“There's a big difference between going through life with the wind at your back, and going through life leaning into the wind”: Feminism in Post‐World War II Information Science

Abstract

This paper centers on feminism in post‐World War II information science, namely in the context of the American Documentation Institute (ADI) and the subsequent American Society for Information Science (ASIS). We focus on the years between 1962, when ADI elected its first woman president, and 1988, when it celebrated its 50th anniversary—a period that overlapped with that of second‐wave feminism in the United States. This research makes three scholarly interventions. First, we contribute to the history of information science, particularly to the history of women in the field. Second, we train a feminist epistemology lens on the field. This involves considering women's participation, representation, and marginalization in information science, on the one hand, and the ways in which information scientists approached women's lives, experiences, and bodies, on the other. Third, we situate information science in the broader history of science, juxtaposing ADI/ASIS with other scientific societies' engagement with feminism. In contrast to the national political, social, and cultural changes it wrought, feminism made little headway in information science during this period. The field largely denied women equity, inclusion, and belonging.

Full text

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Alex H. Poole
Proceedings of the Association for Information Science and Technology 61 (2024): 300-313.
DOI: 10.1002/pra2.1029
“’There’s a big difference between going through life with the wind at your
back, and going through life leaning into the wind’: Feminism in Post-World
War II Information Science”
Abstract
This paper centers on feminism in post-World War II information science, namely in the context
of the American Documentation Institute (ADI) and the subsequent American Society for
Information Science (ASIS). We focus on the years between 1962, when ADI elected its first
woman president, and 1988, when it celebrated its 50th anniversary—a period that overlapped
with that of second-wave feminism in the United States. This research makes three scholarly
interventions. First, we contribute to the history of information science, particularly to the history
of women in the field. Second, we train a feminist epistemology lens on the field. This involves
considering women’s participation, representation, and marginalization in information science,
on the one hand, and the ways in which information scientists approached women’s lives,
experiences, and bodies, on the other. Third, we situate information science in the broader history
of science, juxtaposing ADI/ASIS with other scientific societies’ engagement with feminism. In
contrast to the national political, social, and cultural changes it wrought, feminism made little
headway in information science during this period. The field largely denied women equity,
inclusion, and belonging.
Introduction
In a 2012 oral history, Marcia Bates asseverated, “my career has been characterized by having to
smash through a glass ceiling at every single step.” Born in 1942, the ASIS Award of Merit
recipient underscored (2005) the “big difference between going through life with the wind at
your back, and going through life leaning into the wind.” Bates’s assertions suggest a productive
research question: what light can feminist epistemology shed on post-World War II United States
information science? To address this question, we focus on the period between 1962, which saw
the election of the American Documentation Institute’s (ADI) first woman president, Claire
Schultz, and ASIS’s 1988 Silver Anniversary. We first explain our theoretical base and provide
historical context for women in science. Next, this paper explores the representation of women in
ADI/ASIS membership, leadership positions, and award winners. Then we turn to ADI/ASIS
publications, both non-peer reviewed and peer reviewed, to analyze women’s auctorial,
analytical, and rhetorical and discursive inclusion. Last, we offer conclusions, lessons learned,
and suggestions for future research.
The history of information science remains nascent (Aspray, 2011; Buckland & Hahn, 1998;
Cortada, 2019), as does the history of ADI/ASIS (Farkas-Conn, 1990; Schultz, 1976; Schultz &
Garwig, 1969; R. V. Williams, 2012) and the history of women in either area (Hahn & Barlow,
2009, 2010). Drawing upon feminist epistemology and the ADI/ASIS archives, the ASIS&T Oral
History Program, and ADI/ASIS’s official publications—American Documentation (AD) (1962-

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1969) and the Journal of the American Society for Information Science (JASIS) (1970-1988); the
ADI Newsletter (1962-1974) and the ASIS Bulletin (1974-1988); the Proceedings of the
American Documentation Institute (1964-1967) and the Proceedings of the American Society for
Information Science (1968-1988); and the Annual Review of Information Science and Technology
(ARIST) (1966-1988)—we contribute to each of these scholarly literatures. As Buckland and
Hahn (1998) remind us, “If a field does not document its past, it will lack a history and have a
diminished sense of identity” (p. 1).
Theoretical framing: feminist epistemology of science
According to philosopher of science Sharon Crasnow (2023), feminist science scholarship
fastens on two concerns. First, it explores agency and production, scrutinizing not only the
professional marginalization or exclusion of women themselves, but also the ways in which their
contributions to the scientific record are deprecated or even elided. Since it suggests inequitable
educational, occupational, or advancement opportunities, underrepresentation remains a key
focus of this literature. Second, feminist science literature interrogates most scholars’ reluctance
to include women’s lives, experiences, and bodies as topics meriting study or to reconsider
normative methodologies (e.g., the evidence deemed legitimate) or epistemologies (e.g., the very
definition of knowledge). This paper brings Crasnow’s approach to bear on the history of
information science.
Women in science: Recovering an invisible history
Feminism represents a fundamentally democratic movement, a “politics of universal aspiration”
(Stansell, 2010, p. xiii). Positing that women and men “are inherently of equal worth,” feminism
“asks that women be free to define themselves—instead of having their identity defined for
them, time and again, by their culture and their men” (Faludi, 1991, p. xxiii; Freedman, 2002, p.
7). Inaugurating feminism’s so-called second wave (ca. early 1960s through ca. mid-1980s), the
1960s witnessed feminist milestones such as the President’s Commission on the Status of
Women (1961), the Equal Pay Act of 1963, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (especially Title VII),
the National Organization for Women (1966), the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) (1972), Ms.
magazine (1972), Title IX of the 1972 Educational Amendments to the Civil Rights Act, the
Equal Employment Opportunity Act (1972), Roe v. Wade (1973), the Equal Credit Opportunity
Act (1974), and the Women’s Educational Equity Act (1974). These milestones reflected the
ascent of liberal feminism, which strived through incremental, pragmatic reforms—e.g.,
compliance with equal opportunity legislation, affirmative action, the creation of federally
funded social institutions such as childcare, and the passage of the ERA—to secure equal
opportunity for and full integration of women into extant political, social, and economic
structures (Chafe, 1991).
This political, social, and cultural ferment affected women in science and scientific societies as
well. Historically, most women’s work in science remained effectively invisible, and thus
unacknowledged or slighted (Rossiter, 1986). By the early twentieth century, in fact, a stereotype
of science as rational, objective, value-free, and thus indubitably masculine had crystallized
(Rossiter, 1982). The few jobs open to women remained segregated “either hierarchically (as in
assisting men in tedious, anonymous, and low-paying tasks in scientific institutions like

