DANTON, J(oseph) Periam 1908-2002

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born July 5, 1908, in Palo Alto, CA; died November 12, 2002, in Oakland, CA. Librarian, educator, administrator, and author. Danton was a respected librarian who was a former dean of the University of California at Berkeley's School of Librarianship. Born in California, he spent much of his childhood in Beijing, China, where his parents were teachers. He earned several college degrees, including a B.A. from Oberlin College in 1928, a B.S. from Columbia University in 1929, an M.A. from Williams College in 1930, and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1935. During his early career, Danton was a librarian in New York City and Chicago. He then combined librarianship with teaching, working as a librarian and professor at Colby College and Temple University during the mid-1930s and early 1940s. During World War II he joined the U.S. Navy's Air Combat Intelligence unit, rising to the rank of lieutenant commander. After leaving the Navy, he joined the faculty at the University of California, Berkeley, as an associate professor in 1946, becoming a professor the next year and dean of the School of Librarianship from 1946 to 1961. Danton retired from teaching in 1976 and was awarded that year with the Berkeley Citation. He was also awarded the Beta Phi Mu Award in 1983 from the American Library Association. Danton was credited with making great improvements to the School of Librarianship at the University of California, and his scholarship was also praised by his fellow librarians. He was the author of several books, including Education for Librarianship (1949), Book Selection and Collections: A Comparison of German and American University Libraries (1963), and The Dimensions of Comparative Librarianship (1973), as well as editing other scholarly works.

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

periodicals

Los Angeles Times, November 23, 2002, p. B21.

San Francisco Chronicle, November 19, 2002, p. A23.