaster and the Palmerton Superfund site.

Actions and reactions are interpreted through the work of exhibition curator Grafe, as well as by lenders Professor Sharon Friedman, the Lehigh Gap Nature Center, and the Wildlands Conservancy in Emmaus.

The exhibit is open regular library hours. Visitors are also encouraged to visit the Fairchild-Martindale Library to explore the associated exhibit, "Turning a New Leaf- Teaching Children
about the Environment," and K-12@FMLibrary, both on the main floor.


-- Lois Fischer Black
  
Article posted September, 2010

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