(COPYRIGHT PAGE)

This publication can be purchased from the

YOUNG ADULT LIBRARY SERVICES ASSOCIATION,

a division of the AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION

50 East Huron Street, Chicago, Illinois 60611

ISBN: 0-8389-7913-0

Copyright (symbol) 1997 by the American Library Association. All rights reserved except

those which may be granted by Sections 107 and 108 of the Copyright Revision Act of

1976.

A special thanks to:

donation purchased the rights to reprint the photo of Mike Printz taken by Chuck

Kneyse.

permission to reprint Mike Printz, 1937 - 1996, by Joanne Proctor.

Printed in the United States of America

Dedication

Life Summary: Michael L. Printz, May 27, 1937 - September 29, 1996 - Judy Druse

Introductory Essay: A Splendid Man - Marilyn Miller

Photographs

Section I: Mike Speaks for Himself

A Big Fat Hen; A Couple of Ducks, June 30, 1991 - Mike Printz

An Unusual Contribution: The Work of 1993 Grolier Award Winner

Mike Printz, an Interview - Roger Sutton

Section II: Kansans Remember

A People Man - Diane Goheen

Mike Printz: Master Teacher - Robert Grover

The Topeka West Oral History Projects - Allen W. Hartzell

A Broom Closet Library and a Sad Silk Flower Arrangement: Life with

Mike Printz - Barbara Lynn

Mike Printz, 1937-1996 - Joanne Proctor

Section III: From Across the Nation

Caring Enough to Give Your Very Best: Mike Printz as a Leader -

Michael Cart

Remembering Mike - Mary K. Chelton

A Man of Consequence - Chris Crutcher

BBYAer par Excellence - Sally Estes

My Favorite Fan - Gary Paulsen

A Man with Roots - Hazel Rochman

The Mike Printz Theory of Collection Development, Life and a Few

Other Matters - Pam Spencer

A Passion for Excellence - Deborah Taylor

A Respecter of Kids, A Lover of Books - Jeanne Vestal

Section IV: Tributes

1993 Grolier Foundation Award Citation

1997 ALA Council Memorial Resolution

Epilogue: A Poem - Lynda Miller

This book is being published by the Young Adult Library Services (YALSA) as a tribute to one

of its most beloved and highly respected members, Mike Printz.

Many of Mike's closest friends were also colleagues. In the essays that follow you will discover

how Mike touched their lives both professionally and personally.

Mike was a collector. He collected Fiesta dishes, teddy bears, books, and friends. Mike loved

not only the collecting but also the displaying and promoting of what he collected.

Despite his talents as a collector, Mike was the first to admit he wasn't very good at collecting

money. He often said that he kept his money in circulation because it was good for the economy.

YALSA believes in keeping the memories of Mike in circulation because it's good for the

profession.

Linda Waddle

Colleague, Friend, YALSA Deputy Executive Director

you that the majority of contributors shed buckets of tears as they struggled to put on

paper what Mike Printz meant in their lives.

and varied. Some of the contributors know each other and dislike each other: Mike

collected individuals and if some of them did not like each other, it never influenced how

he felt about them.

Everything you need to know to become a great youth services librarian you can

learn from this volume. Respect the young people you work with; challenge them to

perform, and they will. Add technology, not because it is the current fad, but because it

offers library users more and better tools to help with their research papers and personal

information needs. Most of all, read and love books and appreciate the authors and

editors who create them.

Be active in your state and national association and inspire others to do the same.

For many, when there was no other good reason for attending an American Library

Association Annual Conference or Midwinter Meeting, the thought of seeing Mike was

enough to make the trip worthwhile.

September 28, 1996, was a very gray day in Kansas. As I stood in the backyard

operation on September 9, the clouds in the east magically disappeared and the full

moon shone brightly. Then, gradually, a dark shadow crept across the moon, little by little

blocking out the light until the eclipse was complete. I could not help but think that Mike

Printz was, for many of us, our full moon, and that little by little he was being removed

from our lives. The next day, in the early afternoon, Mike's partner called to say Mike had

died.

diminishes us: we were more than diminished, we were devastated. And still are.

Dorothy M. Broderick, Editor

---------------------------------

Life Summary

Michael L. Printz

May 27, 1936-September 29, 1996

Judy Druse

Mike Printz gave a piece of his heart to all his students, friends and colleagues. No

wonder it gave out after a short fifty-nine years. Mike died September 29, 1996, from

complications following heart surgery.

Michael L. Printz was born May 27, 1937, at Clay Center, Kansas, the son of Floyd

and Hazel Printz. He graduated from Clay Center Community High School in 1955;

earned his bachelor of arts degree in English and history from Washburn University of

Topeka, Kansas, in 1960; and received his master's degree in library science from

Emporia State University in Kansas in 1964. Mike would, in later years, return to

Washburn University as an adjunct assistant professor in the Department of English

State University where he was a visiting professor in the Graduate School of Library

and Information Management.

In 1970 Mike served as president of the Kansas Association of School Librarians

and in 1972 as a regional director for the American Association of School Librarians, a

division of the American Library Association (ALA). However, the ALA division in which

he was most active, where he found kindred spirits, was the Young Adult Library

Services Association (YALSA). He served on the YALSA's Best Books for Young Adults

Committee from 1982 to 1985 and again from 1993 to his untimely death; he was the

1985 committee chair. It was during Mike's first term on this committee that he became

nationally recognized as an expert on literature for young adults. Publishers sought his

counsel, and librarians flocked to conferences to hear him speak. The attention

overwhelmed him--he was just doing what came naturally, sharing with others his love

of books, reading and working with young adults.

First and foremost, Mike was a teacher. Fresh out of college, he accepted a

position as a part-time English teacher, part-time librarian at Onaga (Kans.) High

School. Mike loved working with the young people, but not necessarily in a classroom

environment. In 1963, he moved on to become a librarian at Highland Park (Kans.)

High School; and then in 1969 he moved across town to become a librarian at Topeka

West (Kans.) High School, where he remained for the next twenty-five years until his

retirement in 1994. After retiring, Mike worked as a marketing consultant and selection

specialist for Econo-Clad Books of Topeka, Kansas.

Mike was known for his ability to stimulate his students' love of learning. That's

because he never stopped learning himself. Although he often swore he wouldn't touch

a computer, he was one of the first school librarians to demonstrate and incorporate

online searching into his research skills curriculum. He always said that he wanted to

teach his students two things: how to follow directions and how to work independently.

He taught much more. He taught caring, responsibility and pride. The projects he

initiated at Topeka West High School reflect this.

In 1976 Mike pioneered a Kansas Oral History Project in which students created

video documentaries about a famous Kansan or event in Kansas History. These oral

history projects sometimes sent students across the country for interviews, a fearful

trek for some who had hardly ever left home. Mike encouraged, sometimes scolded,

but always believed in his students. This trust and respect carried them beyond their

apprehensions. These students not only learned of their own proud heritage, but they

became scholars who donated their projects to the Kansas State Historical Society for

future researchers to use. One of the proudest moments of Mike's life was a reunion

with his oral historians.

Mike also initiated an author-in-residence program at Topeka West to give

students an opportunity to work with and learn from noted authors like Gary Paulsen

and Chris Crutcher. The Mike Printz Author-in-Residence Program is now in its

fourteenth year. In addition, Topeka West students and faculty still celebrate an annual

Ethnic Week, a cross-curricular, literature-based study initiated by Mike.

Because of his pioneering work with young adults, Mike won many awards and

honors over the years. In 1988 he was named the District Teacher of the Year for

Topeka Unified School District 501. Topeka West students and faculty celebrated with

a special "Mike Printz Day." In 1993 Mike won the prestigious Grolier Award from ALA.

High School library has been named in Mike's honor. As much as Mike appreciated

these awards and honors, he reveled more in the accomplishments of his friends, and

most in the minor successes of a previously-unsuccessful student.

Mike respected the youth with whom he worked and hoped they would in turn

respect themselves. He believed in treating others the way you wanted to be treated,

regardless of age. He made his students, his friends and his colleagues feel important.

He modeled what it means to care. He gave much of himself.

October 1, 1996, said "Mike Printz was a kind of travel agent for life. He took Topeka

students through books and oral history projects, on wondrous journeys they might

never have experienced without his enlightened guidance."

Mike was a pushover for a clever phrase or passage in a book. One of his

Restless by Gerald Raftery (Vanguard, 1964). One of these lines reads, "But there are

moments when I realize how lucky I am to be a librarian." Mike knew how lucky he was;

and those of us who knew him count ourselves lucky too. His death leaves a void in the

hearts of us all.

----------------

Judy Druse is the Curriculum Media Librarian at Washburn University, Topeka, Kansas.

Marilyn Miller

Mike Printz and I were friends for nearly forty years. During those nearly

forty years, we were also professional colleagues. Both parts of our lives were intricately

entwined. We shared professional aspirations, accomplishments, plans, philosophy, and

activities. We shared personal triumphs, failures, health disasters, families, and

compatible friends. I left Topeka, Kansas, in l967 where our ten years of friendship and

professional collaboration began and flourished. I left for other locations, types of jobs,

and challenges. Mike moved to Topeka from Onaga, KS, in l962. He remained there as

a building level school librarian until l993 when he retired. Throughout his career Mike

was contented with his job as building level school librarian and the frequent

opportunities that were presented to him to teach library science courses for two

Universities and to work as a consultant to Econo-Clad Books. He found deep,

continued fascination with young people and helping them learn was for him a never

ending challenge, opportunity, and source of great satisfaction.

Distance was never a problem in our long association. The phone was our

communication medium of choice. We never wrote. In fact until l993 we didn't

exchange cards at Christmas. I would send him a card each year, and once he

received it he would telephone to wish us a Merry Christmas. Just one of his quirks he

would remind me. Sharing time at ALA, my occasional trips to Topeka, and his rare

trips to North Carolina, where I eventually settled and which was the home of excellent

flea markets that he so dearly loved, gave us opportunities for those sit down

reminiscing times that were so very important to us.

The major problem of trying to summarize the early years of Mike's and our

relationship is that I do not, unbelievable as it may seem, remember when or where I

met Mike. (The absence of a diary or a journal is the loss of memory, so specific dates

are a problem.) I assume we met at a regional meeting of the Kansas Association of

School Librarians since Onaga and Topeka were in the same region. I assume we

struck up a conversation because we were both relatively new school librarians,

younger than most who attended those meetings, and we were both high school

librarians who enjoyed our schools immensely. Mike has spoken publicly and written

about being a student of mine. I don't remember that either. The first course I taught for

the then Emporia State Teachers College was in children's literature, and I was so

numb with what I didn't know that I am afraid I remember only one face from that

course, and it is not Mike's. Wherever and whenever, the groundwork was established

for a long friendship.

Mike was an intense young man. He was energetic, outgoing, loyal, and easy to

get to know. He had eclectic interests, and his ability to demonstrate commitment to

friends, students, colleagues, and his work as a librarian was inspiring. More than any

of these things, though, was his deep passion for reading and his fervent belief that

reading would help young people grow and develop. He believed in the power of the

book to change lives. He believed that young people could develop a wider

understanding of their lives and their world. He believed that books would bring to

young readers solace, understanding, inspiration, insight, courage, and an appreciation

for life's experiences that they might or might not face themselves. None of those

characteristics changed over the years. They just intensified. In addition, however, as

Mike grew older his deep complexities as a human being became more evident. And

as he became more determined to have only the best for his school library, he

demonstrated interesting techniques to gain the support he needed in times of forced

economies or priorities of others for expenditures and allocations. But those are stories

for others to tell.

Shortly after the Kansas State Plan for administration of Title II of the

Elementary and Secondary Act was accepted by the U.S. Office of Education, I went to

Mike, who by then was in his fourth year at Highland Park High School in Topeka, and

informed him that as consultant for Title II, I needed a school library that could

demonstrate the multi-media approach. "O.K. he responded, "what do I need to do."

