Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris
Back in the days of the old National Library (Bibliothèque Nationale) in Paris, prior to the opening of the present incarnation in 1996, I was doing research for what eventually became a book on tourism in relation to Second World War France. The usual procedure in the library was to be assigned a numbered seat in the reading room, then order the books you wanted, which would then be brought to you. One day, as I was sitting and waiting for my books, I was suddenly surrounded by two young men, one on either side of the chair in which I was sitting. Alarmed, I wondered “What have I done wrong?” Was I about to be thrown out of the library? “Are you Monsieur Gordon?” one of them asked me. “Yes,” I said, and was then told to “please follow us.”
I was next led upstairs to the librarians’ private workspace, where I had never before been. My escorts left and I was introduced to a librarian, a friendly young woman who began chatting about a television program she had seen a few days previously. By chance, I had seen the same program and we chatted a bit about it. Then she started talking about my research project and she brought out a cluster of tourist pamphlets and other publications related to Second World War France that had not been listed in the catalogues I had seen. I was told that I could consult the pamphlets and my two escorts then accompanied me with them back downstairs to my seat in the reading room.
I assumed that they were finished with me when one asked if I needed anything photocopied from the materials now piled up at my workspace. At the time, photocopying material in the library was routine but one still needed permission from someone at the desk to do so. In addition, there was invariably a long line of people waiting to use the one or two photocopying machines then available. More recently, you can see researchers hunched over their documents, taking pictures with their iphones.
Yes, I said to my escorts, I did have some sections I would like photocopied. They accompanied me to the line, jumped the queue, and photocopied my materials. When I asked how much I owed them for the photocopies, they smiled, shook their heads, and said “nothing.” They then accompanied me back to my seat, smiled and said: “au revoir,” and disappeared.
This event occurred during the early 1990s. Every so often, the memory of it pops back into my consciousness, as it did today, and so I thought I would write about it. I suspect I am not alone in recalling unanticipated events that played out happily. Anyone reading this blog may well have similar recollections. Putting them together would make an interesting – and perhaps inspiring – collection.
Bertram Gordon is professor emeritus of history at Mills College, as well as an OLLI member, faculty member and volunteer. His most recent book War Tourism: Second World War France from Defeat and Occupation to the Creation of Heritage grew from his discovery of German-language tourism magazines published for German soldiers during their Second World War occupation of France. He can be reached at bmgordon@berkeley.edu.