THE NATIONAL SPORTING LIBRARY NEWSLETTER,
Summer 2002

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE SCHOLARSHIP ENDOWMENT FUND
by John H. Daniels, NSL Director

There is a small book in the National Sporting Library, published in England in 1870, Captain Webb the Intrepid Channel Swimmer. The author John Randall devoted the story to his hero Captain Webb who was the first person to successfully swim across the English Channel. The point that I want to make is that Captain Webb had to make his swim all the way.

I have the same thought when it comes to the final success of the National Sporting Library. In order for this wonderful gem of a library to go all the way, it must finish the job of establishing a million-dollar scholarship fund. The fact is that without the scholarship fund, we will not be able to stimulate the kind of scholarly projects (that can be turned into books and eventually even films) that will put the National Sporting Library on the literary map.

Thanks to the energies and generosity of many supporters, the NSL has come a long way in the last five years. The special leadership of Chairman George Ohrstrom Jr. and Vice Chair Jacqueline Mars has been instrumental in achieving our goals so far. One of the significant mile markers in the Library's exciting growth was the dedication of the new building on Sept. 18, 1999. Since that time our superb President Kenneth Tomlinson has developed a superb, well functioning staff to operate the Library as well as attracting a loyal and generous group of friend of the Library known as the Chairman's Council.

The NSL is the home of the world's most extraordinary collections of books on turf and field sports. The Library's 12,000-volume collection is available to researchers in two expansive reading rooms with alcoves furnished with comfortable sofas and chairs. The Library is equipped with several scholar's study carrels and computer work stations.

We actually have a good start towards the development of an ongoing scholarship program. James L. Young has been working on a major research project at the Library for almost two years. He is making good progress in completing the unfinished Story of American Foxhunting begun by J. Blan Van Urk and published by the old Derrydale Press in 1940 and 1941.

Young's entire scholarship grant has been generously funded by Jacqueline B. Mars and George L. Ohrstrom Jr. We also have some seed money towards the Scholarship Fund through an anonymous contribution of $100,000.

The most important thing remains is the need for an ongoing annual scholarship program funded by a much-needed endowment that must total one million dollars to support the kind of research projects worthy of such a great facility. Many important libraries in America and abroad have ongoing intern and scholarship programs. At Yale and Harvard there is a flow of visiting scholars who are studying rare books in support of their writing projects.

The entire procedure of attracting scholars to compete for sought-after scholarships has been established for a long time. The funding, research, writing and ultimate publishing of books and articles are the life-blood of every one of these institutions. If the National Sporting Library is to finally succeed it needs to fund and develop its own special scholarship program.

There is an enormous quantity of worthwhile research projects awaiting the scholars at the NSL. The biographers will find their resource materials at the Library as will the historians, novelists, art appreciators and lecturers. Every scholar has his or her agenda of interests, and the vast resources of original manuscripts, ancient and modern books on equestrian and field sports subject matter reposing in the Library await their arrival.

Just to give an example of how it works, this is what I experienced in the summer of 1987 when I was still passionately collecting sporting books. I had acquired one of three existing copies of a rare book privately printed by General Henry Eugene Davies in 1872. Ten Days on the Plains is about a buffalo hunting expedition hosted by General Philip Sheridan in 1871, five years before General Custer's demise. There were 15 photographs mounted in the book of General Sheridan and his guests who included Buffalo Bill Cody, the Jerome brother and James Gordon Bennett Jr. I spent most of that summer in the Minneapolis Public Library doing research on Phil Sheridan and his guests. Later that year, my article "The Millionaires Hunt" was published in the Sporting Classics magazine.

Since that time, I have thought about many different subjects that an interested researcher could explore in the Library's rare sporting book collection. The ultimate success of many best selling sporting books has occurred because of the synergy and chemistry that operates between an author and illustrator. Black Beauty has been illustrated by many talented artists including Paul Brown and Cecil Aldin. The talented English artist John Leech helped to popularize the sporting novels of Robert Smith Surtees. The original prototype of what John Jorrocks looked like was created by John Leech. That short, stubby, pot-bellied grocer from London with his snub nose and sideburns lives on forever thanks to Leech.

Here in the National Sporting Library, the scholar will find a wealth of material on the manners, mores and customs of past centuries on the practices of animal husbandry in earlier times, on the growth of veterinary knowledge or the evolutions and devolutions of the "blood sports." He has a window into the age-old interdependence and partnership between man and beast, fish and fowl.

Here scholars will find examples of evolving methods of printing, binding, color reproduction and the making of papers. Along with exquisitely beautiful artwork, there are glimpses to be had of the sociological roles of patronage, class, agriculture as seen from the croft to the vast estate, and detailed views of dress in different countries in different periods of history. The colorful field of transportation is a huge subject in itself.

In the long run the National Sporting Library will have to ask generous friends to swim the final mile to reach the other shore. I am confident that this superb sporting library will eventually be fully funded so that it can accomplish its mission.