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observatories, museums, and laboratories) or territorially, as by working on such ‘feminine’
subject matter as home economics, botany, or child psychology” (Rossiter, 1982, p. 314). In line
with such occupational discrimination, most scientific societies either excluded women or
offered them second-class membership status (Rossiter, 1982).
Spurred by massive federal spending during World War II and the Cold War, the American
scientific enterprise reached new peaks of innovation and productivity between 1940 and 1972.
But as Rossiter (1995) asserts, the period proved far less auspicious for women in science: men
pushed women out of the field, then invoked those same departures to justify further exclusion.
Even though the federal government promoted “scientific womanpower” as early as the mid-
1940s, thereby giving a modicum of hope to women scientists, it provided neither incentives nor
compliance measures to ensure its realization (Puaca, 2014). Therefore, women remained
isolated in the same feminized jobs as before, e.g., librarians and technicians, while men tended
to derogate or ignore the handful of women scientists (Rossiter, 1995). This prejudice
unsurprisingly extended to scientific societies. Although most scientific societies’ membership
burgeoned in the 1950s and 1960s, women still comprised a distinct minority in most (between
8% and 33%). Few societies even bothered to collect data on gender, indicating their disinterest.
Generally consigned to administrative roles, women comprised just 1-2% of professional
societies’ presidencies. Exacerbating matters, while many women wanted “the vocabulary (e.g.,
‘sexist’ or ‘male chauvinist’) and the civil-rights concepts to recognize systematic patterns,
identify the responsible parties, and plan how to correct the situation,” others feared the
professional consequences of activism—or even denied the existence of sexism altogether
(Rossiter, 1995, p. xvii).
A sea change occurred in the 1960s, however. Buoyed by the broader women’s movement (often
referred to contemporaneously as “women’s liberation”), numerous women scientists protested
their station through petitions, caucuses, consciousness-raising groups, marches, fundraising,
data collection, and report preparation (Rossiter, 1995). Scientific societies served as crucibles of
this activism. Consonant with the wider political, social, and cultural changes wrought by liberal
feminism, in the late 1960s some societies plunged into activism. Testifying to this restiveness,
they promulgated public stances on national issues, the ERA most notable among them.
Women’s committees proved essential in this activism—and in societies inching toward more
diverse leadership (Rossiter, 2012). Some women even interrogated the purported objectivity and
neutrality of informal scientific communication networks themselves (Rossiter, 1986).
Complaints proliferated that scientific meetings’ programs and arrangements committees, usually
overseen by men leveraging their interpersonal networks, ignored or slighted women, namely in
giving plenaries or papers or in chairing sessions (Rossiter, 1986, 2012). Not to be overlooked,
childcare was effectively non-existent at these meetings.
Pointing to increased women’s representation and thus to inclusion, nearly all scientific societies
elected women officers, including presidents, in the 1970s and beyond. These advances reflected
the impact of the new women’s committees and caucuses and assumed weighty symbolic
importance, even if it remained unclear how much change these women could—or wanted to—
effect (Rossiter, 2012). Women’s representation in other influential positions also increased, for
instance on nominations committees. Additionally, women secured somewhat greater
participation locally, serving as officers both in regional sections and in specialty or topical
divisions (Rossiter, 1995, 2012).

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By concentrating on the underrepresentation of women in science employment and in science
society membership, leadership, and meetings, and by highlighting women scientists’ liberal
feminist activism, Rossiter sketches a useful framework for the analysis of women in twentieth
century science and scientific societies, one that we adapt in this paper. We extend Rossiter in
three ways, however. We focus on information science, a field she ignores; we consider awards
and authorship as well as membership and leadership; and we analyze organizationally
sanctioned publications, namely their foci and their rhetorical and discursive elements.
ADI/ASIS and feminism
In unpacking feminism in ADI/ASIS, we concentrate on women’s lived experience, membership
demographics, the extent to which women were represented in ADI/ASIS leadership positions
and awards, and the degree to which the professional and scholarly literature included their lives,
bodies, and experiences. Women leaders’ experience indicates a less than hospitable
environment. Moreover, membership numbers between 1962 and 1988 show women’s
underrepresentation in ADI/ASIS leadership positions (presidents, councilors, and annual
meeting chairpersons) and in the ranks of award winners. In ADI/ASIS publications, finally,
women remained underrepresented and generally othered. No wonder Bates (2012), undoubtedly
speaking for legions of women, characterized herself as “sick to death of not being taken
seriously.” Equity, inclusion, belonging—all proved elusive.
Women’s lived experience
In oral histories, several ADI/ASIS women leaders reflected upon the obstacles they faced
simply because of their gender. These experiences illuminate the patriarchal environment in
which most ADI/ASIS members matured and in which they subsequently worked. For example,
ADI/ASIS’s first woman president, Claire Schultz (1997) (born in 1924) remembered her father
believing “that girls got married, raised a family, and did not need advanced education.” Despite
this expectation, Schultz eventually matriculated at Women’s Medical College. When a newly
married Schultz became pregnant during her first year, however, the woman dean—and one of
Schultz’s professors—demanded, “Do you know that women all over the world are waiting to
get into this medical school? And here you are, taking this spot, without being sincere about
wanting a career!” (Schultz, 1997). She gave Schultz a near failing grade and instructed her to
withdraw.
Though a generation younger than Schultz, Marcia Bates also vividly recalled the strictures of
her upbringing. “The world that I was prepared for, the world that was the only real option when
I was growing up,” she (2012) explained, “was getting your MRS or doing some minor job, but
certainly not a job that you would get a serious education for or that you’d be taken seriously at.”
Like Bates and Schultz, Trudi Bellardo Hahn (born in 1944) grew up under highly gendered
expectations. “My mother often told me that I was very clever with my hands, and I probably
would make a good beautician,” she (2015) related. An engineer, Hahn’s father claimed she
could not follow in his footsteps because “girls didn’t have engineering minds” (Hahn, 2015).
But these women forged ahead. Bates, for example, ended up at the University of California as a
library and information science (LIS) graduate student. Ironically given her later experience with
discrimination in the field, she decided to remain in LIS, a less prestigious field than psychology,
her other major interest, because she believed the latter forbiddingly sexist. Also interested in

