Jo Ann Hardison Bell . . . Making libraries lively

Biographical sketch of Jo Ann Bell. This and other articles may be found in the University Archives.

The citation for this article is: "Jo Ann Hardison Bell . . . Making libraries lively," Pieces of Eight, May 1, 1986.

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Jo Ann Bell doesn't talk like a librarian is supposed to -- at least not like the stereotypical librarian most of us have pigeonholed somewhere in our cerebral cortices. And that's because Bell, director of the ECU Health Sciences Library, frequently punctuates her sentences with staccato laughter, occasionally loud enough to prompt a disdainful "shussh!" from our imaginary librarian.

And then sometimes she just can't resist breaking into capital letters, to give her words more EMPHASIS, such as when she talks about the way people perceive librarians.

"Most people think of a library as DULL," she says, "it's slow, it's hard to find information. Instead we want the library to be a place where it's EASY to find information. It's an ALIVE place."

Building that sense of vitality and service into the Health Sciences Library has been Bell's foremost career priority. She has presided over the growth of the library from its earliest days in 1969 -- when she was the sole employee overseeing a nonexistent collection -- to its current status as a highly regarded research facility with more than 148,000 volumes, 34 faculty and staff members, and a modern home in the Brody Medical Sciences Building.

Recently, Bell was honored with what she calls her "second once-in-a lifetime opportunity," her appointment as secretary to the search committee seeking a successor to retiring Chancellor John Howell. The post could be considered the second most important on the committee -- after the chairman's position -- and Bell brings a lot of pride and keen sense of responsibility to her work.

Roundabout Start

Bell's FIRST once-in-a-lifetime opportunity was, of course, the chance to create a library from scratch, though she came to the task in a roundabout fashion. A native of Castle Hayne, near Wilmington, N.C., she earned an undergraduate degree in history at Duke University and, weeks later, married her husband, Mike, now an engineer with thestate Division of Health Services. During brief residences in Boston and then the San Francisco area, Jo Ann was occupied with a less than stimulating career -- paying health insurance claims.

When Mike found himself at a career juncture, the Bells opted to return to North Carolina and Chapel Hill. Tired of humdrum jobs, Jo Ann talked with a college roommate who had gone into library science. "I thought it was the kind of thing that would appeal to me," she said.

In the master's program in library science at UNC-CH, Bell initially had no plans to specialize. But then she took a course in medical librarianship and found that her experience in health insurance helped with medical concepts and terminology. She also discovered that she liked thekind of "service-oriented" work that medical librarians do. "Medical librarians really help the users meet daily needs in doing their jobs and I like that part of it," she explained.

But any thoughts of an immediate future as a medical librarian disappeared when Bell's husband was transferred to Greenville in 1966. At that time East Carolina had an established nursing school but the School of Allied Health was still in the early talking stages, and a medical school was only the faintest pipe dream. "Oh, well," Bell thought, "we'll only be here a couple of years." That was 20 years ago.

Moving, Growing

The ECU health library began in one room in 1969 and was relocated five times in the next three years of growth. The nadir may have occurred one sweltering summer when Bell moved her library to the old cafeteria facility on the main campus. There amid chairs stacked to the 20-foot ceilings, stainless steel steam tables and an ice cream machine ("with no ice cream"), Bell unpacked and cataloged 12 tons of journals donated to the library by the University of Kentucky -- all without benefit of air conditioning. "It was a wonderful time," she says ironically.

And yet it was, she insists, "a WONDERFUL opportunity" -- the chance to direct every detail in the development of the library, ensuring that each element reflects what she calls her "philosophy of service." It's a philosophy that puts the user at the center of the library's universe.

"Everything is secondary to the needs of the user. If the user has a problem, our librarians will not only help, but do it in a way that tells the user, 'I really want to help you.'" A the heart of Bell's philosophy is a marketing concept which she has fine-tuned while acquiring a doctorate in library science and another master's in business administration. The idea is simply that when anything is done, it's done with the customer in mind.

One major service the Health Sciences Library provides is getting materials to the user regularly; deliveries are made to Allied Health and Nursing three times daily. Sometimes, however, users from distant campus locations must visit the Brody Building, the library's permanent home -- at least for the foreseeable future.

Occupying the spacious new facility was "like moving to Heaven," Bell said, though it was difficult to pull up emotional stakes at the Carol Belk Building, where the library had been located for the previous nine years.

High Ranking Resource

From its modest beginning in a 10-foot-square office, the Health Sciences Library today ranks among the top 25 percent in national surveys of health research libraries. In one critical area -- the application of microcomputers -- Bell said the library is well ahead of most of its peers, including any other health sciences library in North Carolina. ECU's HSL has 20 microcomputers now and another 20 will be added in a planned expansion.

In her limited leisure time Bell says she enjoys -- you guessed it -- readiing, though her literary appetite runs to books with "no redeeming social value."

"My idea of a perfect vacation is to go to the beach, eat junk food and read junk books," she said, her sentence trailing off into laughter.

On campus, both in the library and as part of the her Chancellor Search Committee responsibilities, she relies on her ability to organize effectively. This is especially important in her role as secretary to the search committee, she believes; as she perceives her job to be primarily making sure the multitudes of details are taken care of so that the committee can freely function at its highest level.

Bell confesses that she has occasionally had to overcome her distaste for the librarian stereotype and be a "shussher" in the library: "academic libraries need to be quiet and that's really a part of our responsibility." But she hates the popular image -- the prim ladies "looking down their noses at you" who don't seem to want users to take books off the shelves.

"That's the kind of thing I don't like," Bell emphasized. "To me, the library and the librarian image should be that we're here for one reason -- to help people."

Now that's ENTHUSIASM. And that's the last word on Jo Ann Bell.