VALE KEVIN
GRIFFIN
We recently had the sad news that the
RGSSA’s former librarian, Kevin Griffin, has died. He had been very ill for
months and had had to give up his library work. The Royal Geographical Society
of South Australia has been without a librarian since then and it has really
brought home to us what a great deal of work Kevin did, even though he was only
part-time.
Kevin was a very modest person, so I won’t
indulge in fulsome praise or post a photo of him. I shall just say, on a
personal level, that it was a pleasure working with him. His work for the RGSSA
will speak for him. He was instrumental in the decision to set up a
computerised catalogue for the Society for the very first time and mount it on
the Internet, a move which is giving scholars world-wide access to the RGSSA’s
unique collection of works of exploration and travel. In-house, he produced a
series of fascinating exhibitions, drawing on his wide knowledge of the
collection. His expert work as a bibliographer is best seen in his catalogue
for the big exhibition Terra Cognita: Four
Hundred Years of European Exploration, Travel and Discovery, which was
mounted in 2008 for the 100th anniversary of the opening of the York Gate
Library collection in South Australia.
 |
| "Terra Cognita" title page (picture on navy mat) |
The
electronic version of this illustrated publication is available at :
Below we see an extract which shows Kevin’s ability to write concise and
telling annotations:
Thank you for your tireless and dedicated work for
the RGSSA Library, Kevin.
We miss you.
