Ohio Christian University (formerly named Circleville Bible College) is a small college in Circleville that dates back to 1948 and offers over 20 different programs, including traditional undergraduate, adult and online degree completion programs.   Maxwell Librarynot only serves the 600 students that attend the college, but is also open to the public as well.  Director David Tipton has been a spearhead for growth of the library.  Not only has the collection quadrupled in the last five years, but so has the circulation and the amount of reference questions (which I have to say has an impressive database tracking system fondly nicknamed “The RAT”, which, if I remember correctly, stands for Reference Answer Tracking.)   David and I started Kent State’s MLIS program at the same time (okay, I will admit that David finished the program before me!) and I have appreciated his friendship and his continual insightful ideas!  It was nice to finally get to visit the Maxwell library-it is very beautiful, spacious and nicely arranged!  Even though the semester had just ended, I was able to meet most of his multi-talented staff and thoroughly enjoyed meeting them.  The Maxwell Library is a recent recipient of an LSTA Minigrant to upgrade their ILS so they can become an Ohio Link member.  (WAY TO GO!!)

I am going to brag that David showed me the archive room (not open to the public); it is filled with wonderful and well preserved college documents as well as historical books and a bible collection that was donated to the library.  I could spend a day in their just looking at the shelves let alone perusing the titles!  There is also a environmentally controlled display of the Bishop’s Bible (1585) and a Luther Bible (1729).  Not only does the Maxwell Library house the collection and archives, but also contains state-of-the-art classrooms and faculty offices.

Please stop by and visit David and his staff at the Maxwell Library (and don’t forget to ask David to show you some of his wonderful photographs!).  I don’t have as many pictures of the library that I wanted, my camera battery went dead (maybe David will add some to the blog for us!)  Thanks for the tour David!