Milner Library

Gwendolyn Harrison ’84

Gwen began her career at Lincoln Library, Springfield’s Public Library after graduating from the Illinois State University. Her areas of expertise and accomplishment at Lincoln Library included programming for all ages, collection development, the provision of reference services, and the building of community relations with families, neighborhood schools and businesses. She  obtained her Master of Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign during this time. She then went to serve 23 years at the Illinois State Library as library consultant. 

Her crowning achievement was serving as Project Director of ILEAD USA: Innovative Librarians Explore, Apply and Discover. This program was designed to engage librarians nationwide to utilize technology as its basis to address a shared community issue.  Nationally, librarians were encouraged to take this model to their respective states and replicate the program.

Gwen returned to where her career began and now serves as the first African-American director of Lincoln Library.