The Harvard University Library's Office for Information Systems has announced that Dale Flecker, Associate Director for Planning and Systems, will retire on June 30.
Here's an excerpt:
Flecker served the Library for nearly 31 years as an expert in information technology and libraries. He came to Harvard as a systems librarian in 1978, directed the Office for Systems Planning and Research from 1979 to 1985, and became an Associate Director of HUL in 1985.
Dale did more than anyone to guide the Library into the digital age. He understood the possibilities and the problems of e-journals, e-books, and e-catalogues as soon as they appeared on the horizon. At the turn of the century, there were no models for creating a library digital infrastructure that would store and preserve digital objects. Thanks to Dale, Harvard took the lead in this crucial area with its Digital Repository Service, and it pioneered in other aspects of online teaching and research through the Library Digital Initiative. Dale's advice determined library policy at many critical junctures. We will badly miss him.