Within a very few weeks, Mike, with the help of the custodial staff and the cooperation

of his wonderful principal, Earl Volkland, had developed a very basic, elementary, but

workable audiovisual center. They had taken a library table, partitioned into sections so

he had individual stations for a tape recorder, a phonograph with ear phones, a

filmstrip projector, a sound filmstrip projector, an 8mm film cartridge projector, and a

slide carousel projector. And, of course, being Mike, and unafraid of striking out, he

began immediately to structure with teachers the assignments and activities that would

get those stations used by students. I can hear him now talking excitedly about the way

the physical ed. students were using the 8mm projector to study various techniques in

track and field, how the home economics students were using filmstrips to study the art

of table setting. Highland Park became one of the first demonstration high school

library media centers to help implement the State's ESEA plan, and Mike began to

write about their experiences, host visiting librarians and administrators, and doing

some speaking at workshops and conferences in the State.

Mike always took his multi-media responsibilities and opportunities seriously,

and those opportunities one day would turn into the demanding and rewarding oral

history project that would send Topeka West students all over the country interviewing

famous Kansans. However, in spite of the sophistication he gained with multi-media,

he was quick to admit another quirk. He always claimed to me that he would never

learn how to operate a 16mm projector. "I have to draw the line, somewhere," he

vowed. According to conversations many years later, he still had not given in. No

matter, however, how far he plunged into the "multi-media concept" and how

competent and creative he became in the librarian's roles of teacher and curriculum

consultant, it was always the books and the power of reading that most quickly turned

Mike into a passionate advocate for learning and experiencing through resources.

Mike's focus on books would inevitably be enlarged by his discovery of the

people who wrote the books he loved to present to kids. I found it great fun to watch

him work with authors. Once he realized the rewards of knowing and sharing with

authors, Mike began to "discover" authors whom he believed had powerful messages

for young readers. He joyously supported these authors with his friendship, his counsel

about young readers when it was sought, and his introduction of their work to his

students. Perhaps his first discovery was Joanne Greenberg. His process for

identifying great young adult authors grew more sophisticated with time, but this first

discovery was great fun.

"Let me show you a wonderful book. It is my perk choice." I, of course, did not know

what a perk choice was. A perk choice was a little reward system Mike had developed

for the book collection. After he would finish making a book order and listing everything

he was supposed to for the curriculum and for his good books for young adults

a title that fascinated him.

"Look here," he pointed to a book written under the pseudonym Hannah Green.

impressed with either the title or the annotation, but when it arrived I dutifully opened it

and was grabbed, as Mike had been, from chapter one with its tremendous promise for

young adult readers. Mike got busy, trying to find out the author's real name, writing

reviewers and the publishers urging them to recommend this book for young adult

readers. Mike eventually found the author's real name and located her. They

corresponded, and when Joanne Greenberg came to Topeka a few years later to do

This Sign, Mike learned the genuine pleasure that flows from a friendship with a

creative artist. That experience led him to a lifetime of many great friendships with

those who write for adolescents.

Mike's book knowledge quickly gained him a seat on The Kansas Reading

Circle. The Kansas Reading Circle was a book selection and supply project of the

Kansas State Teachers' Association. The book selection committee, composed of

teachers, librarians, and administrators, selected current titles each year for all levels

of Kansas schools. The books selected were presented in a catalog and jobbed to the

schools. Mike's wide reading, wonderful ability to select those titles that would speak to

adolescents, and his persuasive advocacy made a tremendous impact on that

committee in a time when publishing for young adults was beginning to change, and

we needed to look at more adult titles for young adults. I think Mike served longer on

that committee than any other person in the history of the Kansas Reading Circle. As a

result of his work with the committee, his reputation began to move even farther out

into the state.

I don't remember Mike and me ever arguing about anything. I was miffed at him

one time, but I waited thirty-two years to tell him about it--publicly, of course, when he

came to my retirement party in 1995 to lead the wonderful roast prepared by my

colleagues. When I decided to leave my building-level position at Topeka High School

in 1961 for a position with the State Department of Public Instruction, I wanted Mike to

take the position. Topeka High School was a wonderful school with undoubtedly the

most beautifully decorated, handsomely furnished, spacious library in the Midwest if

not the entire country. A sympathetic administration, a talented faculty, a wonderfully

diverse, talented student body, and an excellent curriculum would support all the talent

and ability I knew he possessed. I felt that Mike and that wonderful school deserved

each other. It was time for him to leave Onaga, expand his influence, and have the

support to try all of the things he wanted to do. He would not take the job. His response

to all of my pleas was, "I will not follow you."

It worked out that in l962, the following year, he did come to Topeka. The

principal at Highland Park High School had met Mike, and when the librarian

announced her retirement, Earl Volkland quickly turned to Mike. I did get mine back

then, just a little, for Mike's not coming to my beloved Topeka High School. One of two

things neither Mike nor I ever enjoyed was cataloging. Cataloging was a necessary

evil. When he reported to Highland Park and began looking around, he found an

appalling organizational mess. His predecessor cataloged the books, prepared the

catalog cards, and then as she should have, she put the call numbers on the back of

the book. The only problem was if the spine was not wide enough for the call number,

she would just stop when she was out of spine. The result was an interesting series of

collections within collections. I always reminded him that while I did not like to catalog

either, he could have saved many months of grief if he had done what I wanted him to

and taken the position at Topeka High for we had completed recataloging of Topeka

High's collection and none of our books were spineless.

Mike revolutionized the library at Highland Park High School. He took a library

that cried for attention and fixed it. He reached out to students and faculty who, within a

few weeks, realized that they were participating in a revolution. Before he left for

Topeka West High School where his career really came to fruition, Mike built a

program, embraced the emerging multi-media approach to learning, designed and

presided over a redesigned and renovated library, and realized his desire to become

an essential, integral part of the school, or, as we liked to say in those days, the "heart

of the school."

Mike moved to Topeka West in the early 1970s, and his achievements there

were legion and will undoubtedly be described in other essays in this tribute. He began

to be recognized in larger circles, and his maturity as a librarian was enhanced and

expressed through his eventual activities in YALSA and the increasing number of

opportunities to do workshops and speak at conferences. He truly became an

inspiration and a model for others throughout the country.

I must note here almost parenthetically that I believe Mike's defining moment as

a service-oriented librarian serving youth came from the assassination of John F.

Kennedy. Mike was deeply affected by the presidential efforts of Kennedy and by his

exhortations to service that he delivered so well to the American people. Kennedy's

death was a shattering experience for Mike. I believe that in the few months following

that tragedy, Mike's values coalesced and centered on what would be the driving force

in his life--service to others through librarianship, counseling, and unselfish friendship.

I cannot end this without sharing two of my very favorite stories. Mike and I

reminisced about them often and shared them with others every chance we had. Both

were to be in the travel book we were going to write someday for novice and naive

travelers. The kind of travelers we were in our early years, before, we would slyly

laugh, we became sophisticated world travelers. One chapter would be entitled, "Oh,

Look at That Nice Little Closet in the Hotel Room Door." OR, "So That is What Valet

Service Is."

Mike was in Chicago for some ALA event or other. He came in his hotel room

the first night, and, as he took his coat off, he noticed a door within the hotel room

door. He opened it and found a little closet-like space, and he thought it was so nice to

have that extra closet especially for a wet coat. It would save his clothes in the main

closet from getting damp. So, he hung it in the small closet in the door.

It is important to know that the hotel was the Palmer House. And it is important

to know that twenty-five years ago before there were so many hotels and the necessity

for public relations and customer friendly behavior, hotel clerks could be very snippy. It

always seemed to me in those days that the desk clerks at the Palmer House were the

models for snippy behavior.

So, Mike hung his coat in the nice little closet in the door and went to bed. In the

middle of the night, Mike heard someone rustling at his door. He hears the little door

being opened, so he jumped out of bed, peeked out the door, and saw a man going

around the corner with his coat over his arm. He threw on his clothes, took the elevator

to the lobby and rushed breathlessly up to the desk and blurted out his complaint that

his coat had just been taken from his room. The desk clerk looked at him haughtily and

snippily told him about the purpose of the nice little closet in the door. "I was so

embarrassed," Mike laughed. "I slunk back to the elevator, and at the next floor, what

do you think? Jimmy Durante got on, and we had the best conversation while we went

back up to my floor. I was so excited."

Another chapter was going to be "The Joys of Eating Cold Soup." I took Mike to

his first Newbery-Caldecott banquet. The first course was vichyssoise. We picked up

our spoons and began in unison to sip our soup. After a few sips, Mike, who was sitting

to my left, said out of the right side of his mouth, "Marilyn, my soup's cold." Without

either of us breaking sipping stride, I responded out of the left side of my mouth, "Mike,

it's supposed to be." We dutifully finished our soup without further discussion.

Just as we started our careers sharing experiences and good times, we ended

our active careers sharing honors. To my absolute delight, Mike was named the l993

recipient of the Grolier Award, and the presentation coincided with my presiding as

president of ALA at that year's inaugural banquet. As we sat side by side at the head

table, we talked about the wonderful times we had had in the profession we shared and

the many outstanding and memorable people we had had the great good fortune to

know. As Mike's beautiful Grolier citation was read, all I could think of was that here

stood one of my great good fortunes and how truly I had been favored to know and love

such a splendid man.

---------------------------------------------

Marilyn L. Miller is professor emeritus at the University of North Carolina, at

Greensboro, Greensboro, North Carolina.

June 30, 1991

Mike Printz

President Daugherty, Mr. Rogers, platform guests and colleagues, I am delighted to

be here today. I have titled my remarks "Big Fat Hen and a Couple of Ducks," and

when I finish I hope everyone understands why. When President Richard Daugherty

telephoned and asked me to share with you, I was touched and honored. I also began

to think about what success is and realized immediately that all librarians have success

stories, and those stories happen because of many people and not just one. In schools,

success comes to pass because of teachers, students, administrators, authors,

publishers, parents, and a network of professional colleagues all over the country. After

thirty-two years as a school librarian, I think I have begun to develop a credo or a series

of beliefs I have about this profession. Like most of us I'd like to take credit for this

philosophy, but I must give credit to those people who helped develop a success story

that I mentioned earlier. I am fortunate that some of those folks are here today, and

when I mention their names, I'd like for them to stand. One of my earliest mentors was

Dr. Marilyn Miller (President-Elect of ALA) and she is responsible for starting my

professional guidelines.

In the early 60s Marilyn was librarian at Topeka High School and taught a summer

course in school librarianship at the library school in Emporia. In addition to being a

very practical course, she instilled in me four ideas that have guided me for these

years. She said that school librarians must keep abreast of curriculum; we must adapt

to the new technologies; we must insist that service to students and teachers come

before everything else, even filing cards in the card catalog; and we must care about

those young adults who attend our school. She said that if we followed those directives

that program success could result and that we might even change one young adult's life

in a positive manner. I remember thinking to myself that I wanted to change thousands

of lives, but she continued by saying that perhaps that is all one person could do in this

life and that is to change another person's life positively. Somehow, I have never

forgotten her words.

So here goes, here is my credo; here is what I believe about this business of school

librarianship. I believe that every young adult can learn and the library is the best place

for this to happen. In the library every student can find all types of learning materials to

meet educational needs, be it the most sophisticated computer software to seed

catalogs. In my early years I built strong collections of all types of print and non-print

learning materials and was proud of the way they were being used. Marilyn Miller was

now in Michigan and came to visit and, I don't want to say Marilyn badgers, but she

subtly reminds you that you could be doing more. After viewing classes using these

varied materials, she wondered where the audiovisual production facility and video

editing bays were located. Thus came our next challenges and the two were

established. Now, I also believe that if you spout philosophy, you must follow with proof.

Not long after we established the production center, Bobby came into our library lives.