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Berkeley’s graduate program, Hahn was (2015) “warned off” by an alumnus who apprised Hahn
of the program’s disdain for both women and librarians. Other programs seemed less than
welcoming, too. Of the same generation as Hahn and Bates, Debora Shaw (2015) spoke of the
gendered climate at Indiana University. Despite a heavy proportion of women doctoral students,
Friday afternoons featured an all-men faculty and doctoral student gathering in which they would
“play poker and do whatever else needed doing.” Auspiciously, Shaw and her women colleagues
successfully lobbied to supplant this with an inclusive scholarly seminar.
Unsurprisingly, some women leaders subsequently encountered hostility in the professional
arena. Of her tenure at the University of Kentucky, Hahn (2015) ruminated, “aside from a little
sexual harassment, which was acceptable in those days and considered very funny if you were
not on the receiving end of it, I really enjoyed my time there.” For her part, Bates (2012)
discerned rampant gender-based professional discrimination at the University of Maryland, the
University of Washington, and the University of California-Los Angeles. In a slightly different
professional key, Marjorie Hlava, born in 1946, recalled (2012) working as the National Energy
Information Center’s information director: “I was the only female information engineer, and then
I was the only woman in management—with an all male staff and all male colleagues—so I
learned to girl watch with the rest of the guys when we went for coffee.” Hlava (2012) also
remembered evading 1975 ASIS president Dale Baker’s “fast hands.”
These vignettes suggest a far from inclusive or welcoming experience for women in information
science. As Bates (2012) summed up, men “tended to alternate between totally ignoring [women]
and being irritated that we persisted in this goofy idea that we could do what the men did and
were as good as they were.” In short, glass ceilings too often remained intact—and sexism too
often institutionalized.
Organizational representation
Membership demographics
While ever preoccupied with growing membership (Bryan, 1969; Gull, 1961; Kaiser, 1963;
Taylor, 1967, 1968b, 1968a), ADI/ASIS like the scientific societies Rossiter examines mostly
ignored demographics such as gender, much less race or ethnicity. But membership directories
suggest that women comprised approximately one-third of membership in 1954, 45% in 1971,
52% in 1980, and 50% in 1988. These percentages far outstripped those of Rossiter’s (1995)
scientific societies, implying that women’s contemporary concerns would find a more receptive
audience in ADI/ASIS.
Only after nearly two decades as a membership-based association did ASIS take demographic
stock of membership. A 1971 survey found striking gender divisions (“ASIS Membership: A
Profile,” 1972). Of the 46.5% whose disciplinary orientation was information science, 71% were
men. By contrast, of the 42.5% whose orientation was library science, nearly half (49.4%) were
women. Fleshing out this gendered split, respondents oriented toward computer science (11%)
were overwhelmingly men (86%). Similarly glaring differences surfaced in work activity. The
most common job type (37%) was operational work in a library or information center (more than
57% of women). The second most common, management or administration (25%), exhibited an
81% male/19% female ratio. Length of ASIS membership could not explain this inequity: men
had tallied a mean of 10.5 years and women 11.5 years. These statistics pointed to a schism
similar to that identified by Rossiter (1982), namely that women remained segregated

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hierarchically and/or territorially from men. As such, these figures suggested inequitable
information science workplace opportunities.
Eight years later, King et al. (1980) determined that more than four-fifths of respondents held an
advanced degree, most commonly a Master’s in library science (MLS) (33.9%). Women held
nearly three-quarters of the MLS degrees; this degree earned the lowest median salary and
helped account for women’s median salary of $23,600 (as opposed to men’s $29,700). Not only
did women suffer salary inequality because of their MLS degrees, however. They also dominated
functions common to new professionals, namely information or data searching (women held
75% of these positions), preparation (67%), or analysis (68%) on behalf of others. Conversely,
women remained scarce in what King et al. called “traditional” (read: masculine) areas, namely
systems analysis (42%), information science education and training (35%), and information
research and development (31%). Not to be overlooked, information science showed “no high
drop-out rate…due to family commitments,” a customary rationale for women’s lower status
(King et al., 1980, p. 17). These findings reinforced the 1971 survey’s indications of segregated
and inequitable employment and advancement opportunities.
On a smaller but similarly revealing scale, a Northern Ohio ASIS (NORASIS) chapter survey
also highlighted gender inequity (“Chapter News,” 1977). A typical member was a woman of
European ancestry aged 25-49 with at least a master’s degree. Like ASIS women nationally,
“Ms. NORASIS” worked as either an information specialist or a librarian. Earning between
$10,000 and $20,000 per annum, she like ASIS women nationally suffered egregious pay
inequity, as her male counterpart earned between $20,000 and $30,000.
In sum, ASIS membership studies found women relegated to lower-paying, lower status jobs.
This aligns with Rossiter’s (1995) conclusions. Although ASIS boasted a higher percentage of
women members than most scientific societies, their station remained far inferior to that of their
men colleagues. More troubling, ADI/ASIS like other scientific societies seemed quite
unconcerned with this gross imbalance.
Presidents, councilors, and annual meeting program chairs
Propitiously, the degree of women’s underrepresentation in ADI/ASIS in key offices such as the
presidency and Council lessened over time. Between 1962 and 1988, 18 men (67%) and nine
women (33%) served as ADI/ASIS president: one in the 1960s, three in the 1970s, and five in
the 1980s. Per the association’s constitution, presidents wielded considerable power, since they
(albeit in consultation with Council) appointed committee leaders and members, including the
key nominations and awards committees.
Suffice it to say that women presidents faced challenges. The first one, the Institute for the
Advancement of Medical Communication’s Claire Schultz, took office a full quarter century
after the organization’s founding. She expressed considerable surprise when asked to run. “I told
[the chair of the Nominating Committee] that it would be crazy,” Schultz (1997) recalled, “a
woman could not win, and anyhow, why choose me as the guinea pig?” Notably, Schultz
ascribed her candidacy not only to her professional visibility, but also to the nascent feminist
movement. “I guess it was just a sign of the times—woman’s lib,” she (1997) mused.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Schultz encountered initial hostility. ADI had recently hired its first
Executive Director, John Kaiser, who made “an adamant statement that he would not work for a
woman, never had a woman boss, and never wanted one” (Schultz, 1997). Fortunately, upon

