Dolly B. Davis Hoover: Pioneer Black Librarian

Abstract

On November 26, 2000, friends and colleagues gathered at Saint Stephens Episcopal Church to honor the memory of Dolly B. Davis Hoover, the first African American faculty member at Indiana State University. The newspaper accounts of this occasion make note of her contribution to diversification and her role as a librarian at the university. As Charles Chillington eulogized “she opened ways that were not opened to most of us here.” These accounts, however, only offer a mere palimpsest of her remarkable career, a career which should be acknowledged in annals of Black Librarianship. The accomplishments of Dolly B. Davis Hoover are remarkable given the context of the time when she embarked upon the career of professional librarian in 1945.