Bobby was a fifth year senior in a three-year high school. He was not a discipline

problem; he just didn't come to school on a regular basis. We even joked in the faculty

lounge that he had more tenure than most of us. He had even convinced the school

nurse that he had to take a pill each day after lunch and then rest for thirty minutes on

the cot in her office. This went on for several weeks until the nurse got suspicious and

had the white jelly-bean-pill tested. I don't think that even President Reagan got that

many miles out of jelly beans. Bobby had one great love in life and that was working on

cars. He got a job offer to be a mechanic, but, alas, he had to have a high school

diploma. He needed one course to graduate and that course was British Literature,

which, needless to say, was not his "cup of tea." His teacher or saint, Marge Bakalar,

told him that she would be fair and explicitly outlined what he must do to pass British

Literature. Before the study of Macbeth, the class came to the library to prepare oral

reports concerning Elizabethan culture. Bobby's topic was falconry. He had no idea

what falconry is and began to read. In one of those magical moments in a kid's life,

something happened, and he became fascinated and looked up everything we had on

mother got involved and she worked for the Menninger Foundation, which has a

collection of rare books on falconry. She was able to borrow those, and Bobby used our

production equipment and prepared slides to accompany his talk. He didn't attend

school for three days prior to his presentation date, but came to the library to practice.

The day of the falconry report arrived as did Bobby with clean fingernails, shampooed

hair, and new clothes. Off he went to the classroom with slide projector and notes in

hand. He returned in about thirty minutes, and he had tears in his eyes. Now, I think

you know Bobby well enough to know that tears were not common. I was sure the

worst had happened, and I went to him and asked if the projector blew a lamp or what.

on to his mechanic's job. About ten years later, I encountered Bobby's mother in the

shopping mall and asked after her son. She informed me that Bobby did not come

home from Vietnam and that she had just returned from Washington where she saw his

name on the Wall. She said she didn't know that people could leave things at the Wall,

or she would have taken one of his prize possessions. I told her that I was going to

Washington for Midwinter ALA in a few weeks, and I would be glad to take what she

wanted placed there. She brought the envelope to the library and asked me not to open

it until I got to the Wall. I followed her instructions, and when I opened the envelope, it

contained one 2" x 2" slide. I held it to the light, and it was his title slide. It read:

"Falconry in Elizabethan Times: Directed, Written and Produced by Bobby Fisher." I

remember wondering that day if his short life was the one that Marilyn Miller had talked

about having been made better by a library experience.

Several years passed, and in 1985 Marilyn Miller came to visit again, and I proudly

showed her our production and video facilities, and she seemed impressed, but in her

true style wondered where the computers were located and what online services we

offered. I remember thinking that we could not possibly find time to add one more

service, until I went to visit Linda Waddle at the Cedar Falls (Iowa) High School Library.

Linda, would you please stand?

We had both been members of the YASD's Best Books for Young Adults

Committee, and she had given glowing reports of her successes with Dialog, the online

searching computer program. Incidentally, Linda is now the deputy executive director of

YASD. What a thrill and coup for that division's membership! She demonstrated to me

how quickly students could get bibliographies and how some databases even printed

out magazine and newspaper articles full text. This was in 1985, and I decided to try a

search about a topic for which I could find no materials when a student asked. It was

September and Dr. Robert Ballard, a native Kansan, had just discovered the Titanic.

Using traditional research materials, I had located two newspaper clippings from our

local paper. By using Dialog, I found fourteen citations--seven of them full text. I was

sold! Never again would students leave empty handed. My principal pulled some

secret, magic strings, and we introduced our students to Dialog in the spring.

I believe that school libraries should provide opportunities for young adults to get in

touch with their own local heritage and history by providing oral history experiences.

During the Bicentennial of the nation I became concerned as to what students would

remember about 1976 ten years hence. The commercialism bothered me, and when I

came home one day and the Avon lady had left a catalog advertising George and

Martha Washington hand soap, I decided to implement an oral history program at

Topeka West. Briefly, the experience works like this. Seniors enroll during their last

semester. They are paired with a partner and assigned a significant event in Kansas

history or a famous Kansan. During the next three months they prepare a thirty-minute

video documentary concerning their topic. They raise all their own money, conduct

interviews and after spending the last month of school sharing their findings with civic

groups and school classes, they present their projects to the Kansas State Historical

Society for scholars and researchers to use in the future. After sixteen years of these

projects, we have covered 160 topics involving almost 320 seniors. They put to use

everything they have learned in eleven and one-half years and travel all over the U.S.

to conduct interviews. In addition to what these students learn about original research,

primary sources, raising money, traveling, and communicating, I feel they begin to

realize that one can hail from Kansas or any state and do anything they want with their

lives if they are willing to work hard enough and dream big enough. I sometimes

wonder if Shannon, who developed a one-woman show concerning the women in

Dwight Eisenhower's life, or J.R., who covered Indianapolis 500 winner Rick Mears and

chose racing as his profession, is the one Marilyn Miller spoke about. Carol Wilson, our

school's Department of English chairperson, does oral history projects with her students

who interview senior citizens about a multitude of subjects on a one-to-one basis and

then the class desk-top publishes a booklet of the interviews.

believe that librarians, perhaps school and public together, need to let young adults

know that we do not live alone on this continent or in this world. Diane Goheen and I

are co-librarians at Topeka West High School and provide multicultural experiences

that stretch across the curriculum and are based on literature. Hazel Rochman, a young

apartheid in South Africa. She compiled these autobiographical and fiction vignettes by

South African writers when she was a school librarian and was working with a social

and created an awareness in our school when the library sponsored a week of

nationally known anti-apartheid speakers featured in library forums, film festivals,

community speakers, student art and poetry exhibits based upon that book. Our

principal provided fifty copies of Hazel Rochman's book several months before the

week began so that classes in all areas of the curriculum could have time to develop an

awareness. After the week was over our student council took out all the Coke machines

in our school because Coca-Cola supports the South African government. One student

got a summer job with the state department of education. Her task was to help with

clerical jobs concerning a tri-state educational meeting being held at a Holiday Inn in St.

Louis. She was to help make room reservations at the motel and remembered that

Holiday Inn also supported the South African government. She told her supervisor that

she could not morally make those reservations and she told him why. He responded

and changed the location. Now I know that those two actions did not hurt Coke or

Holiday Inn, but young adults spoke out about their feelings and new-found awareness

because of an experience that had its beginning in the school's library. In consequent

years we have covered the Holocaust, Native Americans, and plan, at Mary K.

Chelton's gentle urging, to raise awareness about the Hmong people in the United

States during the next school year. I couldn't help but wonder if the young lady who got

the motel reservations changed might be the one Marilyn Miller had in mind.

I believe that school librarians should provide young adults the excitement of

working with authors. I met an author for the first time in 1960. Her name was Loula

Senator Edmund G. Ross whose vote kept President Andrew Johnson from being

impeached. She was in Topeka for a Kansas Association of School Librarians

convention, and I was invited to a reception in her honor. The lifelong love affair with

authors began. In fact, I was so taken with Ms. Erdman that I stole one of her finished

cigarettes from the ashtray as a memento. I still have that cigarette butt.

Eight years ago our school started the author-in-residence program. We bring in

authors for an intense two-day writing workshop with approximately thirty students who

have been selected by their composition instructors. For the first half day no adults,

except the author, are allowed in the library reference room, and the workshop begins,

and the same thirty students and the author really open up to one another and begin to

write, critique, and share. The students have copies of two of the author's books, which

they read before the workshop begins. The results have been exciting and each author

has a special experience that comes from this adventure, and sometimes they don't

even know about it. Time will allow me to tell about three authors. Two of the three are

here today, and I would ask them to stand as I relate the impact and force they have

had.

When Mr. Brooks was our guest, a new kind of supermarket department store was

opening in Topeka. It is called Hypermart. He gave the kids a writing assignment about

this grand opening and a lost child. The kids never forgot this and continued to write all

year about openings of new stores with some unusual twist. In fact, the creative writing

teacher picked up on this idea and used it extensively. Kevin, now a student at Yale

University, called me long distance to tell me that his work had been accepted for that

school's prestigious literary magazine and much of the credit was due Bruce Brooks

who taught him to believe in his ability and encouraged him to keep writing and

submitting until it reaped rewards. Another of our writers-in-residence was Chris

Crutcher.

Chris Crutcher touched lives deeply and with a long lasting effect. I don't think he

even knows about the two specific incidents that I will relate because I haven't held up

my end of the deal. Bryce, an athlete, wasn't sure he should let his peers know that he

is a poet. Bryce told me that Chris Crutcher gave him the courage to submit his work,

inform Chris Crutcher. Then there is Hugh who loves to write, but doesn't like the rest

school has to offer. He hasn't stuck with college, but lets me know that he writes every

day as Chris told him he should do, and one of his most prized possessions is a framed

can't be here today since he is appearing on another program at this same time. There

was a freshman boy named Mark. He lived with his mother and waited in the library

some nights for a ride home, and I introduced him to Gary's works. By the time the year

was over he had read all the Paulsen books and was an avid fan. I suggested he write

to Gary, and he did and got a nice answer. A couple of years later Gary Paulsen was

our writer-in-residence. Mark attended the workshop, met Gary, and graduated that

spring. He got a degree in film from a state university and landed a job as an associate

director for the Women's Film Institute in Los Angeles. Mark comes to see me when he

visits Topeka and last Christmas was no exception. I noticed he had a terrible cough

and suggested he see a doctor. The final diagnosis was that one lung was filled with

cancer and had to be removed. He had never smoked and is a runner. Even then they

weren't sure they had gotten it all, and he faced thirty-two radiation treatments, then

chemotherapy. I visited him regularly in the hospital, and one day he asked me if his

friend Gary had written any new books. Incidentally, Mark was really scared of what

autobiographical story concerning his life with his dogs and love and life and death had

just been published. I took Mark a copy. When I returned to his hospital room the next

day, we visited about a lot of topics and when I was ready to leave, he handed me the

Mark is back at work in L.A. and is making it one day at a time determined and

unafraid. I know these authors have changed lives. Programs like the author-inresidence

do not happen without the cooperation of administrators, publishers, and one

special person, Barbara Lynn.

It is with a lot of pride that I introduce Barbara. She is one of my former library

science students, served as a school librarian for sixteen years, is one of the leaders of

Young Adult Services Division and is the national library consultant for the Econo-Clad

Company. Her influence in getting quality materials to young adults all over the country

is exceptional and admirable. Econo-Clad is also a tremendous help with the author-inresidence

program because Barbara helps with getting books for the students,

complimentary copies of the author's books for the participants' instructors, and usually

provides a fine dinner for the authors and the student coordinators.

Finally, I believe that librarians must have a sense of humor. One of my responsibilities

is to teach a two-week reference unit for all the sophomores in our school. A straight

diet of indices, handbooks, special encyclopedias, dictionaries, and electronic research

remember that one of the strippers believes that everyone needs a gimmick. Gypsy's

gimmick was strategically placed blinking lights.

I have two gimmicks that work with the young adults and reference books. First, I

call them scholars, use scholarly terms, award scholar's crowns for them to wear when

they answer difficult scholarly questions. They even autograph these silly cardboard

way. In over twenty years of teaching these books, I've only had six people make it to

ten my way on the first try. I was going to have everyone here today try to count, but

unfortunately time will not allow.

It goes something like this:

A big fat hen

A couple of ducks

Three brown bears

Four running hares

Five females sitting on a fence

Six simple simons standing on a stump

Seven Sicilian seamen sailing the seven Sicilian seas

Eight egotistical egoists echoing eight egotistical egoisms

Nine nimble pneumatic nudes naughtily nibbling gnat's knuckles and nicotine

Ten tiny trumpeters tunefully tooting ten tiny tunes on their ten tiny trumpets.

