Librarian helps researchers access works from around the world

Nishon Hawkins | Library Manager | KU Libraries

Researchers often turn to libraries to access books, journals, microfilm and other academic materials. Nishon Hawkins helps researchers obtain items that are especially difficult to find.

Hawkins is a library manager and has worked in the KU Libraries for 20 years. She runs the interlibrary loan program, which allows students, faculty and staff to request items that KU Libraries does not have in its collections.

"She is always driven toward the best work for her team and how it translates in service to patrons,” said Angie Rathmel, associate librarian and head of acquisitions & resource sharing.

When a researcher needs materials that are not housed in KU Libraries but are available in other institutions’ repositories, the libraries can temporarily loan these items between themselves through cooperative agreements. Hawkins and her team coordinate with colleagues at other institutions in these exchanges.

“In the day-to-day, there are practical, routine processes that she facilitates, as well as highly complex parts moving in multiple different directions. She understands every single one of these expertly and how they can work most efficiently — not just with technology but with the people she works with,” Rathmel said.

The interlibrary loan team’s work became especially important to KU researchers during the travel restrictions of the pandemic. Misty Schieberle, professor and director of undergraduate studies in the Department of English, needed access to hundreds of late medieval wills and deeds for her investigation of the life of a famous poet. The original documents were only available in London, but four microfilm copies are housed in American institutions. Hawkins and her team helped locate those microfilms and ensured Schieberle had what she needed for her work.

“Her tireless efforts allowed me to find over a dozen new documents illuminating the life of a famous medieval poet and to trace bequests from wealthy London merchants to underemployed students and priests that had not been recognized before. These discoveries are now published in a top journal in my field and in a collection of essays on archival sources,” Schieberle said. “Nishon quite literally made these discoveries and my articles possible.”