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meeting Schultz, Kaiser warmed to her. Schultz (1997) remembered, he “began to habitually call
me Lady Claire—meaning it as a compliment.” “We worked together easily,” she (1997) noted,
“but he never dropped the ‘lady’ bit.” By contrast, Schultz’s relationship with the 1965 ADI
president, Laurence Heilprin of the Council on Library Resources, proved frosty, for he
considered her an “‘uppity woman’” (Schultz, 1997).
Yet Schultz’s presidency hinted at no large-scale change in ADI gender relations. For example,
the 1964 annual meeting featured “a distinctly separate program for the ladies,” which centered
on sightseeing, attending the Philadelphia Orchestra, and dropping by the World’s Fair (“ADI
Annual Meeting in Philadelphia,” 1964, p. 3). The 1968 annual meeting also featured “a Ladies
Program of Events” (“1968 ASIS Annual Meeting - Columbus, Ohio,” 1968, p. 1). As Rossiter
(1995) points out, such gender-segregated practices likely proved discomfiting indeed to women
scientists.
The second ADI/ASIS woman president (1971), Syracuse University’s Pauline Atherton,
broached gender cheekily in her inaugural remarks. She “expressed her pride in succeeding as
excellent a president as Charles P. Bourne, noting that ‘behind every great man is a woman’”
(Koller, 1970, p. 5). A half dozen years later, consultant Margaret Fischer became the third
woman ASIS president. Remarkably, University of Minnesota librarian Audrey Grosch
succeeded Fischer. In commemoration, the Bulletin reported, “President Fischer said it gave her
great pleasure to hand over to Ms. Grosch the Grosch Gavel that she herself had donated to the
Society” (“Introduction of 1978 President: Audrey N. Grosch,” 1977, p. 41). Grosch made clear
her hard-nosed masculine competitiveness, advertising her trapshooting success as a three-time
national women’s champion, the 1974 World Shooting Championship’s silver medalist, and only
the second woman to earn the title “International Distinguished” from the U.S. government for
her moving target competition prowess (“1976 ASIS Officer Election Results,” 1976;
“Membership,” 1974). Even as women blazed trails in ASIS leadership, they remained cognizant
of their othered position.
Further representational progress occurred between 1980 and 1988, as the number of women
elected to the presidency approximated their overall proportion of membership. As with the
scientific societies Rossiter (2012) discusses, however, it remains unclear how much agency
these women had to effect feminist change—and whether they sought to do so. In any event,
ASIS’s structure as set forth in its constitution militated against including newer or more junior
professional members in decision-making, which likely impeded prospective feminist change.
As with the presidency, ADI/ASIS Council featured disproportionately few women between
1962 and 1988. However, the percentage of women elected to Council increased over time,
edging toward parity vis-à-vis membership demographics in the 1980s. Between 1959 and 1968,
nine of 46 members were women (20%), between 1969 and 1978, 17 of 51 (33%), and between
1979 and 1988, 20 of 44 (45%) (Bohnert, 1988; Sawyer, 1988; Stein & Stein, 1988).
Despite the increase over time of the number of women presidents and councilors, feminist
concerns remained sidelined. Council took up just two such issues—and dispatched each one
summarily. First, in its spring 1980 meeting, Council chose future annual meeting sites; they
included Chicago, IL (1986) and Atlanta, GA (1987), cities in two states that had refused to
ratify the ERA. The Bulletin reported, “Council felt that it should vote on site selection without
being influenced by political issues that are not part of ASIS policy” (“Highlights of May 1980
Council Meeting,” 1980, p. 4). But in its next meeting, Council determined to “take no action on

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issues concerning the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), because, even though they ‘may be of
concern to individual members,’ they are outside the mission of ASIS” (“Highlights of July 1980
Council Meeting,” 1980, p. 43). Never formulating a policy on the ERA, much less on sanctions
for non-ratifiers, ASIS preferred to maintain a manifestly counterfeit separation between
(information) science and society. In this, the association departed from many other scientific
societies (Rossiter, 1995).
Second, pronouns came under scrutiny. At the 1972 annual Business Meeting, the Ontario
Institute for Studies in Education’s Diana Ironside motioned for ASIS to supplant “chairman”
with “chairperson.” Ensuing discussion found most attendees opposing the motion, claiming that
“chairman” was “generally accepted to be non-discriminatory and applicable to men and
women” (Koller, 1972, p. 8). In a lopsided vote (62-34), attendees defeated the motion (though
ASIS inexplicably neglected to consult membership at large). More than a dozen years later, at a
Board of Directors Meeting, Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Daniel Robbins moved to amend
the Bylaws. He favored changing masculine and feminine pronouns to “masculine/feminine, e.g.
he to he/she, him to him/her” (Resnik, 1985). Though seconded by Chemical Abstracts Service’s
Robert Tannehill, Jr., the amendment went down to defeat 4 to 5, with four men and notably, one
woman, Trudi Bellardo Hahn, opposed. As with the ERA, Council never revisited the issue:
ASIS thereby smothered two key liberal feminist initiatives. Leadership also prevented any
discussion of other key liberal feminist concerns such as equal opportunity, Title IX, affirmative
action, or childcare. Most problematic, ADI/ASIS lacked mechanisms for such issues to be
discussed and voted upon by membership at large, that is, outside the apparently sclerotic
confines of leadership.
In addition to ADI/ASIS Council and the presidency, women remained severely
underrepresented as annual meeting program chairs. Between 1971 and 1988, 18 individuals—
but just five women (28%)—served in this capacity: two in the 1970s and three in the 1980s.
This lack of proportional representation supports Rossiter’s (1986) contention: an old boys’
network dominated the most influential informal scientific communication networks.
Ultimately, in the late 1960s and 1970s ADI/ASIS seemed reactionary compared not only to the
societies Rossiter (1995, 2012) analyzes, but compared to its sister organizations, the American
Library Association (ALA) and the Special Libraries Association (SLA). Despite its substantial
numbers of women members (far more than most scientific societies), ADI/ASIS unlike ALA
never established a women’s caucus or committee. Founded in 1970, the ALA Task Force on
Women—later renamed the Committee on the Status of Women in Librarianship—compelled
the profession to address sexism (Cassell, 1987). Key targets for activism included inequitable
employment, compensation, and promotion opportunities, especially the relegation of women to
low-level jobs regardless of their qualifications. Feminist agitation not only improved women’s
chances to win seats on Council and even the presidency, but proved instrumental in supporting
the ERA (Council passed a resolution in support of the amendment in 1974 and a designated task
force [1979-1982] advocated for its passage) and related meeting place boycotts (a measure
approved in 1977) (Cassell, 1982, 1987). Whereas ALA offered childcare at annual meetings
starting in 1972, finally, ADI/ASIS declined to address the issue (“Getting Some o’ That Ol’
Time Religion: Annual Meeting Chicago, 1972,” 1972).
Like ALA, SLA supported the ERA (Stonehouse, 1978). The 1978 SLA Business Meeting saw
two proposed ERA resolutions debated, both of which ultimately passed after spirited debate.
The first resolution stated that SLA supported the ERA in principle. The second stipulated that