Years after graduation I see former students and they tell me how much they

remember their sophomore scholar's unit. I tell them how thrilled I am that they recall

ducks. Marilyn, I'm afraid no lives have been changed in this experience.

So I don't know how successful the program has been or whether I've changed that one

life yet, but I do know that my life has been enriched and blessed by them and those

with whom I work. It works both ways, you know. I read something the other day from

reflect on what it is that I do.

"The story says that a traveler from Italy came to the French town of Chartres to see

the great church that was being built there. Arriving at the end of the day, he went to

the site just as the workmen were leaving for home. He asked one man, covered with

dust, what he did there. The man replied that he was a stonemason. He spent his days

carving rocks. Another man, when asked, said he was a glassblower who spent his

days making slabs of colored glass. Still another workman replied that he was a

blacksmith who pounded iron for a living. Wandering into the deepening gloom of the

unfinished edifice, the traveler came upon an older woman, armed with a broom,

sweeping up the stone chips and wood shavings and glass shards from the day's work.

'What are you doing?' he asked. The woman paused, leaning on her broom, and

looking up toward the high arches, replied, 'Me? I'm building a cathedral for the Glory of

Almighty God.' I've often thought about the people of Chartres. They began something

they knew they would never see completed. They built for something larger than

themselves. They had a vision."

For school librarians it is the same. Most of us will never see our students grow up.

But from where we are and with what we give, we serve a vision of how the world ought

to be. The old woman of Chartres was a spiritual ancestor of librarians who build

cathedrals to the human enterprise in our own quiet way. From us young people learn to

Thank you for listening to me today.

Roger Sutton

PRINTZ: Well, probably a couple of things. One, I like the diversity of being a school

librarian, so different from teaching five or six hours of English in a day. As a librarian, I

have different things to do, different people to work with, and different challenges each

hour of the day. Second, I've always loved to read and wanted a chance to be able to

share that, to encourage young people.

PRINTZ: I especially remember the challenge of getting boys to read, which wasn't an

first stories that ever dealt with a high school couple who had to get married. Felsen

maybe paved the way for young adult literature with that. Then for girls there were I'm

not trying to be sexist at all, but there were a lot of writers. There was Betty Cavanna,

Maureen Daly. Of course, I had them reading lots of adult books as well.

you, one of your big crusades was to get a lot of adult books on that list.

PRINTZ: It still is. I think we sometimes forget the mature, sensitive young adult who

can handle adult books and has adult interests. I think it's important that we find the

very best of those books and writers like Joanne Greenberg, for example, who writes

books that really have an interest for mature young adults.

You can publish booklists, you can do displays, you can do all kinds of motivational

things to get people to read. But there's nothing as great or as powerful as going into a

classroom with a cartful of books and talking for twenty minutes about thirty or forty

books, then standing out of the way when students come up to get them. Of all the

things I've ever done, that would have to be the greatest rush in the world. To be able

to talk about books and turn somebody on; to have them come up and almost pull the

book out of your hand or knock you over to pick up the book because they want to

read.

PRINTZ: Well, I don't know if there are any secrets, but I try to find some element,

some area of a book that picks up on an emotion or an event in somebody's life.

Something that touches a responsive chord in a student and makes him or her want to

read about and share that kind of experience.

PRINTZ: They check them out right there. You have to be able to let the books go

immediately that's the secret of a booktalk. I guess I'm not much of a purist, but if the

books have just come in and you haven't had time to catalog them and put your little

stamp and your tag on the back, you need to be able to let kids take them anyway. I

even get them to sign the inside of the book jacket. That way they can take the books

immediately. They love the fact that the books are new and nobody's read them before.

PRINTZ: Well, I think that's very important. Some friends that I teach with are lovers of

books, they let me come into their classrooms with books that have been nominated for

BBYA, and I do some booktalks. I say, "You know, we really need your input. I'd like

you to read some of these books and then I want you to write some comments for me.

And when I share them at the Best Books meeting I'll say your name. I'll say this is

what Mary thinks or this is what Joe thinks about this book." You have to make kids feel

important. That's one way I do it. Another way is through an independent study

program. I enroll six or seven kids a semester who do nothing but read for an hour a

day. They come into the library at the beginning of the semester and I give them some

guidelines. Then they read the books that are nominated and write for me all semester

about what they think of them.

when it comes to their comments about books that have been written about them or for

them. They need to know that what they say, what they write about a book, is important

and that I trust their opinions as much as I do those of my professional peers.

PRINTZ: The number one thing you need to say to teachers is, "Get rid of those awful,

awful textbooks." Textbooks are geared to the average student, and I'm not sure who

the average student is. We need to throw that textbook out the window or only use it to

start with. Let it be the guide to getting kids involved in all sorts of reading and sharing

and research. For example, I'm doing this project right now with a mathematics teacher.

He came to the library one day and said, "I get so tired of teaching math the same way

all the time, but everybody says I have to do this to get through the textbook by the end

of the year. I want to branch out. I wish there were a collection of science-fiction math

stories I could give to my students. Then they could come up with some research topics

from the stories." Not being a strong science fiction person, I called Sally Estes at

a class set of the book, and it's been amazing to see what the kids reading those short

stories have come up with. They are doing all kinds of research. They get on Dialog

and get into some really scholarly professional journals. They get articles and books.

With interlibrary loan the way it is today, we can get almost anything they need. To see

that excitement happen in a mathematics class has been a real joy for me. You don't

usually think there's much that the math department and the library can do together.

PRINTZ: Probably kicking, and screaming, to begin with. One of the people who's had

the greatest influence on my life as a librarian is Marilyn L. Miller. One of the first

courses I took in library school at Emporia State was with her. And, I remember so well

when she told us that we could not even comprehend what was going to happen to

information in our lifetime. No matter what it takes, you have to be on top of all the

different formats of information. You need to help the kids find the information they

need and you also need to teach them how to select the very best of that information.

To wade through the materials that may not be good and develop some criteria for

selecting the very best. For example, there's one database in Dialog called Papers,

which has full-text retrieval of thirty or thirty-five daily newspapers from the mid-1980s

through today. Students can enter a topic and get a bibliography of articles, and they

can have those articles printed out for them within minutes. Then, they have to be able

to sort through all that.

I have to give credit to another person, Linda Waddle, who has long been an

advocate of Dialog and online searching for high school students. I went up to visit her

by a Kansan). I had a kid come into the library who wanted to read something about

that, and I found two newspaper clippings from local papers. So Linda said, "I want to

show you how to use Dialog." She got me into that newspaper database, I entered

"Titanic" and the name of the Kansan who had led the expedition, and I had something

like thirty-four articles in five minutes.

I knew that somehow I had to convince the people back home that we needed this. I

said to our principal, "We have to have this. We have to have this tomorrow." And,

bless his heart, he said, "Well, I've got a little money stored away here that I made from

pop sales and a couple of other things. We'll try it for a year." And it started. You have

to work with administrators that way. You have to convince them that this is something

the kids need. At the end of the year he said, "We can't go backward. We have to

continue this."

PRINTZ: I sometimes think the way we teach history to students is all wrong. We start

with world history at the sophomore level, and then junior year they all take a course in

American history, and if time allows we have local history. I think we need to work that

around the other way and start with our own roots.

The oral history project began in 1975 as we were getting ready to celebrate the

bicentennial of this country. Our school district had some money ready to give to a

school to celebrate the occasion with innovative programs, so we developed a program

whereby seniors could enroll in a course in oral history. They would select a famous

Kansan or an event in Kansas history and go out and interview anybody they could find

who knew anything about that topic. Then they pulled all that together into a thirty-

minute documentary. We started with audiotape recorders and then went to videotape.

Over the sixteen or seventeen years we've had that project, we've probably covered

about two hundred topics with three hundred or four hundred kids traveling all over the

United States to do their interviews. More kids researched Kansans famous Kansans

than they did events in Kansas history, and I think that's very important. Kids who grow

up in the Midwest think that to make it big they've got to be on either coast. I contend

that if you're willing to dream big enough and work hard enough, you can do anything

you want to right here in Topeka, Kansas.

When the projects were finished, we gave them to the Kansas State Historical

Society, and they've been there for scholars to use. I think it's great for kids to realize

that something they did in 1983 or '84 might be used fifty or sixty years from now. I

think that gives them a sense of their place in history.

PRINTZ: I have a wonderful staff; I'm very fortunate. I have two people who have been

with me for years, Kay Ping and Darlene Luellen. They are library clerks, and they have

a real understanding of kids. Kay has worked with me for many years on the oral

history program, working with the students on the editing and that sort of thing. And

Darlene has an uncanny knack for finding kids who hurt in some way and reaching out

to them with a lot of love and care.

I also have an outstanding co-librarian, Diane Goheen. She and I really work well

together. I'm kind of an idea person and not really good with details. She is good with

details and is also an idea person. She remembers kids' names, something I'm not

really good at, and once kids have worked with Diane, they come back to her again and

do something with this book in the school." So we went down to the principal and said,

"Dr. Frazer, we know that every year in this school there's an ethnic week, and we don't

do a lot with it, but we'd like to volunteer to take over that week."

We had the whole school read the book, any class we could. I'm talking not just

language arts and social studies classes, which read it eagerly, but we had speech and

home ec. classes read it, and forensics classes did dramatic readings. We did a schoolwide

program on apartheid and were able to bring in some speakers Hazel

recommended. I think if nothing else happened, we at least created an awareness of

what apartheid was. Our student congress passed a bill that Coke machines would be

taken out of Topeka West High School because of the Coca-Cola Company's presence

in South Africa.

Another thing that happened was that the oral history kids who traveled all over the

United States made a resolution they would never again stay at Holiday Inns, because

Holiday Inn supported the South African government. One young black girl in our

school who was very moved by Hazel's book got a job that summer with the state

Department of Education as a clerical aide to earn some money to go to college. The

state education departments of Kansas, Missouri, and Iowa, I believe, were planning a

meeting in St. Louis, and her responsibility was to make the hotel reservations at a

Holiday Inn there. On her second day on the job, she, to quote Shakespeare, "screwed

her courage to the stickingplace," went to her supervisor and said, "I cannot morally

make these hotel reservations." She told him why, and they changed the place of the

meeting. Well, I know that didn't hurt Holiday Inn and didn't hurt Coke, but the kids were

taking some stands that I hadn't seen since the '70s when they were involved with the

environment, Vietnam, things like that. They were taking some real stands on issues.

And I think that's very important.

school system. And, you go to school in the neighborhood in which you live, although a

minority student may go to any school he or she wishes until a racial balance has been

reached. Of the 1,300 students, I imagine maybe two hundred or three hundred are

minorities.

bothers me that in the last year we've had eleven or twelve students expelled from our

school because they were carrying loaded guns on campus. In fact, our school system

has formed a separate school called "The Second Chance School." When you are

caught with a loaded weapon you are expelled from your school and go to that school.

There's an unbelievable lady there who teaches sixteen to eighteen kids. They go there

for a semester a year, and they come back to their original school. If they are caught

with a gun or anything again they are expelled, I suppose, permanently.

It bothers me that we've come to that. I worked with some kids who had come back

from the Second Chance program, and I think I failed them in some way because I

wasn't able to spend the kind of time with them they needed. But, I learned a lot from

them. I learned a lot about what it is to be alone, what it is to be ostracized, what it is to

be watched by the school security people and administrators, what it's like to be

watched by other kids' parents. And, I know they did something wrong. But sometimes

it's hard to say "I did something wrong, and I'd like to try to be better" when you don't

have a lot of support to be better.

I've always believed that to work with kids you have to let them know you respect

them. And if you respect them, then perhaps they will respect themselves, which I think

is something very, very important. And, they will give that respect back to you. I think

you get what you give. I believe that very strongly. I think it's simple. You just treat

people the way you want to be treated. No matter how old they are.

