Announcements

Temple names interim curator for Charles L. Blockson Collection

Temple University has named Aslaku Berhanu to be interim curator of the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection, effective Jan. 2, 2007.  The collection’s founding curator, Charles L. Blockson, is retiring at the end of December.  Berhanu will serve as the interim curator while Temple conducts a nationwide search for a successor to Blockson.

Berhanu currently is the reference librarian and cataloger for the Blockson Collection, making her “the ideal person to provide care and continuity for the collection while we search for a permanent curator,” said interim Provost Richard M. Englert.  “I am delighted that she will oversee the collection during this leadership transition.”

“I am excited by the challenge and responsibility of leading the Blockson Collection,” Berhanu said.  “I look forward to working with the scholars and researchers who make use of this national treasure, and I want to thank Temple and Mr. Blockson for giving me the wonderful opportunity to work with the collection.”

Berhanu and Blockson are members of a blue-ribbon committee formed in October to search for a successor to Blockson, who is retiring as curator of the highly regarded African-American collection that bears his name.  That 12-member panel includes academics, librarians and archivists.  It is led by Theresa Powell, Temple’s vice president for Student Affairs; Margaret Jerrido, archivist and administrator of the Urban Archives at Temple, serves as vice chair.  The University will retain a search firm to assist the committee in its efforts.

A separate Blockson Collection Endowment Committee, co-chaired by Temple Trustee James S. White and Englert, is raising funds for the preservation and dissemination of the collection to honor Blockson’s legacy and accomplishments.  The President’s Office made a $100,000 gift to begin the fund-raising efforts.

Materials in the Blockson collection date from 1581 and include prints, photographs, slave narratives, manuscripts, letters and other materials. Within the collection are first-edition works by Phyllis Wheatly and W.E.B. DuBois; African Bibles; correspondence of Haitian Revolutionaries; Paul Robeson's sheet music; narratives by Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglass; thousands of taped interviews and radio programs on African and African-American history and culture; and more than 500,000 photographs.

Berhanu, the interim curator, has worked in the Blockson Collection since 1988. She holds a master of library science degree from Rutgers University and a bachelor of arts in education from Addis Ababa University in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.  Before joining Temple, she held positions at Rutgers, the Education Testing Service and Addis Ababa University.  She has been active in professional associations and community activities.