Marie Harvin's career demonstrates a lifelong love of her profession, meticulous attention to the literature of cancer, and a total commitment to a strong professional association. She is recognized by her many colleagues as a no-nonsense librarian of the old school and a giant of our profession.
Janice Marie Harvin, born in 1924 in Alto, Texas, died in Houston on November 18, 2000. She was a child of the Texas depression, strong-willed, independent, proud, committed to the values of hard work and education. Marie graduated from Stephen F. Austin State University, Nacogdoches, Texas, in 1943 and from George Peabody College Library School, Nashville, Tennessee, in 1945. She served as catalog librarian at Vanderbilt University Medical Library (1947–49) and at the University of Maryland (1949–55). Marie also gained experience in medical reference work at the University of Nebraska College of Medicine (1955–56), at Vanderbilt (1956–57), and at the National Library of Medicine (1957–60). Later, until 1966, she was director of the Medical Library at the University of Arkansas. Then, until her retirement in 1984, she directed the M. D. Anderson Research Medical Library in Houston.
Not to be overlooked are her love of the history of medicine and her contributions to the Medical Library Association (MLA). The History of Cancer Collection at M. D. Anderson was her pride and joy. While cataloging items in that collection, she discovered a letter written by John Shaw Billings. Another "find" several years earlier was a letter written by Sir William Osler to a Baltimore physician.
Marie understood the need for a strong professional association. She was host librarian for the first meeting in Little Rock of the Southern Chapter in 1963. Together with Ann Hutchinson of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, New York, Marie was instrumental in the formation of the Cancer Librarians Section in 1974. She served as the first president of the newly formed South Central Chapter in 1973. It should also be noted that, in typical Marie fashion and illustrative of her independent spirit, she resigned from MLA for a time, because, as she said, it was "dabbling too much in politics!"
Perhaps Marie's philosophy and personality were best described by her friend and mentor, the late R. Lee Clark, M.D., who said, "Ms. Harvin is not a routine librarian. She is endowed with creativity and imagination and at the same time has a very practical outlook on daily responsibilities that libraries in a research and teaching institution demand."
The librarians in the Texas Medical Center remember Marie Harvin with great fondness.
Article from Jackson SJ, Hoffman K. (Janice) Marie Harvin, 1924–2000. J Med Libr Assoc. 2002 Jul;90(3):361. PMCID: PMC116420.