A People Man

Innumerable words can describe Mr. Mike Printz, Topeka West Librarian for twentyfour

and a half years. Mike was many things to many people, and various people

associated with Topeka West remember him for a myriad of reasons.

Students who were at Topeka West during Mike's tenure remember his wit and faith

in them as people. He established the Oral History program that sent students

throughout the continental United States to conduct research and interviews of the

subjects while today some of us have difficulty sending students across town for

information. Mike's faith in these young adults prompted him to expect the most from

them and most often see his expectations met. Many nights, though, Mike paced the

floor waiting for the oral historians' obligatory call summarizing their day in the distant

locale. Mike's students, too, remember his orneriness. More than once I heard him call a

trusted library proctor to his desk on the morning a vacation was to begin at 3 p.m. With

all seriousness, he instructed the proctor to proceed to the main office, turn on the

intercom, and announce that school was now dismissed! His "Couple of Hens" ditty has

become immortalized with sophomores who experienced his "indices unit" during their

required English class.

Professionally, Mike led several of us in the library profession. As an enrollee in one

of his adjunct courses, I first encountered Mike Printz. During the initial class meeting, it

was evident that Mike possessed a rare charisma. He exhorted us to reach to creative

heights and strive for superiority in the field. Oddly enough his exhortations were never

voiced as such; rather, it was a rare student who did not reach into the depths of him or

herself to retrieve the innate excellence Mike was convinced each individual possessed.

Mike's passion for the library and learning was matched by his compassion for people.

While he was always eager to work with the bright student, he seemed to have a

special place in his heart for the less appealing teen. He was a master at finding just

the book for the loner who visited the media center at lunch and then suggesting the

title to that person. The student being treated for lymphoma, the student serving time in

the detention center, the first-year teacher nearing his or her wit's end, or the parent

suffering through the loss of a child would very likely receive a visit from "Mr. Printz"

bearing books to help ease the pain. Always, he would end these visits with his

trademark, "Well, bless your heart."

many connections, we were able to elicit the attention of the library world at least for a

Bloomington provided avenues for us to keep apartheid in the forefront of many

librarians' minds.

From establishing the Oral History Program, to working with Ethnic Week studies,

to enhancing curriculum projects, Mike's energy seemed limitless. Mike brought ideas

back from professional meetings he attended and often found a teacher willing to

implement those innovations at Topeka West. A teacher might come to Mike with a

kernel of an idea, and before that teacher knew it, a full-blown project was underway.

Give Mike a mole hill and you would soon possess a mountain in terms of ideas and

information. Ownership was always given to the teacher with the original idea germ, but

it was general knowledge that the "ideas man" had the real patent on the undertaking.

Always humble, Mike's goal was to empower students and teachers.

That Mike Printz was extremely instrumental in developing the Topeka West Media

Center and was a leader in the library profession cannot be denied. Overall, though, I

feel Mike would most appreciate being remembered for his "people skills." He was a

compassionate man with a gift for enabling others to pursue their own gifts. He is

missed by former students, parents, and colleagues.

--------------------------------------

she remains as librarian.

Robert Grover

Some people are "born to teach." Mike Printz was one of those people. He taught

high school students, his faculty colleagues, and graduate students with equal skill and

caring. He was honored twice during his career with district and city "teacher of the

year" awards. This piece recognizes his extraordinary ability as a teacher.

Mike had an excellent rapport with young adults, he was as open to students as his

circulation policy. Mike told students that they could "check out anything in the library

but the librarian." On one occasion he checked out two large potted plants to a student

who used them at his mother's wedding. As noted by Margaret Fowler, Topeka West

High School counselor, "He accepted every kid as an equal. He saw no difference in

kids, no matter if they were rich or poor or black or white or yellow. He loved them all."

Shortly after I met him, Mike invited me to visit him at Topeka West High School. After a

tour of the library media center and a discussion of his services and collections, a class

came in for one in a series of instructional sessions on indexes and other reference.

Mike deftly presented an introduction to indexes, drawing from his audience their

experiences in the library and with this type of resource.

The incident that was etched into my memory that day was his "crowning" of

students. When he asked questions, and students responded with thoughtful and

appropriate answers, Mike reached up and plucked a cardboard crown from a

collection that rested on shelves around the room. The successful student proudly

positioned the crown on his/her head. I was transfixed that this seemingly "uncool"

activity was viewed as an honor by the young people. Mike obviously gauged correctly

the pulse and interest level of his audience. Indeed, he understood young people, and

he loved them.

Mike's signature teaching activity at Topeka West High School was his annual oral

celebrate the U.S. Bicentennial, the oral history class was begun " . . . to make history

come alive for students, and also to give them a clearer understanding of their local--

connected with Kansas history and spent the semester researching. The topic was first

researched locally by consulting school, university, and public libraries, newspaper

archives, and historical museums. A substantial part of the students' information came

from interviews conducted in the home of the subject. Often the subject was a famous

person who had lived in Kansas at some point in his/her life. Participating in the project

have been Hollywood stars like Ed Asner and Elizabeth Taylor, race car driver Rick

Mears, astronaut Joe Engle, and former U.S. Senators Nancy Kassebaum and Robert

Dole.

Students arranged their own interviews and were responsible for soliciting

contributions to pay expenses of the class. For many it was the first time they had

traveled without adult supervision to distant locations. While traveling, students were

instructed to check in with Mike every evening. When students had difficulties, Mike

activated his national network of friends to help the students who were in trouble.

The finished product of the research was a thirty-minute slide/tape or videotape

presentation at a public showing, which Mike labeled "Opening Night." Invitations were

sent to parents, friends, local teachers, and leaders of civic and service organizations.

The event drew as many as 1,500 for a single night's program. Projects were retained

in the Topeka West High School Library, and a copy was given to the Kansas Historical

Society.

Mike articulated the benefits of this project as follows: "Our students have learned to

do careful, detailed research, and have acquired problem-solving techniques that will

aid them in many endeavors. Also, career choices have been influenced by the oral

For this unique class, Mike's role was that of guide, consultant, coach, and advisor.

Mike clearly loved this teaching, but admitted that it was extremely time-consuming,

and during spring semester, this one class consumed vast amounts of his time, day,

and night.

Mike was also a very successful teacher of graduate students. Teaching for both

Emporia State University and Washburn University, he consistently drew large numbers

of students to his classes on school library media program management and young

adult literature. In these classes he demonstrated his knowledge of current young adult

titles and authors, as well as his knowledge of young people and their reactions to the

literature.

What was the secret of Mike's extraordinary success as a teacher? Perhaps the

essence is found in his own words: "I've always believed that to work with kids you

have to let them know you respect them. And if you respect them, then perhaps they

will respect themselves . . . . And, they will give that respect back to you. I think you get

what you give."3

During my numerous visits to Topeka West High School it was apparent that Mike,

during his twenty-five years at the school, had earned universal respect for the library

media program and himself. More importantly, he also taught his students and

colleagues to love learning, perhaps his greatest gift to all of us who knew him.

References

1. Printz, Mike. "In the YA Corner: Topeka West's Students Honor E.T.'

2. Ibid.

Robert Grover is a professor in the School of Library and Information Management at

Emporia State University, Emporia Kansas.

Allen W. Hartzell

I consider myself to have been a very lucky person to have had a chance to work

closely with Mike Printz during spring semester of my senior year at Topeka West High

School in Topeka, Kansas. I was one of the twenty-two students selected that year to

do one of the Oral History projects. Although I did not really know Mike at that time, I

had met him many times in the library, and he had always been helpful and friendly.

Upon the recommendation of one of my history teachers, Earl Williams, I joined the Oral

History projects. I was selected to work with two other students on a project covering

the early years of the Menninger Foundation (now Menningers) in Topeka. This project

was very interesting and appealing because it gave us the chance to interview many of

the people who had helped to create and shape the Menninger Foundation. Probably

the most interesting was the chance to interview Dr. Karl Menninger, who had helped to

form the hospital with his father.

Throughout the entire process, Mike was available whenever we needed to speak to

him. He always made time for us, and was willing to listen to whatever we had to say.

He was the teacher who helped us to learn new ways of looking at things. He was the

cheerleader to give us support when things were not going as we had hoped. He was

the motivator when we were not moving along as quickly as we should have been. In

short, he was the best friend that a person could have. I realize now just how much I

learned from Mike during that semester.

In the years that followed, I kept in touch with Mike, although not as much as I now

wish I would have. He was always willing to make time to talk when I stopped in to see

him at the Topeka West High School library. He was always glad to have a chance to

talk with former students, and to hear what they were doing now.

After I graduated from Washburn University in Topeka, I did not have any luck in

locating a job in my field. I had heard about the Library Science program at Emporia

State University in Emporia, Kansas, and I decided to go there. I must admit that my

initial reason for attending was to become an archivist, rather than a

librarian/information professional. Shortly after my decision to go to Emporia State,

Mike retired from Topeka West. I was fortunate to have been able to attend the

retirement/Oral History reunion party that was given for Mike in December 1993. It had

been several years since I had last seen him, but I was glad for the opportunity. I told

Mike that I was entering the School of Library and Information Management (SLIM) at

Emporia State. He said that he was excited for me and told me some good things about

the program. I did not realize until later that he had been a graduate of the program.

Although I really did not think about the role that Mike had played in my education,

looking back now I wonder if someplace deep inside of me there was that memory

about how important Mike had been to me. That may have played a bigger role in my

decision to start at SLIM than I realized at the time. The influence of the Oral History

projects is still with me. In one of my classes as SLIM, we had to do a repackaging

project. I decided to do a reindexing of the Oral History projects that are held at the

Center for Historical Research, Kansas State Historical Society, in Topeka. This work

should help anyone who is interested in the Oral Histories to locate them easier. During

this project, done in the spring semester of 1996, was the last time I talked with Mike. I

regret that I did not get the opportunity to show him the finished project, but it is one

that I hold a special place for in my heart.

I feel that I am a better person for having known him and worked with him. Although

my plans are not to go into school libraries, I hope that maybe someday I can have the

kind of positive influence on someone that Mike Printz had on me, and all of the

students he met during his years at Topeka West High School.

---------------------

Allen W. Hartzell is currently a student at the School of Library and Information

Management, Emporia, Kansas and a member of the West Topeka class of 1979.

Barbara Lynn

Moments that alter our lives forever are unplanned and seemingly insignificant. The

moment that has most defined my professional career and personal growth happened in

the spring of 1981 when I decided to take my reference class in Kansas City, thus

moving my Secondary Materials Selection Class to summer school on campus at

Emporia State.

That decision, at the age of thirty-five, allowed me the privilege of experiencing

education in its truest sense at the hands of master teacher, Michael Printz. In spite of

the fact that I carried a huge course load that summer so that I could finish my degree

an AV presentation and coordinating a gala event at the end of summer school with

recently released Iranian hostage, Rocky Sickmann. While this was a fun and exciting

encouragement. Through his mentoring and guidance, I and my colleagues, learned to

believe in ourselves and our abilities. In the space of six short weeks, we accomplished

things I would never have thought possible, especially by me. This included

coordinating press coverage, organizing a parade through Emporia, Kansas, assuring

dignitaries greeted Rocky in Topeka, and more. Mike showed us that we could

accomplish anything to which we put our mind. That brief six-week experience changed

my life and was the beginning of a professional and later a personal friendship that I

cherish.

Throughout that summer school course and later young adult literature courses

taught by Mike, I experienced the real meaning of education and began to understand

guidance of the student and the encouragement of each person to reach his or her

highest potential. While Mike never gave a single test, assigned a grade to a project, or

moments!

Another invaluable gem of wisdom that I learned from Mike that fateful summer of

1981 was that you can run the best library program in the country out of a broom closet.

