Judith Hopkins

Published August 14, 2014 This content is archived.

Judith Hopkins, longtime UB librarian and active member of the Faculty Senate, died Aug. 8 in Atlanta after a yearlong battle with lymphoma. She was 80.

A specialist in the area of cataloging, Hopkins worked at UB for 27 years. She served as head of original cataloging from 1977-1983 and as technical services research and analysis officer from 1984 until her retirement from UB in 2004.

She also taught as an adjunct in UB's School of Library Science from 1979 to 1983.

Hopkins served several terms as a senator in the Faculty Senate, UB’s faculty governance body. She was secretary from 1988-89 and 1989-90, and later served as chair of the Bylaws Committee.

A native of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, Hopkins received a BA in history from Wilkes College in 1955 and a MLS from the University of Illinois in 1957.

She worked at several colleges and universities, including Mt. Holyoke, Yale and the University of Michigan, in addition to UB.

She also worked at the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) in the early 1970s, an organization that today is dedicated to providing computer library services for more than 50,000 libraries in 84 countries and territories around the world. She was among the original staff and the first librarian hired to work at OCLC.

After retiring from UB, Hopkins moved to the Atlanta area to be near her sister and brother-in-law.

She co-authored “Research Libraries and their Implementation of AACR2 (1986) with UB interim archivist emeritus John Edens, and is the author of a number of significant articles, including “The French Cataloging Code of 1791 and the Origins of the Card Catalog,” published in Libraries and Culture.

She also was well-known for her role as list owner of AUTOCAT, the worldwide library cataloging and authorities discussion group.

Hopkins was the recipient of the Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Librarianship, as well as the prestigious Margaret Mann Citation. The Mann Citation recognized her contributions to the practice of cataloging, in particular her early involvement in OCLC, which helped move bibliographic information into the computer age.