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SLA would not hold mid-year meetings after 1980 and annual meetings after 1984 in states that
refused to ratify the ERA. In 1979, a membership-wide vote approved this latter resolution (an
overwhelming 69% voted in favor). The amendment’s 1982 expiration for ratification, however,
mooted both ALA’s and SLA’s activism.
By failing to consult membership on these foundational feminist issues, ADI/ASIS leaders did
themselves no credit. Much might have been learned from these cognate organizations’ example,
namely their greater commitment to transparent and democratic decision-making.
Awards
As it matured, ADI/ASIS established various awards, including the Award of Merit (1964-), the
Watson Davis Award (1976-), the Best Information Science Book Award (1969-), the Best
JASIS Article Award (1969-), the Outstanding Information Science Teacher Award (1980-), and
three student awards (1972-, 1974-, and 1982-, respectively). Men won a disproportionate
number of the prestigious (namely, scholarly research) awards. Women were best represented in
feminized areas such as of service and teaching. Of the propensity for gender-based professional
service imbalances that shored up women’s candidacies for these awards, Bates (2012) declared,
“this is what women do; they take up the slack.”
Established in 1964 as ADI’s highest honor, the Award of Merit saluted “noteworthy
contributions to the field of information science” (“Pioneers,” 1988, p. 36). Between its
inauguration in 1964 and 1988, 25 individuals received the award. Merely three were women
(12%), the first of whom received the award in 1972 (women also earned the award in 1980 and
1984). Launched a dozen years after the Award of Merit, the Watson Davis Award honored
individuals’ “continuous dedicated service to the Membership of ASIS” (“Nominations for 1976
Awards,” 1976, p. 46). Although women were better represented in the Davis Award than in the
Award of Merit, between 1976 and 1988 only nine women (of 26 total winners) received it
(35%): four in the 1970s and five in the 1980s.
ADI/ASIS’s scholarly awards slighted women even more grievously. Having established a Best
Information Science Book Award in 1969, ASIS first bestowed it on a woman in 1981. Of 24
individuals to receive the award between 1969 and 1988, just two were women (8%)—and only
one was first author (both received the award in the 1980s). Also in 1969, ASIS established a
Best JASIS Paper Award; a woman first received it in 1975. Of 21 individuals to receive this
honor between 1969 and 1988, just six were women (29%): three in the 1970s and three in the
1980s. Bates (2012) surmised that some men “felt that it was fine to have women publishing
little touchy-feely articles about information-seeking and the like, but when it came to the deep
philosophical issues, ‘This was Men’s turf.’”
Women garnered a far higher share of the less prestigious teaching and student awards. ASIS
established an Outstanding Information Science Teacher Award in 1980. Displaying strikingly
gendered language, the award inter alia recognized “personal qualities and attributes that are
useful in working with students” (“ASIS and ISI Announce Outstanding Information Science
Teacher Award,” 1980, p. 31). In the award’s first nine years, women won five times (56%), a
figure in line with their overall representation in ASIS membership. To an even greater extent,
women dominated student awards. ASIS expanded its outreach to student members in 1972 with
the Best Student Paper Award and in 1974 with the Doctoral Forum. Of 17 individuals to receive
the student paper award between 1972 and 1988, 14 were women (82%). Thirty-three individuals
participated in the Doctoral Forum between 1974 and 1988, a venue that permitted students to