When my first professional position presented the challenge of a small turn-of-thecentury

facility with a totally out-of-date collection in which my predecessor had

alienated the student body but endeared herself to portions of the faculty by assuring

broom-closet philosophy carried me through that first tough year and many more

professional challenges.

from the courses at Emporia State, to Opening Night of Oral History sessions at

Topeka West High School, to mentoring a young clerk at Econo-Clad. In my years of

and encourage to expand his or her horizons.

Mike was also a lifelong student. He was fascinated by every new experience and

took the time to visit and learn from everyone that he met. When Mike discovered

something new and interesting, he bubbled with enthusiasm for that book, or

discoveries were certainly unusual if not downright strange!

Only a couple of weeks after Mike went to work at Econo-Clad Books in the Spring

of 1994, I was fascinated to observe him back on the production floor exchanging

recipes with one of the machine operators. At that point, I had worked there for more

interests and names than I or many other managers.

In ten years as a classroom teacher, the most difficult part for me was standing in

front of a classroom of students. I had hated speech classes in school and shied away

from any situation that put me in front of an audience. Just a short time after making

events and relationships with professionals all across our country that have enriched

my life. From observing Mike, I began to understand the importance of encouraging

and involving new people in their profession. I know many of you reading this have

nudge.

new doors for me. Again one phone call in the Fall of 1982 greatly impacted my life.

Serving on the Econo-Clad Advisory Board, which Mike unselfishly chaired for more

than twenty years, opened up professional opportunities in the vendor environment, a

ladies beach group.

My relocation to Topeka, Kansas, in 1987 provided me the opportunity to experience

working together daily when he joined the marketing staff at Econo-Clad in 1994. While

I was officially his boss in that setting, our relationship continued to be that of teacher

After the move to Topeka, Mike invited me to be a part of the Flea Market Group. An

years. As lifetime president of the group, Mike would call for an official meeting every

month, which was really a social excuse for us to get together and enjoy a meal and

but Mike always creating the tallest tale!

had the opportunity to experience his sense of humor and downright orneriness,

loved nothing better than getting the best of you with a practical joke. For years, a

group of us had this truly ugly silk flower arrangement that we had delivered by a florist

to each other, displayed on the podium when Mike spoke on an ALA conference

returned from travel to find my office totally empty with a large banner across the door

claiming no entry, crime scene or another time closed for remodeling for new marketing

director!

On April 1, 1994, Mike spent the day telling various people there was a fire across

from the back entrance to Econo-Clad. Gullible people that we were, one-by-one, we

trouped back to see the fire only to find Mike sneaking up behind us whispering April

Fools! Several days later, we did manage to TP his car in the parking lot, and Dick

but he fell for it completely and the rest of us were cheering from the front windows.

Pam Spencer and I spent many hours and countless cross-country phone calls in an

attempt to get Mike. We actually even accomplished it once or twice!

he was an integral part of a surprise party that included a trolley ride for my family with

Mike sharing ghost stories of famous people and locations in Topeka.

While Mike, like all of us, enjoyed those moments of glory and recognition, it was the

constant small random acts of kindness that truly defined Mike. On the night before

Those words and his continued spiritual presence will comfort and carry me for the rest

of my days.

Mike Printz, you made a difference. In your brief time with us, you transformed many

of our lives. Mike, we are better people because of you. Your legacy lives on!

--------------------------------

Barbara Lynn is Western Regional sales manager for the Brodart Company.

Joanne Proctor

newspapers and national journals by those more eloquent than I. Being a teacher and

remembering how Mike always made us write a paper on the grade we thought we

should receive and why, it just seemed logical to remember Mike with a report card

from a personal view:

One of the qualities that always impressed me about Mike was his willingness to listen

what you looked like, or whether your opinions differed from his.

Mike probably gave away as many of the books as he kept of those he received from

publishers. I see many as I look around my library, and I know of others who also

is my daughter)

The young people who passed through the Topeka West Library were connected to the

rich heritages we share through the Oral History project, and to information needed for

research projects, and especially to the incredible variety of literature that Mike

exposed them to. Until the semester she worked in the Topeka West Library, my own

for books. Thanks, Mike.

certificates with them), he insisted that we connect to young people first by finding out

their preferences, experiences, concerns, and dreams. He literally connected us by

phone calls to authors of the books we were reading. He connected us to each other by

letting us talk to each other about the books we read. There are many of you that I first

workshops and conferences locally and nationally. Without Mike, we are still a little

disconnected.

---------------------------------------------------------

Joanne Proctor is president of the Kansas Association of School Librarians (KASL).

Michael Cart

There is no good time to receive the news of a friend's death, but perhaps it's

the news of Mike Printz's death arrived, my mind was so filled with thoughts of personal

loss that there was no room for such philosophizing; yet in retrospect it does seem

somehow appropriate that the sad news should have arrived during a fall YALSA

Executive Board meeting in Chicago.

"Appropriate" because Mike and YALSA went together like love and marriage but

even more appropriate because four of the five of us present, who by virtue of our

positions represented YALSA's top leadership, were there because of Mike. Not that he

had "placed" us there in any Machiavellian way but because we had been inspired by

his own example of leadership and his unique talent for bringing out the best in others.

Speaking only for myself (though I suspect my colleagues would agree), I often felt that

Mike had more faith in me than I had in myself. It was partly his you-can-do-it attitude

and partly a desire not to betray that trust that helped so many rise to the occasion and

try on the mantle of leadership to see if it fit. And with Mike around to provide necessary

alterations, it usually did.

When I was still a library director, I used to feel a bit guilty that subjects like

leadership bored me to tears (they conjured up too many visions of M.B.A. programs

and dreary business texts, I guess). I suspect that Mike felt the same way but his great

talent was for taking the "drearies" out of the topic by removing the dryly theoretical and

replacing it with humanity.

If there was a Mike Printz Model of Leadership, it was surely made up in equal parts

of caring, inspiring, providing a personal example, and, yes, employing some gentle

persuasion when necessary. In this context my first encounter with Mike was as

appropriate as my last: it came at the first gathering of a newly appointed YALSA Best

Books Committee. Though a novice member, I already knew Mike by reputation as

"the godfather of Best Books," but this was the first time I had actually met him. He

was introduced, appropriately, by the Committee Chair Barb Lynn, who had asked him

to be present so she could acknowledge his having inspired her own first interest in

young adult literature when she had been his student in library school. At least that's

what she told us. Frankly I think the real reason she asked Mike to be present was that

his love for books was as infectious as the common cold. And I suspect Barb hoped her

committee would catch the bug from him, and, I'm happy to say, we did.

You couldn't love Mike without loving books. The author-in-residence program he

created at Topeka West High School brought America's leading young adult authors

there to meet and work with his students and like so many programs Mike started, it

quickly became a national model of excellence. It's one of the reasons a Margaret

Edwards Award-winning author once dubbed Mike, in conversation with me, "Mr.

Young Adult Literature."

That was appropriate, too. For Mike didn't only give the reading bug to librarians and

library school students, he gave it to countless young adults whose lives were enlarged

and improved, accordingly. He encouraged their feedback and respected their opinions

Books Committee (and if there is such a committee in heaven, I'm sure Mike is chairing

it right now). As a result, not only were lives enhanced so was the literature. To me

that's real leadership in action--the kind that inspires by offering a caring, personal

example and respect that encourages and empowers.

Mike demonstrated his gift for leadership, as well, with the oral history project he

started at Topeka West. I was amazed at the level of ambition and sophistication his

kids brought to their research and to the real contributions they made to the

preservation of Kansas history (if Mike loved books, he may have loved Kansas history

and lore even more!). Seeing Mike in action was to understand that the students were

inspired to stretch beyond what they might have thought themselves capable of

because Mike believed they could. Mike believed in possibility, and it rubbed off on his

students and his colleagues alike. Maybe because he grew up in Kansas, that belief in

possibility was as big and broad as the horizon. When I became president-elect of

YALSA, I immediately called Mike for help in planning my 1998 Washington, D.C.,

preconference about youth at risk.

"Who could we get as keynote speaker?" I asked. Mike didn't hesitate to give a oneword

answer: "Hillary," he said!

And you know what? If he had lived, Hillary wouldn't have known what hit her. He

would have gotten the first lady there, speech in hand, because that's the kind of leader

Mike was.

Some leaders leave monuments to themselves in the form of bricks and mortar.

Mike, through the programs he had the vision to start and through the countless lives

he touched and the countless people he inspired with his caring and confidence, left

living monuments, instead, that continue to enrich young adult literature, young adult

library service and future young adult lives.

never forget him and his example.

-------------------

Michael Cart is president-elect of the Young Adult Library Services Association and

Mary K. Chelton

I loved Mike Printz and considered him (besides Dorothy) my best professional

friend, and a source of personal inspiration. He was a genius with kids, a superb

teacher, and a person of rare humility. I miss him every day I live here in his beloved

Kansas, wondering how I came to be here without him, and hearing his voice often in

the Kansas accents of students and colleagues. He always made me feel deprived that

librarian I ever met was from Kansas, and his name was Mike Printz.

During that year, I left my job at the Montgomery County Public Library in Maryland and

asked that they consider as a farewell present a round-trip ticket to Topeka, Kansas.

They thought I was nuts but gave it to me, and I had the fun of following Mike around for

a week and getting to know him on his home turf. (Mike and I, you see, were both

spendthrifts and never could afford to visit each other outside of ALA, so this was a

great treat.)

I had heard about Mike long before I met him for the first time on a street corner in

conferences and by phone often thereafter. Since Mike often told funny stories on

himself, but never bragged about his work, it took me a while to put the picture together.

heard about him. I then learned that he invited the authors often censored elsewhere to

because they were censored but because they wrote provocative stuff which he felt

kids wanted. Chris Crutcher and Terry Davis came to Topeka West High School that

way, and although they never were able to come, Judy Blume and Stephen King got

invitations. He also invited the first time and neglected author, if he felt they had

something important to say to kids, which is how David Moore and two of his Hmong

audiences, even though the book had been unanimously rejected that year by the

YALSA BBYA committee. All of these invitations and local arrangements were made by

kids, not Mike. He started the ball rolling and then stepped in again only when

just the way he wanted it.

Mike could turn anything into a learning experience, although sometimes

circumstances defeated him. He brought a couple of kids from Topeka West to talk to

the BBYA committee to make the point that kids also read adult books, and the

committee should pay more attention to them. Since ALA was in New York that year,

he hoped the kids would also enjoy all the cultural attractions there like the Museum of

Natural History. Instead, to his intense consternation, they preferred watching the

the museum. He laughed at himself, though, when he shared that with me.

Besides his author visits, though, he pioneered an oral history program on Kansas,

which was privately funded by the Topeka business community and which led to many

exhibits in the Kansas Historical Society. One of those students, now in the School of

Library and Information Management at Emporia State University, did a class project in

showed up to share some personal information with him while I was there visiting, nor

that 250 of these students came to the Historical Society to honor him at his retirement.

called to tell me that he had spent several days in the Eisenhower Library to prepare for

a program at Topeka West to create Junior Fellows who would get the chance to study

in the presidential library. I, a lifelong Democrat, could not understand this fascination

his being a Republican), when he reminded me that Eisenhower was from Kansas. He

then shared the resulting program video with me, which showed what the two kids

other to dramatize his women. As was the custom established by Mike, all the oral

history kids had to present their research publicly to the school and community. This

was experiential learning at its best, which Mike understood intuitively long before

national groups on the subject came into existence.

When I was working on a paper on evaluating federally funded youth services

programs in 1989, I asked Mike about the expected outcomes of secondary school

library media programs. Without missing a beat, he said that they were (1) knowledge

of oneself as a unique person with special abilities who is also part of a larger

community; (2) reading for pleasure as a lifelong habit; (3) the ability to do independent

research in a wide variety of media; (4) the knowledge and skill to be gainfully

employed and to engage in personal relationships; (5) the ability to distinguish between

factually-derived and unsubstantiated or biased information; (6) the knowledge and

skills necessary to participate as a U.S. citizen; and (7) the knowledge that, while one

cannot know everything, that there are people and places to help. I was impressed

then, and still am, as how grounded he was in knowing what he wanted to achieve.

