A Lasting Tribute to Duke’s Outgoing University Librarian
After nearly four decades of service to Duke, Deborah Jakubs, the Rita DiGiallonardo Holloway University Librarian and Vice Provost for Library Affairs, retired in May 2022. But on her way out the door, she got a surprise going-away present from the Duke Library Advisory Board.
Unbeknownst to Jakubs, board members pooled their resources to raise nearly $4 million to name a library space in her honor. The space they chose? The Library Administration office suite, the “captain’s deck” from which Jakubs has steered Duke’s world-renowned library system for the last seventeen years.
Jakubs, whose career at Duke began in 1983, was named University Librarian in 2005. During her tenure, the Libraries’ physical presence on campus changed dramatically, including the dedication of Bostock Library and the von der Heyden Pavilion, the renovation of Perkins and Rubenstein Libraries, the construction of The Link and The Edge, and the expansion of the Library Service Center. In her final year, Jakubs focused her energies on finalizing plans and fundraising for the renovation and expansion of Lilly Library on Duke’s East Campus, which is scheduled to begin next year.
The funds raised by the Library Advisory Board in Jakubs’ honor will go towards the Lilly renovation, a long-awaited project that promises to transform one of the oldest and most architecturally significant buildings at Duke into a much-needed intellectual and social center of East Campus. Fundraising for the project is ongoing.
“This naming gift by the Library Advisory Board is such a fitting tribute,” said Joseph A. Salem, Jr., who succeeds Jakubs and was named Duke’s new University Librarian upon her retirement. “The Lilly Project was dear to Deborah’s heart, and its upcoming completion will cap off a long chapter of expansion and renewal in the history of the Duke University Libraries for which we owe her a debt of gratitude.”
