Professor John Dean Award

I am really pleased to hear about the John Dean Award, which is being awarded by UCD School of Information and Library Studies, to honour UCD's first Professor and Head of Library and Information Studies. John was Head of Department when I did my postgraduate course in librarianship.  I interviewed him for

AnLeabharlann a short time before his death and was struck by his major contribution to West African librarianship. I had some inkling of this, having taught librarianship in Sierra Leone from 1989 to 1991.  One of the first things the Director of the Institute of Library Studies at the University of Sierra Leone asked me, was if I knew John Dean.  This was despite the fact that many years had passed since John had been in West Africa and he had never worked in Sierra Leone.  Click here to access the article.