DAVID LUBIN MEDIATOR EXTRAORDINAIRE HIS LETTERS,HIS LIBRARY

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DAVID LUBIN MEDIATOR EXTRAORDINAIREHIS
LETTERS,HIS LIBRARY

• by Jane Wu
• Chief Librarian, FAO
• jane.wu_at_fao.org

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DAVID LUBIN

• a genius?
• a visionary?
• a crank?
• an eccentric
• a news-maker

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DAVID LUBIN

• not a politician
• not a man of great wealth
• did not wield great influence
• an ordinary man who achieved the extraordinary.

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Lubin --Founder of International Institute of
Agriculture
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International Institute of Agriculture

• an economic development organization
• well ahead of its time.
• world clearinghouse for agricultural information
• stabilizing agricultural prices through
  international action

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Lubin worked from a vision

• built international demand
• envisioned international structure
• problem-solver

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Lubin single handedly responsible

• identified and defined agricultural problems
• identified causes
• proposed solutions
• implemented them

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What kind of person?

• a man of zeal, persistence, imaginative
• inquiring mind, inventive
• exceptional concentration
• peculiar, exceptional virtues
• disarming frankness,
• evident sincerity, honesty
• unselfish

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A common scrub

• humble origins, emigrant
• self-educated, many trades
• lost in the desert
• Great Fire of Chicago
• returned to California
• biggest department store and mail order house on
  the Pacific coast

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The plight of the farmer

• unaware of world crop conditions
• unreliable, incomplete price information
• isolation,lack of information
• lack of knowledge led to exploitation

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Vision of Information as Key to Equalization

• information as public property
• agricultural information clearing house
• failure in England and France
• Italy -- Minister of Agriculture
• practical help -- sports journalist
• met King at San Rossore

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Unusual words to a King

• ... You are, of course, a very important person
  here, but remember you are a small potato in the
  world, the monarch of a third-rate nation.
• at one leap Italy can head the nations in the
  general fight of our days the fight for Justice
  in economic relations.

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Victory did not yet mean success

• Lubin sprang into action/tireless energy
• Disappointments, conflicts and opposition
• Letters, visits to governments
• U.S. President intervention
• Lubin excluded from Conference

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After the Conference

• Lubin wrote thousands of letters
• To the Queen of Rumania, he wrote
• Your Majesty, you were good enough to express
  the wish that I should forward to Your Majesty
  some further literature on the subject of the
  International Institute of Agriculture. In
  compliance I have the honour to enclose herewith
  some documents, mainly correspondence, bearing on
  the subject

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Despite many obstacles

• Lubin contacted journalists, statesmen,
  politicians and authors
• thousands of letters, travels, meetings
• sheer persistence and tenacity
• many disappointments and difficulties
• lively correspondence with H.G. Wells on
  agricultural and philosophical subjects

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Letters H. G. Wells
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(No Transcript)
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After the Signature of the Convention

• much to overcome
• indifference and prejudice
• active but hidden opposition
• Lubin worked night and day

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David Lubin faced opposition

• Agent of the Union Stockyard in Chicago
  complained
• the Bureau of Agricultural Economics of the US
  Department of Agriculture was issuing too much
  information
• A piece of information known to everybody is of
  no interest to me, but a piece of information
  that I have and the others have not can be turned
  into money!

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Professionals involved in international trade

• opposed dissemination of information
• Louis Dreyfus
• Remember that the worlds eyes are on the
  Institute and you must do nothing, give no advice
  and no information before you are absolutely
  certain about it

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Working with apparent boundless energy

• Lubin continued his work up until his death from
  Spanish influenza in 1919
• By this time the IIA had developed a momentum of
  its own
• The Library continued to flourish

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Reference Room - DLML
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Outstanding Collections

• Almost 400,000 volumes (by 1946)
• Cappelli rare book collection (400)
• Incunabulae collection (32)
• Giglioli pamphlet collection
• Marescalchi viniculture collection
• Silviculture Collection (11,000)

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IIA Periodicals
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Hortus Romanus
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Example -- Everyman bindings
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Marescalchi Collection
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David Lubin Memorial Library2005

• Over a million volumes
• Electronic collections
• Institutional memory of FAO
• FAO IIA publications
• Enduring value

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Lubin biographer says

• those who were inclined to dismiss him as an
  idealistic dreamer were the incompetent the
  shallow politician, the decorative diplomat, the
  superficial journalist. he never feared
  contact with the really competent, -- the real
  statesman, the shrewd hard-headed business man,
  the keen economist. He submitted his ideas to
  them time out of number and the result was always
  victory.

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And Lubin himself said
So much to be done and so precious little done,
and the family is so large (about one billion
eight hundred million) --David Lubin, founder
of the International Institute of Agriculture
(IIA) in a letter to H.G. Wells, November 4th,
1916