Introduction
The Robert Gaylor LGBTQ Collection contains about 5,000 print books written by or about queer people with genres spanning fiction, sociological studies, photography, government documents, erotic pulp novels, and more from the late 19th century through early 21st. The periodicals and ephemera include over XXXX titles, including national and international magazines, travel guides and pamphlets, pride event programs, and many rare, short-lived periodicals. Robert Gaylor, who worked as a librarian at Kresge Library from 1965 until his retirement in 2003, gifted his collection of books, periodicals, and ephemera to Kresge Library in 2007 and has made smaller additions to the collection in the subsequent years. You can read more about Bob Gaylor and his collection here.
The Card Catalog
In addition to these print collections, Gaylor donated the card catalog accompanying his personal library. The catalog consists of 12 drawers of about 10,000 packed cards, organized alphabetically by author’s surname. The cards, largely in manuscript in pencil, include basic bibliographic details, including the author, title, publication information, and call number. The cards describe the books within Gaylor’s collection, and document the books Gaylor learned about and wanted to acquire.
Importantly, however, many of Gaylor’s cards contain fields revealing valuable information, including where he learned of a book, the prices for those he purchased, and broader reception of these queer books. For example, many cards indicate where Gaylor found the book reviewed and citation information for published bibliographies that include the title, the date when Gaylor read the book, and Gaylor’s personal commentary about his reading experience. Some cards indicate which other libraries also held the book, measuring the broader availability (or unavailability) of a title. Cards also often contain the Library of Congress Card Number (LCCN). This number includes the year in which a given publication was entered into the Library of Congress, and can thus indicate which edition Gaylor learned about.
A true librarian, Gaylor didn’t write in his books: in his own words, “I didn’t want to mess the book up.” The cards, however, document Gaylor’s life collecting and reading books about the queer experience. Together, these details help triangulate how, where, and when Gaylor learned of books on queer subjects to add to his collection.
This digital exhibit digitizes a small sample to illustrate the rich research potential of the larger collection of cards. These cards have been digitized, front and back, and the content of the cards has been transcribed for greater accessibility. Users can see the cards here, or browse by broader thematic categories:
See a list of authors’ names and the variety of genres represented in the exhibit.
Learn more about how Gaylor collected his books—both those in his physical collection, and those in his desired collection. See the bibliographies and queer and mainstream periodicals from which he learned about desired titles, as well as how he contacted the publishers.
View cards that document the queer reading experience, including the date(s) Gaylor read or reread a title, his summary of the book’s queer content (or lack thereof), and evidence of broader patterns within his reading.
Explore the materiality of the cards, including multimedia cards, the cards’ variety of paper types, and evidence of Gaylor revisiting his cards to add content over time.