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I have been updating the records in Blais for Special Collections’ Nordic Collection, making the information more accurate and also ensuring that the links from Blais to our online requesting system, Aeon, are working. While I have been working on this project, I have learned a little about this unique collection and its history.

Special Collections has more than thirty thousand volumes on Nordic history, literature, religion, education, politics, and economics. Most of the materials are in Danish, Swedish, or German. The collection began with a donation from Waldemar Westergaard, who was a professor at Pomona and UCLA, and Special Collections has added significantly to this collection with the acquisition of the personal libraries of David Bjork and other scholars, You can read more about the highlights of the Nordic Collection here.

And for some information on the background of the Westergaard donation, there is an interesting article by Franklin Scott in Scandinavian Studies, Vol. 41, No. 4 (Nov. 1969). If you have access to JSTOR, you can check it out here.