10
present their ongoing research and receive feedback. Twenty (61%) were women.
Complementing these awards, the Institute of Scientific Information awarded a Doctoral
Dissertation Scholarship starting in 1982. Women won seven of eight awards (88%) between that
year and 1988.
Overall, women’s representation in some award categories, particularly the less prestigious ones,
and in major leadership positions, increased over time, in some cases mirroring membership
demographics. In both major award winners and leadership positions, however, a tiny number of
women accounted for the bulk of women’s representation. This containment of women
effectively inoculated ADI/ASIS against any major change. Moreover, women’s experiences did
not necessarily make them overt feminist advocates. For example, as an ASIS councilor, Hahn
voted against more inclusive pronoun usage in ASIS, and Bates (2012) remembered that the
University of Maryland dean Margaret Chisholm, who became the University of Washington’s
first woman vice president, “did to me what had been done to her…if you are a woman working
where there are few women, you do most of the work.” Patriarchy died hard in information
science.
Professional and scholarly publications
Over more than a quarter century (1962-1988), authors in ADI/ASIS informal and scholarly
publications seldom addressed feminist issues or concerns, whether in professional
announcements and news items, research, or in their rhetoric or discourse.
Professional announcements and news items
Inaugurated in 1974 as a successor to the ADI and ASIS newsletters, the ASIS Bulletin
complemented JASIS’s scholarly focus with more informal, non-technical content, including
ASIS (including SIG and chapter) activities and information science related social issues (Lass,
1973; H. S. White, 1974). Since members submitted news items, the Bulletin, however
infrequently, limned feminist activism, women’s awards and accomplishments, local women
focused programs, and brief research reports speaking to women’s concerns.
First, women’s feminist activism—albeit in a retrospective capacity—made the Bulletin in two
cases. Upon her 1976 retirement from Biological Abstracts (BIOSIS), Phyllis Parkins earned
plaudits as “a leader, a lady, and a liberated woman before Women’s Lib ever existed” (M.
Williams & Brandhorst, 1976, p. 39). Similarly, an obituary paid tribute to McDonnell Douglas
Corporation’s Virginia Raynes as past president of the Business and Professional Women’s Club
of St. Louis and as a member of the Women’s Political Caucus who was “a staunch fighter for,
and defender of women’s rights” (“Members in the News,” 1978, p. 45).
Second, ASIS women periodically celebrated “firsts” or the receipt of designated awards. In
1975, the University of Maryland’s Margaret Chisholm accepted a position as the University of
Washington’s first woman vice president. The Bulletin later (1984) saluted the University of
Illinois’s Martha Williams as the National Library of Medicine Board of Regents’ first woman
chair. Other women earned women’s awards or awards from women’s organizations. In 1971,
the University of Michigan gave five awards for outstanding service to the library profession.
Three years later, Barbara A. Frautschi of Battelle Columbus Laboratories received the
Columbus Technical Council’s first Technical Woman of the Year award and was named the
“CO-ASIS Woman of the Year.” Bunker Ramo Corporation’s Jan Krcmar meanwhile earned a
1976 Leadership Achievement Award Medallion from the Los Angeles YWCA. Perhaps most

11
striking, several ASIS women members noted their nomination for or receipt of a Federal
Woman’s Award: the Bureau of Standards’ Ruth M. Davis (1972), the Library of Congress’s
Henriette D. Avram (1974), and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission’s (CPSC’s)
Marilyn Bracken (1975). Still other women were elected to leadership posts of women’s
organizations. For example, the Library of Congress’s BevAnne Ross served as 1974-75
president of the Potomac Business and Professional Women of the D.C. State Federation.
Third, local ASIS chapters and Special Interest Groups (SIGs) sponsored occasional women-
centric programs in the mid-1970s. In 1974, the Metropolitan New York chapter hosted a
seminar in which the Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Ms. Magazine, Patricia Carbine, discussed
the challenges women managers faced. The group’s annual meeting again featured Carbine;
participants even received an SLA-created bibliography on the topic. A year later, the Delaware
Valley chapter hosted the Register of Copyrights’ Barbara Ringer, who spoke on “The Place of
Women and Minorities in Information Services.” Also in 1975, a Drexel University student
chapter meeting featured Martha Cornog of Auerbach Corporation, who talked about information
science careers for women.
Fourth, the Bulletin rarely printed brief research reports, three of which concentrated on women.
In one, Access Innovations’ Marjorie Hlava found that a disproportionate number of practicing
searchers (i.e., the lowest level employees) were women (Hahn, 1980). In another, SUNY-
Buffalo’s Dorothy Pollack reported on the frequent job discrimination in library management
positions (“Report of the 1980 ASIS Mid-Year Meeting,” 1980). At a 1987 ASIS student mini-
conference, finally, Rutgers University’s Jacqueline Algon earned best paper honors for a study
on women’s organizational negotiations (“ASIS Student Mini-Conferences Prove Successful,”
1987).
Whether concerning brief research reports, local activities, awards and achievements, or
activism, ASIS’s informal, member-driven Bulletin sometimes zeroed in on feminist topics. This
coverage offered important if quite modest grist for equity, inclusion, and belonging.
Research
Women rarely garnered attention in ADI/ASIS’s publications. Men far outnumbered women as
authors, while annual meeting programs and publications rarely focused on feminist concerns
such as representation or discrimination.
First, although bibliometric studies in ADI/ASIS publications usually ignored gender as a unit of
analysis, two articles underlined women’s lack of scholarly visibility. White and McCain’s
(1998) author co-citation analyses of twelve information science journals (1972-1995) found that
only 20 of the top 120 most cited authors were women (16.7%). Lipetz’s (1999) JASIS study
found that the percentage of all authors who were women changed from 20.6% (1955) to 10.4%
(1965) to 18.8% (1975) to 32.4% (1985). Further, the proportion of JASIS papers that featured at
least one female author changed from 33.3% (1955) to 14.3% (1965) to 25% (1975) to 40.4%
(1985). The proportion of JASIS papers with only women authors was much smaller, however:
14.3% (1955), 5.7% (1965), 18.2% (1975), and 25.5% (1985). The proportion of papers
featuring both women and men authors was also nominal: 19% (1955), 8.6% (1965), 6.8%
(1975), and 14.9% (1985). Despite an overall increase in women’s authorship, moreover, Lipetz
(1999) concluded that the percentage of women authors in JASIS remained lower than in cognate
fields’ journals (such as the SLA’s).

