Happy 50th NSLA

Last week I was honoured to be part of the celebrations to mark celebration 50 years of National and State Libraries Australasia (NSLA). I attended in my my role as Chair of the Tasmanian Library Advisory Board (TLAB) at an event that took place in the glorious Mortlock Chamber at State Library of South Australia. Earlier in the day we had been given the opportunity to see some of the Library’s amazing archival collections. Always a treat.

National and State Libraries Australasia (NSLA) is an incorporated association comprising the national, state and territory libraries of Australia and New Zealand with the constitutional purpose of bringing together the knowledge and expertise of the ten member libraries in order to build, manage and provide access to library collections and services that reflect the diversity of the communities they serve. Each member library is represented on NSLA’s board by its chief executive, state librarian, or director-general. The Chair of the board is nominated by vote for a two-year term. This was the last event for outgoing chair Vicki McDonald (Sate Library of Queensland). Sue McKerracher (Libraries Tasmania) will become Chair in 2024.

The inaugural meeting of what was then called the State Librarians Council was held at the State Library of Victoria on 30 March 1973. Its worth looking at the time line on the NSLA website to track the initiatives over the years. As someone who has been in the library world for those 50 years I did a bit of ‘remember that!’. Many, many successes.

In the interconnected library community it was also a joy to catch up with friends and colleagues from across Australia and New Zealand and to meet up with colleagues who have been newly appointed to positions in the NSLA family; Catherine Clark CEO and State Librarian, State Library of Western Australia and Caroline Butler-Bowden who commenced as the State Librarian and the State Library of New South Wales the previous week ( Caroline came to SWITCH on day two of her new job- talk about baptism by fire!).

Happy Birthday NSLA and may you have many more.

Image credit: Mark Beatty, National Library of New Zealand from NSLA web site