Preparing a Grolier Award nomination is an arduous process, because you have to

submit a resume for the person without their knowing about it, so on my trip to Topeka,

driving, I would grill him for information which I then surreptitiously wrote down every

time he pumped gas or went to the bathroom. Like most people, he liked to talk about

himself if asked, so I discovered that he had never intended to be a librarian, but

needed eight hours of library service for his first job, that Marilyn Miller was his great

inspiration as a teacher, that he was Kansas born and bred in Clay Center, and that he

had only had two jobs in his life, with Topeka West High School as the second one. I

where it was, he said that he felt the librarian should be on the floor or in classrooms

partner, Gene Floro, helped me smuggle files about his Kansas Teacher of the Year

award out of their house later to put the final nomination package together. (I felt like

Kinsey Malone on an investigation.) Since he never suspected a thing until he got the

award, it was doubly delightful, not only to pull it all together in secret, but also to watch

his utter delight in New Orleans where he not only won the Grolier, but also where

Marilyn Miller asked him to be her presidential escort for the inaugural banquet.

Mike and I swapped book titles, recipes, professional annoyances and just about

anything else we could think of over the years. For example, I loved his story of almost

quitting AASL when one of the titles being suggested for school librarian was media

programming engineer. He was a good friend always. Sick as he was toward the end,

he made an excuse to come down with Gene to Emporia to visit us when we arrived in

the summer of 1996, perhaps knowing that it might be the last time, but wanting to

welcome us to Kansas.

Probably the best thing we could do for Mike is to carry on his great work with kids.

finished, but you do the best work you can. Library work with kids was a calling for

Mike, not a job. He raised practice to an art most of us only hope to emulate. I want his

memory to live on in the quality of my work, but I will continue to miss him every single

day.

---------------------------------------------------

Mary K. Chelton is assistant professor at the School of Library and Information

Management, Emporia, Kansas.

Chris Crutcher

In 1985, at the age of 39, I was sitting in the living room of my very first house,

staring at the computer and slapping myself on the back for tricking the world into

publishing a book written by a man who had finished writing one more book than he

read in all of high school, when my telephone rang. It was Mike Printz from Topeka

West High School in Topeka, Kansas, to tell me that Nortie Wheeler was one of the

Best Book. He wanted to be the first to tell me because he loved the character so much,

had promoted the book tirelessly among the other members of the selection committee,

list were unanimous choices, probably many, but I hung up the phone thinking

something special had happened.

That was the feeling Mike seemed to create for everyone with whom he came into

being the Author-In-Residence for two days at Topeka West High School. I had no idea

but I said most certainly I would. Mike went on to explain the program he had created

for Topeka West and Topeka High students in which a writer came into the school for

wonderful as he said it, but as the time approached I became more and more anxious

because I had no specific strategy.

All further communications about the project were held with one or the other of two

students who had been chosen the previous year to work out the details of my stay.

They arranged my travel, my accommodations and worked with me with my schedule.

By the time I got to Topeka, I had two friends in the room, and they were students.

Mike met with me the night before the workshop to be sure everything was going

smoothly, and spent time telling me about some of the kids who would be in the

any reason. He let me know that teachers from several schools and the college would

be stopping in but to ignore them and simply do my thing. He had total confidence in

me. Far more confidence than I had in myself.

Since those two days in Topeka, I have given scores of presentations and done

many, many workshops. I forget sometimes, how thin was the ice on which I skated

when I walked into that room of thirty students, all of whom were familiar with me and

ready for something big because of the extensive behind-the-scenes preparation (for

which Mike refused to take credit). None of those presentations or workshops sticks out

in my mind, however, with the clarity of that first one. Within an hour, this workshop took

on a life of its own; all I had to do was fall into the excitement and passion these kids

had for writing, and hang on. When it was over, and the kids were gone, Mike and I sat

in the back room of his library, waiting to go to the airport. He said I must be exhausted.

I was flying so high I had no idea whether I was exhausted or not. He said, "Could you

Later, as I sat on the plane headed west, feeling that jubilant exhaustion that I tend

to relate to the best 10-K road race, or the fastest mile swim, or the basketball game

that is so perfect all you have to do is step into it and it carries you, it occurred to me

what Mike Printz had created. It was the soft, powerful pressure of his invisible hand

that opened the possibility for that experience. And I realized I got more than I gave,

because Mike gave more than he got.

And that is my experience of Mike Printz. When I think back on the second Topeka

West workshop I did for him, and my small part in his presentations at ALA, and the

quiet time in which I was honored to simply sit and talk with him about his vision of YA

accepted for himself what he so readily gave to us, readers and writers alike; a place to

stand in the circle of the joy and heartache that is storytelling.

My high school band teacher used to tell me that anytime I felt indispensable I

should stick my finger into a glass of water, pull it out quickly and see how long the hole

was numb, but I walked into my kitchen, poured myself a beer and raised it to Mike

Printz. I took a long swig, put my finger in the beer and pulled it out quickly. The hole

remained.

---------------------------------------

Sally Estes

Mike Printz, BBYAer par excellence, was always the first to admit that he would like

to be on the Best Books for Young Adults committee for life. He came on the committee

in the early 1980s and chaired the 1985 committee, which, at that time, finished its list at

the 1986 Midwinter Meeting. He served out his appointment on the 1986 committee,

which was chaired by Betty Carter. To his great delight, he was reappointed to the 1994

committee to serve until 1996. Unfortunately, his deteriorating health prevented his

serving out his term.

Remembering Mike's BBYA tenure, you can't help but think about his dedication to

YAs and their reading, his sense of humor, his determined push for putting adult books

on the list, the number of titles that he read. We got to know Mike's students because of

his frequent quoting of their opinions of the books under discussion. Mike's students

were definitely well read. How many times did Mike say, "It's a stretch book"? He

nominated a lot of adult books, most of them also field tested by his kids. When Morgan

enthusiastically nominated it to the committee's dismay. Eventually, he allowed that

perhaps he shouldn't have nominated it. But, in his own irrepressible way, he could not

resist sending me the mockup of the jacket for the 1994 paperback publication of Bard,

during the mid-80's for BBYA? It seems several folks, perhaps even yourself, made

caustic remarks. Well, it must have been popular, because the paperback has just been

released lo' these many years later. You may want this cover for your memory book.

'Twas good to see you in L.A. and look forward to the next BBYA plus preconference in

Miami." That was an "I told you so" that has rested in my memory book ever since. He

also felt that participating in the BBYA preconferences re-evaluating past lists was the

next best thing to sitting on the committee.

Mike was extremely loyal to authors he liked and to their books. In Mike's eyes Gary

Paulsen could write no bad book. Mike nominated every one that came along and

always prefaced his discussion of a particular title with the statement, "This is Gary

Paulsen's finest book," usually reducing the rest of the committee and any observers to

uncontrollable laughter.

Mike was also, as I recall, the first committee chair to enliven his mailings with

sophisticated computer graphics and brightly colored paper, and his mailings were

frequent as he cajoled committee members to READ, READ, READ. It was a joy to get

a mailing from him just to see what he'd thought up this time.

Mike was such a genuine person to know him was to love him. There is always a

bonding process that goes on as committee members get to know each other, but the

bonding that occurred with Mike and his co-members was awesome (in the original

meaning of the word). What emerged was a circle of closely knit friendships that

endured long after BBYA.

----------------

Best Books for Young Adults Committee.

Gary Paulsen

I have been asked to do a few words about the benefits of a relationship between a

Mike helped me as an author.

God . . .

that I come, set up the schedules, fed me, housed me (I slept on many porches and

couches), nursed me when I was ill (the flu seems to accompany appearances),

cheered me when I was depressed (there were many times when I would sit a whole

night and autograph only one or two books), arranged for help from bookstores,

arranged for travel or helped with a sick dog (I traveled for two years with a border collie

named Roop).

thank you.

But more importantly, on a very profound level librarians have helped me to

understand young people. It is fundamentally vital that a writer of books for young

and this author learned, and continues to learn from school librarians (and of course

teachers).

stellar example of both. But he was more, too, much more...

Jackson, had brought me to Dallas for ALA. It was my first convention, my first time to

be in a luxury hotel (the Adolphus), my first time at nearly everything. To compound my

difficulties I had only two months earlier finished running my first Iditarod and was

suffering from a kind of post traumatic stress disorder from the experience.

I was nervous, confused, absolutely terrified that I would say or do something wrong,

that I would be the proverbial bull in the china shop.

The luncheon was in a suite and there were eight or ten librarians, and everybody

mentally slipping away when a man turned to me and said:

It was of course Mike. He made me feel completely at ease, and as we started

talking an almost instant friendship happened. I would say it began to develop but that

kinship, always felt a love.

when I left that room after the lunch I felt as if Mike and I had known each other forever.

And that was just the start.

As time passed and I knew Mike better, the love grew. I came to lean on him,

my own heart difficulties developed I called Mike, frightened, and he talked me through

it.

There were scenes, small vignettes I think that showed Mike as he really was, the

beauty of him.

At a convention where he was to speak: I was sitting up and slightly to the rear of

going to lean over and make myself known, try to help him relax when the person next

book, looking up at the stage, and then started petting the book with his right hand, the

way he might pet one of his collection of teddy bears or as I might pet a puppy, and I

could see the calm come into him. It was as if the book were alive, a friend to help

him...

Again: I was at Topeka West High. Mike had brought me in on a residency. It was

near the end of the week and we were in the library (now the Mike Printz Library)

talking. There were young adults everywhere, working, finding books, bringing them

back and Mike and I had found a place where we could speak alone for a moment.

something and Mike excused himself from our conversation and went off to a corner to

speak to the boy. I never knew what it was about but the picture, Mike and the boy

standing in the sunlight coming through the window, the boy obviously in need of help

and Mike helping him, talking earnestly, softly, until I could see the strain come out of

gave the boy some help and Mike wanted to know if it was all right to go to the hospital

worried that something wrong could be done about a book and I knew then the most

wonderful thing about Mike: he truly loved books. Loved the paper, loved the ink, the

covers, even the process and that love extended in some wonderful way to the authors.

He told me of his first convention that night, when he went as a new librarian and there

he watched her put a cigarette out and walk away. He looked at the cigarette butt,

looked at her walking away, and he picked up the butt and wrapped it in tissue and kept

is as a souvenir. He still had the butt. Not so much because of the woman as the books

she wrote, to have something of a person who wrote books.

I will miss Mike every day for the rest of my life.

---------------------------------------

Hazel Rochman

Mike Printz made me feel at home.

We met as new members of the Best Books for Young Adults Committee when we

were both school librarians back in 1983. Talking and arguing about books, we got to

know each other and became friends forever.

Who would have thought we would have anything in common? Me, an uprooted

stateless alien from Johannesburg who didn't know how I got here; Mike an American

so rooted in the Midwest that (as Mary K. Chelton always said) he made you feel

deprived that you didn't grow up in Topeka, Kansas. But it never made him rigid. On the

contrary, I think it was that rootedness that gave him the strength to be so open. He

knew who he was. Those he loved, he loved with a fierce, unshakable loyalty. He didn't

care if you agreed with him or not.

For a mover and shaker, he was so quiet. In his school, where he had enormous

influence on hundreds of students, he was a background presence, never in the

limelight. He brought me to Topeka West High School to talk to the school community

about how I had selected the stories, but also about my personal experience of what it

was like to grow up white and apart.

But not just me. When Mike was on a roll, you couldn't stop him. With his great

colleague, Diane Goheen, he created a schoolwide project on apartheid that reached

out from the library to teachers in every department in the school, and even beyond to

the parents and the wider suburban community. From Chicago, he brought in Prexy

Nesbitt, formerly consultant in the U.S. for the government of Mozambique, and two

thousand students crowded the library to hear him in nine workshop sessions. The

eminent Mozambique artist Malangatana Ngwenya came to the school and painted

murals with the students. Films were shown all week. The kids did research online and

gave class presentations on various aspects of apartheid and institutionalized racism.

