Reading rooms

Vytauto g. 84, LT-76352 Šiauliai

Reading room items are for reference-only. After informing the staff working in the reading rooms, they can be brought along to the Individual or Group Work rooms; however, they should be brought back to the reading room on the same day by the end of working hours.

The reading rooms have self-service copying machines.

Periodicals and Arts Reading Room

Universal Reading Room

Dr. Jonas Šliūpas Reading Room

2^ndfloor, Room 202 A

Working hours:

Mon-Thur: 8.00-17.00

Fri: 8.00-15.45

Jonas Šliūpas archive, donated by Vytautas and Vanda Šliūpas, is kept at Šiauliai Academy Information Centre. Vytautas Šliūpas had started the archive of Jonas Šliūpas, a physician, doctor and a publisher of the first Lithuanian periodical Aušra, in California in 1987. On 13 October 2005 a cooperation agreement was signed between Šiauliai University and Vytautas Šliūpas, under which the university took an obligation to process all documents of the archive, promote it and ensure its accessibility to all interested readers.

On 13 January 2009 the first batch of documents was delivered and an official opening of Doctor Jonas Šliūpas Archive took place on 12 June of the same year. Two more deliveries of books, documents and other objects were accepted by the library in 2010 and 2012. The major part of the archive consists of books covering the period between 1821 and 2011. More than 5,000 books are processed and have their entries in online catalogue. The earliest of the books is a textbook of the Prussian language published in 1821 in Germany (Die Sprache der alten Preufsen: Einleitung, Ueberreste, Sprachlehre, Wörterbuch).

The collection of periodicals is also quite extensive and it covers the period between 1886 and 2010. Not all items are originals; some of them are copies. The archive has originals and copies of newspapers that were edited by doctor Jonas Šliūpas. The most valuable part of the archive consists of manuscripts. It comprises documents, their copies, letters, articles, various certificates, photos and other historical or documentary materials that were collected in exile.

Some personal belongings of Šliūpas family, various audio and video recordings, paintings and souvenirs gathered by Vytautas Šliūpas from all over the world are also kept in the archive. When celebrating 150^th birth anniversary of the doctor Jonas Šliūpas, in 2011 the library published a calendar While Looking Through Doctor Jonas Šliūpas Archive; its compilers received Laurynas Ivinskis Award for the best calendar of the year.

Rare Books

More than 10 thousand items are kept in the reading room:

items published before 1917 in foreign languages;
items published before 1945 in Lithuania and in exile
periodicals published before 1940;
items published in displaced persons (DP) camps in Germany before 1950;
items on the institution of higher education in Šiauliai (study programs, methodical literature, activity plans and reports, materials on the history of the university, its activities and events, posters, official notices, calendars, etc.);
printings of the National Revival (the years 1988–1993);
items with dedications, autographs and ex libris;
items of exceptional forms, miniatures;
bibliographic and polygraphic rarities;
personal collections, manuscripts;
dissertations and their abstracts, habilitation papers;
final papers that are related to Šiauliai University Library;
library yearbooks and photos.

The largest part of the holdings consists of items donated by Lithuanians living in exile. Parcels with documents came from various countries – USA (Pranė Šlutienė, Bronius and Filomena Masiokas, the Lithuanian Research and Studies Centre in Chicago and others), Canada (Ginutis Procuta, the Lithuanian Canadian Community), France (Žibuntas Mikšys, Petras Klimas), Australia (Canberra Lithuanian Community, Sigita Gailiūnaitė, Algimantas Taškūnas) and others. A large collection on Lithuania was donated by the Kent State University Library. The collection consists of more than 300 Lithuanian books and periodicals, published in the period between 1894–1977, personal documents and manuscripts that used to belong to Dr Domas Jasaitis, Prelate Pranciškus Mykolas Juras, economist and journalist Dr Jokūbas Stukas and Edward A. Schultz, a lawyer and the Chairman of the Lithuanian United Organizational Committee of Western Pennsylvania. The collections reveal the impact that was made by the activities of American Lithuanians on the history of Lithuanian and USA.

The earliest book that is kept in the Rare Books Reading Room was published in Leipzig in 1732 and contains the history and criticism of the German language and poetry (Beyträge zur critischen Historie der deutschen Sprache, Poesie und Beredsamkeit). The earliest Lithuanian book – Ziwatas Pona yr Diewa musu Jezusa Christusa is the Lithuanian translation of St Bonaventure’s book that was published in Vilnius in 1759. It is a great monument of the 18^thcentury North Samogitian dialect as the Lithuanian translation of the book is based on this dialect. The reading room also has 19 books with counterfeit publishing data (1865–1904), the majority of which are religious books.

Holdings of the rare books were supplemented with the private collections donated by Juozas Vaitkevičius, Rector of Šiauliai Pedagogical Institute, and professors Eglė and Bronius Prėskieniai, Vytenis Rimkus, designer from Šiauliai Vilius Puronas, promoter of Esperanto Pranas Sitonis, members of the Lithuanian Society of Political Prisoners and Deportees and other private libraries.

Information:

Vida Steponavičienė

Tel: +370 41 393 049

Email:

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Readings rooms

Periodicals and Arts Reading Room

Universal Reading Room

Dr. Jonas Šliūpas Reading Room

Internet Reading Room

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