What is OCLC?
      OCLC is a nonprofit, membership; library computer service and research organization dedicated to the public purposes of furthering access to the world’s information and reducing information costs.

      OCLC's Mission
      As set forth in OCLC’s Articles of Incorporation, the objectives of the organization are to:

      Establish, maintain and operate a computerized library network and to promote the evolution of library use, of libraries themselves and of librarianship, and to provide processes and products for the benefit of library users and libraries, including such objectives as increasing availability of library resources to individual library patrons and reducing the rate-of-rise of library per-unit costs, all for the fundamental public purpose of furthering ease of access to and use of the ever-expanding body of worldwide scientific, literary and educational knowledge and information.

      History of OCLC

      In 1967, the presidents of the colleges and universities in the state of Ohio founded the Ohio College Library Center (OCLC) to develop a computerized system in which the libraries of Ohio academic institutions could share resources and reduce costs.

      OCLC's first offices were in the Main Library on the campus of The Ohio State University (OSU), and its first computer room was housed in the OSU Research Center. It was from these academic roots that Frederick G. Kilgour, OCLC's first president, oversaw the growth of OCLC from a regional computer system for 54 Ohio colleges into an international network. In 1977, the Ohio members of OCLC adopted changes in the governance structure that enabled libraries outside Ohio to become members and participate in the election of the Board of Trustees; the Ohio College Library Center became OCLC, Inc. In 1981, the legal name of the corporation became OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. Today, OCLC serves more than 27,000 libraries of all types in the U.S. and 64 other countries and territories.

      In 1974, the American Library Association (ALA) awarded OCLC Founder Frederick G. Kilgour the prestigious Margaret Mann Citation in Cataloging and Classification for "making the Library of Congress MARC database a practical and useful product." In 1982, Mr. Kilgour was awarded ALA's highest honor, Honorary Life Membership, for his contributions to librarianship, including the establishment and development of a practical vehicle for making the benefits of technology readily available to thousands of libraries."

      OCLC has had four presidents in its 31-year history. Frederick G. Kilgour was President and Chief Executive Officer from 1967 to 1980 and retired from the OCLC Board of Trustees in February 1995 after having served as Permanent Founder Trustee since 1980. Rowland C. W. Brown was President and CEO of OCLC from 1980 to 1989. Dr. K. Wayne Smith served as resident and CEO of OCLC from 1989 through April 1998. Jay Jordan has been President and CEO since May 1998.

      Largely for historic reasons, there are several different national MARC formats. Although these national formats have much in common they are sufficiently different to require conversion programs between them. IFLA's UNIMARC format was primarily designed as an intermediate format, to reduce the number of conversion programs, which a library might, need in order to utilize records from different sources

      Notes taken by: Marcus S. McKoy

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