12
Second, ADI/ASIS programs and publications infrequently delved into women’s concerns. Three
annual meeting programs departed from this norm, however. In 1976, one Special Interest
Group’s (SIG’s) program focused on “Women in Information Science.” Attendees cited
“problems in the areas of pay, job opportunity, and inner- and outer-directed stereotypes as bases
of ASIS divergence from reasonable probability distributions in the proportion of women
presenting invited papers or holding prestigious elective or appointive offices” (“Information *
Politics in San Francisco: Highlights of ASIS-76,” 1976, p. 27). They also worried about the
federal government rolling back affirmative action. Proposed actions included student
scholarships, professional recognition, career guidance, and antidiscrimination strategies. Hinting
at the contentious nature of the topic—and potential hostility to it—the session organizers
insisted, “Persons who do not feel there is any discrimination in the information science field are
urged not to attend” (Uprichard, 1976, p. 15). This explicitly political event aside, two other
annual meeting programs centered on women’s assertiveness training. A 1977 session focused
on “how to stand up for your basic rights as a professional and as a person,” while a 1979 pre-
meeting workshop on assertive communication predicted benefits for entry and intermediate-
level “Information professionals (especially women)” (“ASIS Continuing Education Courses,”
1980, n.p.; “ASIS-77— September 26 to October 1—Chicago, Ill. Information Management in
the 1980’s,” 1977, p. 32). Yet these programs proved one-off, creating no lasting strategies or
vehicles (e.g., support groups) to engender change.
Third, research presented in ADI/ASIS publications (annual meeting proceedings, AD/JASIS, and
ARIST) generally ignored women’s lives, experiences, or concerns. Yet five exceptions stand out,
four of which frontally addressed equity. In one book review, future ASIS president Audrey
Grosch underlined the history of sexism in librarianship. She (1975) expressed the hope that
“reading this volume will help both sexes in the profession to work together to give women
professionals a better and fairer role in the profession” (p. 353). Furthering educational equity for
women, the federally funded Women’s Educational Equity Communications Network (WEECN)
developed a tertiary database. As Butler and Brandhorst (1980) explained, the platform focused
on topics such as “women’s participation in education; sex roles, sex role stereotypes, and their
relationship to educational and career decisions; family and socialization influences on
educational and career choices; school influences on educational equity for women; [and]
legislation related to sex discrimination in education” (p. 174). Hedvah Shuchman (1980)
likewise targeted inequity. She contended that the lack of women’s inclusion in informal
engineering networks hamstrung their professional advancement. Not only had men in
management and prospective women engineers yet to accept women in engineering, but
insidious stereotypes and social norms undercut optimal formal and informal men/women
working relationships. Expanded opportunities, she reasoned, would buoy both women’s careers
and the field overall since such opportunities facilitated increased publishing and patenting.
Nancy Geller and her associates (1981) investigated an allegation of gender discrimination
through citation analysis. An academic department denied tenure to a woman assistant professor
even as they tenured and promoted two men assistant professors. The department chair was a
male full professor. Geller et al. found that the woman scientist’s work was significantly more
effective than that of her promoted colleagues; in fact, it compared favorably with that of the
department chair. Less overtly political but also centering on women (namely, on the
feminization of poverty), Elfreda Chatman (1986) examined the working poor’s awareness and
use of job information. Considering 50 women temporarily employed as part of the urban
Comprehensive Employment and Training Act (CETA), Chatman concluded that diffusion theory

13
was applicable, albeit with modifications: e.g., new job information was useful so long as it was
recent. The study’s findings, Chatman asserted, could help information professionals better serve
low-income users. Remarkable though they were in the context of ASIS’s contemporary research
landscape, these publications hinted at no appreciable feminist methodological or
epistemological reorientation, much less a cogent agenda for feminist activism or change.
Rhetoric and discourse in ADI/ASIS publications
The rhetorical strategies and discursive choices of some authors constitute subtle but illuminating
evidence for the presence or lack of feminist themes in ADI/ASIS publications. Although not
focusing on women’s issues per se, a few scholars mentioned women rhetorically, usually in
terms of information storage and retrieval research. They tended to do so, however, by drawing
upon hoary stereotypes or employing retrograde, patronizing, or condescending language. For
example, writing on automated language processing, Robert Simmons (1966) reprised an
example that harkened to Victorian norms of sexual propriety: “A K-F dictionary entry for the
item honest might take the following form: honest - adjective - (evaluative) - (moral) - [innocent
of illicit sexual intercourse] - ((human) and (female))” (p. 142). Studying information searching
and retrieval in psychiatric videotapes, Brigitte Kenney and her colleagues (1970) relied upon
gendered medical stereotypes. They enlisted the example search, “’all patients who are depressed
or all patients who are female’” and ‘”all patients who are both female and depressed’” (p. 131).
Likewise buying into pernicious stereotypes of women’s propensity for mental health struggles,
in discussing search logic Norman Roth (1973) used the example of “’find t women and madness
or Schizophrenia and not a(uthor) chesler’” (p. 202). An irreverent Frederic Scheffler (1973)
analyzed information storage and retrieval systems. Flippantly invoking feminism, he offered the
example, “Boolean expression is Dad; Mom; Dad and Mom; Dad or Mom; Mom and Daughter
for women’s lib advocates; or some other individual or combination depending on the particular
family” (n.p.). In like mind, Herbert Landau (1979) offered a hypothetical dating example in
analyzing “people retrieval.” “Our first customer desires a match with a woman either attractive
or rich,” he wrote. “Here we can now employ the simple Boolean intersection logical (AND) and
simple Boolean union (logical OR) to frame our query: Female AND (Attractive OR Rich)” (p.
56).
Allan Whatley (1983) subsequently underlined the common problem of library users’ frustration
and disappointment. In doing so, he reverted to stereotyping women’s purportedly natural
domestic interests: “Suppose a Women’s Institute member wanted a book on weaving. She might
be ‘lucky’ if there was just one book in her local library” (n.p). Revisiting information retrieval,
Trudi Bellardo (1985) studied the attributes of online searchers. She considered, among other
factors, their personality traits vis-à-vis masculinity, femininity, and self-esteem as calibrated by
the Interpersonal Disposition Inventory. Again, stereotypical notions of gender loomed large.
Notably, femininity—“A domain containing themes of nurturance (compassionate, warm, gentle,
sympathetic, affectionate, sensitive to the needs of others, eager to soothe hurt feelings),
introversion (soft-spoken, shy), and self-subordination (childlike, flatterable)”—did not correlate
with searcher effectiveness (Bellardo, 1985, n.p.). These examples implied just how lightly
women were regarded—and just how easily they were othered rhetorically.
Not only rhetoric, but discourse proved another arena in which authors either included or
deprecated women. On the one hand, scattered language in a handful of ASIS publications,
namely the use of the phrase “men and women” and pronouns, namely “chairperson” or