Mike and Diane's work is a model for junior high and high school projects across the

curriculum and they presented it in workshops around the country. Mike just wouldn't

take no for an answer. Because of Mike's determination, Mark Mathabane, the

nonfiction in 1990.

In his passionate commitment to bringing books and teenagers together, Mike

exemplified the best in our profession. He drew us into community. Sometimes it seems

that he was right and just about everybody important did come from Topeka. He

certainly made the place special for me. I miss him.

-------------------------------------

Pam Spencer

Mike Printz, as sweet and stubborn a Swede as one would ever want to meet.

In 1985 I attended the Midwinter Meeting held in Washington, D.C., which, being

held close to my home, allowed me to attend the Best Books for Young Adults meetings

where I saw and heard Mike for the first time. New to the whole world of young adult

literature and BBYA, I was entranced by the literary knowledge these committee

members had. On a Sunday afternoon of the conference, I brought one student from

our school's young adult group to hear the literary discussion. She was hooked on YA

lit, I was hooked on YA lit, and lucky us, we got to meet some of the "legends" in young

adult literature-Christy Tyson, Betty Carter, Linda Waddle, Hazel Rochman, Roger

Sutton and Mike Printz, to name only a few.

From that first encounter with Mike in D.C., a friendship developed between us and

the phone rang regularly with questions, news, concerns and issues. Mike had some

firmly held views that were often in direct opposition to "normal library management

techniques" popular in school libraries. Let me share some of them with you:

Inventory: that sacred ritual that brought all library activities to a halt and allowed a

librarian to sit in front of his/her bookshelves was not part of Mike's routine. When I

asked him how he knew when a book was missing so that it could be reordered, his

reply was "If a student needs a book and it's not available, it's time to order another

one." So logical! And best of all, it didn't take away any time from working with students.

Collection development: Mike's reasons for ordering any materials were

student-driven. He read and read and then read some more. And then he sold books

to students, and sold books to students and then sold some more books to students. He

booktalked to anyone and everyone. If he'd read a new book, he had a regular circle of

librarians, publishers and friends he'd call to discuss the book. If you hadn't yet read the

book, you immediately felt guilty, rushed out and either found or bought the book and

read it immediately. He goaded, cajoled and inspired everyone to read.

Holidays in libraries: Mike was very inventive in decorating the Topeka West High

School library around the winter holidays. The main office in his school was always filled

with poinsettias which were probably bought through the school administrative fund.

Somehow many of those poinsettias ended up in Mike's library, thanks to a few stealthy

trips of his.

Sense of humor: Infamous for playing practical jokes on his friends, it was hard to play

a "gotcha" on Mike. For many years Mike chaired the Econo-Clad Advisory Committee,

and I was one of his committee members. One December Barb Lynn (then Marketing

Manager for Econo-Clad) and I cooked up a scheme one week which led to my calling

Mike to find out if he'd received a bonus from Econo-Clad. I explained that I had

received a sizable bonus and couldn't imagine why. Well, Mike fussed and blustered,

as only Mike could, but had no idea why Econo-Clad was doing this as they never had

before and he'd certainly never received one, and on and on and on. However, he

planned to call Barb Lynn immediately and find out what was going on. Well, Barb and I

giggled and kept stringing him along. We gave him the whole weekend to stew about

this large bonus I had received and he hadn't. The following Monday I finally called and

told him the truth. It was the only time Barb and I were able to say "Gotcha!" And he

made sure we paid for it!

Friendship: My husband Art also became great friends with Mike to the point that they

often called one another, especially as each of them became sicker. During the summer

of 1994, Art and I stopped in Topeka on our way back from visiting family in New

Mexico and spent several days with Mike and Gene. Though I had told Art that Kansans

traveled miles for lunch or dinner, he was amazed when the four of us drove 125 miles

to have lunch in Lindsborg, a special smorgasbord lunch in honor of Mike's and my

Swedish heritage. Following a wonderful afternoon of shopping and sightseeing in this

Swedish-inspired town, we drove a little further for chicken dinner at the infamous

Brookfield Hotel. On the entire trip, Mike made sure we saw every monument and

heard every snippet of Kansas history. We enjoyed side trips to the Eisenhower

museum/library, some tower out in the middle of nowhere and a historic mill and

museum which had a display of figures made of cement. Yes, Mike even knew who was

represented by these cement figures. Mike knew everything about Kansas history-you

had no choice but to join him in his love for his native state.

Students: Everything Mike did in his library was done for his students. They came first,

and he had no time to waste on adults who didn't share his student-centered views. His

influence on his students was long-term. A wonderful example is the resolution for Mike

Printz offered at the 1997 ALA Midwinter by a former student of his who is now an ALA

Councilor.

This article was supposed to be about how Mike influenced others with his ideas on

collection development. Mike was Mike and his collection development policies would

be the same as his theories on reading and they would be the same as his views on

student use of the library. What you saw with Mike was what he was; there was no

pretense, no status, no excuse. He was a wonderful person in addition to being an

outstanding librarian, and I will always proud that he was my friend.

--------------------

Pam Spencer is the councilor for the Young Adult Library Services Association and

coordinator of Library Services at Fairfax County Public Schools in Annandale, Virginia.

Deborah Taylor

It is truly rare to find an individual who personally or professionally is just what they

say they are. Mike Printz was that rare individual. When I met him, many years ago, he

was a member of the Best Books for Young Adults Committee. He was doing something

he loved more than anything, working to discover and herald books of high quality,

which he loved, for young adults, whom he loved and respected. As our professional

acquaintance grew into a mutual friendship, I was always moved by Mike's passion for

excellence, and I was touched by his belief that those of us who toiled in the YA field

could accomplish great things. He had a way of making you feel, if he thought you could

do something, you could. He is the reason I became a candidate for YALSA President.

When I was elected, I felt comfortable sharing with Mike the emotion I felt as the first

African American elected president of YALSA. Lots of people give lip service to diversity

and inclusion, but Mike truly acted on what he believed.

When I received the news that Mike had died, I was with the YALSA Executive

Committee in Chicago. I was so grateful to be with Linda Waddle, Michael Cart, Pat

Muller, and Pam Spencer that day, people who understood why our hearts were broken.

Before we left Chicago that weekend, I vowed to dedicate the 1997 YALSA

preconference on Popular Reading to Mike. I wanted to make that day a joyous, living

memorial to a man who, (in Mike Printz-speak) "knew a thing or two about books and

young people." Mike loved YALSA preconferences devoted to books.

Many who read this volume, knew and loved Mike as much as I did. However, I hope

we will remember to share this with others, particularly new librarians who did not know

Mike as well.

Mike Printz left all who work with youth in libraries an incredible gift. He left us a

standard for service, a beacon so bright, it can't help but light our way. He also showed

us how to be the best, with warmth, good humor, and love. He really knew how to

appreciate and celebrate the differences and common ground of folks from all walks of

life.

There is a gospel song with words that say, "May the work I've done, speak for me.

May the life I've lived, speak for me". Well spoken, Mike. There is also a Langston

Hughes poem that speaks of loving his friend who has gone away. Hughes captures as

only a talented poet can the depth of hurt we experience when we lose a beloved

friend.

---------------------------------

Deborah Taylor is the 1996-97 president of the Young Adult Library Services

Association and the coordinator of School and Student Services at Enoch Pratt Public

Library in Baltimore, Maryland.

Jeanne Vestal

Preconference sponsored by YASD in June of 1990 was an outstanding experience for

For many years he served on the Best Books for Young Adults Committee. He had

always done his homework and could speak eloquently about any book up for

and appropriate adult titles. Mike never underestimated his kids either for their

intelligence or their wide range of interests. Mike seemed to become one with his

what his plans were after high school. His reply reflected the incredible experience he

him, and he was only a junior in high school.

tells the story of his efforts to make the other voices heard from the past and present,

from far away and from near. Read about it in fact and fiction and poetry and biography.

Look at life in art and listen to its music.

Library Journal in their fortieth year celebration issue ( July 1994), he was very excited

He noted several authors whose novels speak to young adults and enrich their lives.

He praised the nonfiction works that had brought responsible, accurate titles into the

He professed that during the next forty years, school librarians would lead the way in

the information explosion. Well, for 36 years, Mike Printz led the way for his students

If Mike had been paid for every book idea or opinion we solicited from him, his estate

would have been in the high millions.

-----------------------------------

Jeanne Vestal is the publisher of Twenty-First Century Books, New York, New York.

conviction is that every young adult can read and learn and that the library is the best place to do

it. His life commitment is to making a difference in the lives of young people. He sees each kid

as important and as an individual.

He was an advocate of youth participation long before it became popular. He has students get in

touch with local history by teaching research skills through investigating native born Kansans.

Africa apartheid, the Holocaust, Native Americans, and the Hmong. He has shared his life-long

love affair with authors by creating the framework of his Author-In-Residence program and

giving his students the excitement of working with authors. He creatively engages students and

than a librarian, more than a teacher, because he has been for over 34 years a caring friend to

students, sharing his love of books and love of life with them.

He has made his colleagues aware of quality, stimulating, interesting literature for young adults

enthusiasm and humility and tireless support of good literature for young adults. He has a

passionate belief that kids should get what they want to read and has lived his life committed to

intellectual freedom.

He has a vision of how the world ought to be and from him young people have learned to live

with knowledge and to care. His caring is a role model for the profession, and he has respect and

stature as a professional educator and is a powerful, human influence in our profession.

He says he is inspired by Marilyn Miller, and believes with her that all one person can do is

Elizabethan falconry, a big fat hen and a couple of ducks resonate in the lives of all who have

New Orleans, June, 1993

Peggy Sullivan, Executive Director Marilyn M. Miller, President

WHEREAS Mike Printz, high school librarian at Topeka West High School for over thirty

years, passed away this last Summer, and

enthusiasm for reading, and

and

approach to recorded learning, performing at The Center for the Book, and

WHEREAS Mike was well known for his work with the American Econo-Clad Young Adults

Books Committee, and

WHEREAS occasionally in life a dedicated and loving professional will leave behind a legacy

which lasts far beyond their own lifetime,

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that Mike Printz be remembered by the Membership of the

American Library Association for his vast contributions to the library profession and young adult

literature, and

Topeka.

Moved by: Kent Oliver

Kansas Chapter Councilor

Seconded by: Pam Spencer

YALSA Councilor

Linda Miller

A MAN IN PLAID

A PROUD MAN

SCHOLAR

A MAN OF MANY FACES.

A KEEPER OF PEOPLE

PLACES

AND CAUSES.

A MAN IN LOVE WITH ORIGIN,

FAMILY

WITH MYSTERIES

FOUND

IN GHOST TOWNS

PEOPLE AND THEIR ACTIONS,

AND GOSSIP.

A COLLECTOR OF

SMALL TOWN CAFES,

FIESTA WARE,

WIND UP TOYS,

DICK TRACY,

PEOPLE.

A MAN INTERWOVEN WITH SENSITIVITY

AN ADVISOR

BEST FRIEND TO MANY

A TEDDY BEAR.

A MAN ANGERED BY

INJUSTICES

CONTRADICTIONS

INCOMPETENCE.

PROTECTOR OF THE UNDERDOG

YOUTH

DIVERSITY.

A GENTLE HISTORIAN,

A STAND ALONE KANSAN,

A PROUD AMERICAN.

A CARETAKER

KEEPER OF THE WRITTEN WORD

JUGGLER OF BOOKS...

------------------

Lynda Miller is the executive director for the Topeka Public School Fund and project

coordinator for the Business Partnership Program in Topeka, Kansas.