Russian Exchange

DARTMOUTH'S Stefansson Collection constitutes one of the world's two largest polar libraries, the other belonging to the Leningrad Arctic Institute in Russia. Plans have recently been completed for regular exchanges between the two. With the greatly increasing world-wide interest in polar concepts and studies, it is anticipated that a steady stream of duplicate books and periodicals of mutual interest to both countries will flow between Hanover and Leningrad.

The final arrangements were made by Mrs. Evelyn Stefansson, librarian of the Dartmouth collection, during a recent four-week tour of Russia when she was gathering material for her forthcoming book, Here Is the Soviet Union, commissioned by the Charles Scribner's and Sons Publishing Co. Mrs. Stefansson is the wife of the noted explorer and arctic consultant to the College, Vilhjalmur Stefansson, who assembled the collection over many years. During her visit she was warmly received by Soviet polar experts, who were enthusiastic and cooperative about the project. She reported that they were familiar with her husband's work and books, three of which have been published in Russian. One of them, TheFriendly Arctic, dealing with survival in a natural environment, was said to have been used in planning the development of Siberia in the '30s. In the four weeks she was in Russia she toured the cities of Moscow, Irkutsk, Sukumi, Tbilisi, Kiev and Leningrad, where she visited the Arctic Institute with which the exchange arrangements have been made.