14
“chairwoman” instead of “chairman,” gave an indication of some discursive movement, however
modest, toward inclusion and belonging (“‘A World of Information’ Is Theme of 1972 ASIS
Annual Meeting,” 1972; “Chemists’ Club Invites New Members,” 1973; “New Products
Displayed,” 1981; “Pitt Conference on Electronic Information Handling,” 1966; Armstrong,
1982; Bonn, 1962; Chartrand, 1986a, 1986b; Durr, 1978; Hayne, 1960; Kaiser, 1963; Kent &
Lancour, 1965; Kikuchi, 1967; A. King, 1965; Lasswell, 1965; London, 1968; Minick, 1973;
Nemzer, 1973; Sarett, 1968; Weisman, 1967; Woolston, 1972). In other words, a few authors no
longer reflexively assumed that men’s and only men’s experience was normative.
On the other hand, efforts to promote inclusive language could elicit patronizing retorts. In one
piece Fritz Machlup (1979) snidely remarked, “men—which of course stands for men and
women” (p. 111). More important, numerous writers used gendered language that seemed
patronizing or disrespectful, thereby facilitating a discursive othering of women. For instance,
Harold Wooster (1964) satirically played upon a recent government task force’s coinage of a
neologism, “STINFo,” to denote scientific-technical information. Unable to resist needling
women, Wooster (1964) listed other neologisms, including “Stinfowl—By extension from hen
medic, a female documentalist” (p. 152). Daniel Cooper (1966) similarly objectified and belittled
women, noting, “I know librarians are not always women, it’s just more pleasant to think of them
that way” (n.p.). In even more condescending mood, Andrew Aines (1977) reported on recent
research characterizing human touch as a key communicative medium. “Positive effects seem to
be more pronounced on women than on men,” he observed, then quipped, “Let’s not go
overboard, based on this information, guys—the researchers are reporting on a limited sample”
(p. 8). Introducing a novel musical network, Ellsworth Mason (1984) noted mordantly that the
product “advances the cause of affirmative action by the use of a female computer” (p. 35). A
patronizing Edward Cremmins (1984) even characterized ASIS as a “truly ‘nearly great’
trailblazing society” because “in its last two national elections, it has had not just one but two
female candidates for its highest elective office, its presidency” (p. 27). In a final revealing
example, Ji-ren Bao (1988) objectified women aesthetically. He suggested, “if a scientist may not
notice the color of a woman’s clothing, because he concentrates his mind very strongly on
academic matters, we would consider this scientist very academic” (n.p.). Overall, then, men
writers who mentioned women showed little inclination to treat them as legitimate partners in the
information science enterprise. Rather, women remained objects or ornaments, rarely to be taken
seriously.
Conclusion
Despite spatial constraints, this paper makes three major scholarly interventions. It bridges a
tremendous gap in the history of information science, specifically the history of women in the
field. Overall, feminism made scarcely a ripple, let alone a (second) wave, in post-World War II
information science. As the organization tallied a half century of achievements in 1988 (e.g.,
ADI/ASIS past presidents, councilors, and award winners), it was evident that although women
had come a long way from effective invisibility, they had a long way yet to go to achieve full
equity, inclusion, and belonging. As of the late 1980s, feminism remained contained in ASIS.
Additionally, this paper breaks new ground in bringing a feminist epistemology of science
perspective to information science research. We home in on both representation and
marginalization, research standpoints and methods, and rhetoric and discourse. Even as they

15
achieved greater numerical parity with men in ASIS membership over time, women remained
underrepresented in virtually all areas of society leadership and recognition. In the same vein,
women’s lives, experiences, and bodies rarely merited recognition or study, and what little
attention they received seldom put them on equal footing with men.
Finally, we contribute to the broader history of science. ADI/ASIS offers a useful test case for
Rossiter’s contentions concerning scientific societies. The association resembled Rossiter’s
societies vis-à-vis women in three ways. First, women in ADI/ASIS generally occupied the
lowest paying and lowest prestige occupations (namely, library and clerical). Second, ADI/ASIS
effectively ignored demographics as a concern, then never acted even after surveys uncovered
troubling imbalances. Third, women entered the ranks of ADI/ASIS leadership in greater
numbers beginning in the 1970s. Conversely, ADI/ASIS differed from the societies examined by
Rossiter in four ways. First, although ADI/ASIS boasted a far greater percentage of women than
the scientific societies analyzed by Rossiter, it witnessed no commensurate broad-gauged
politicization, namely the taking of stances on public issues, nor did 1972 represent a sharp break
after which feminism in ASIS made conspicuous progress. Second, ADI/ASIS ushered in no
women’s caucus or committee, much less any petitions, consciousness-raising activities,
fundraising, publications, or marches. ADI/ASIS moreover failed to support national liberal
feminist initiatives such as equal opportunity, affirmative action, childcare, or the Equal Rights
Amendment. Third, ADI/ASIS never saw appreciable challenges to biased informal scientific
networks, e.g. conference leadership. Fourth, ADI/ASIS leaders buried feminist issues,
preserving a patina of scientific neutrality and objectivity. While so many other scientific
organizations spoke out, ADI/ASIS remained conspicuous in its silence.
The experience of women in ADI/ASIS between 1962 and 1988 suggests three lessons. First,
much as they may wish, (information) scientists cannot hermetically seal off their scientific work
from broader political, social, and cultural concerns. Indeed, claiming to do so is disingenuous at
best. Second, the very structure of scientific societies militates against change and thus
potentially impedes efforts toward equity, inclusion, and belonging. Therefore, societies must
make deliberate efforts—ideally midwifed by constitutional or by-laws changes—to integrate
new and diverse members into leadership positions and decision-making. Third, societies must
develop democratic and transparent mechanism(s), e.g., membership referenda, through which to
broach social issues and determine optimal strategies to address them.
We suggest two questions for future research. First, the early 1980s saw the rise of the New
Right. A incipient backlash gained further momentum, targeting in particular women’s right to
choose and the ERA (Faludi, 1991; Rosen, 2000; Stansell, 2010). Faced with this backlash, did
younger generations of information scientists engage more explicitly with feminist
epistemologies or did they retreat? Second, this paper analyzes the feminism of highly educated,
white, middle class women. How might a consideration of intersectional feminism(s) enrich our
understanding of information science history?
“Fair treatment of women,” Bates (2005) insists, “can happen only when we ALL self-
consciously ask ourselves what we are doing every time we apportion work and rewards.” It
therefore demands a “self-conscious effort to change” (Bates, 2005). That change, however,
remains a work in progress—not only in information science, but in American society.

16
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