Marilyn Crandell Schleg was a medical librarian with two Master's degrees, one in microbiology from the University of Wisconsin and the other from the University of Michigan in library science.  Marilyn was afflicted with Multiple System Atrophy, a form of Parkinson's disease, for many years before her untimely death in July of 2001. Her husband, Edward, and son, David, now continue to fund the Lecture in her name.

"(My family and I) wanted to do something for Albion
because Albion did so much for me," Marilyn stated.

MR. MILES HARVEY
 

Education B.S., Journalism, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign M.F.A., English/Creative Writing, University of Michigan Professional Pursuits Journalist, United Press International Journalist & Managing Editor, In These Times Literary Critic & Journalist, Outside Short stories for The Michigan Quarterly Review, The Sun, Nimrod, etc. Awards Fellowship for fiction from the Illinois Arts Council - 2004

THE ISLAND OF LOST MAPS A TRUE STORY OF CARTOGRAPHIC CRIME   Simon Winchester Author of The Professor and the Madman "Beguiling . . . as with the best of maps, the more one looks, the more fascinating and intriguing it all becomes." From Booklist Beneath the tweedy patina of the rare-book and -manuscript trade lurk dealers with far baser agendas than admiration for significant historic objects. In a fascinating and multifaceted investigation, Harvey details a case involving the larcenous plundering of numerous libraries. The objects of avarice were maps published during the Age of Exploration. Because the supply of such maps is finite, their value has inflated greatly ... The crook at the center of Harvey's story is Gilbert Bland, who posed as a nondescript academic and infiltrated the rare-book collections of numerous university libraries, where he furtively sliced out plates from atlases, absconded to his Florida strip-mall map dealership, and profitably dumped them onto a market none too curious about provenance ("You've got a 1671 Ogilby's America? Splendid!"). From American Archivist Since Bland absolutely refused to cooperate with his would-be biographer, Harvey's insights in the Bland case were gleaned the hard way, by spending years reviewing relevant newspaper accounts, military records, court documents, criminal records, and other public documentation. He also interviewed almost all of the other principals in the case—librarians, archivists, map dealers, police, FBI officers, and judges, as well as those members of Bland's family and friends who would talk to him. From CNN As Harvey finds himself with a collection (from court documents to letters from prison) of all things Gilbert Bland, he begins to realize that a collection speaks just as much about the collector as it does the subject. These glimpses inside the process of researching and writing ... make even the most obvious detours and back roads readable and understandable. The reader may not always share Harvey's interests, but his interest in these interests is intoxicating. In the end, Harvey forces us to be a bit like Bland -- to break the book, picking it apart for the things that interest us. And, with a collection this vast, we'll have no trouble finding something. OTHER PUBLICATIONS Books Primary School, Elementary, or Juvenile Audience Barry Bonds: Baseball's complete player -1994. Hakeem Olajuwon: The dream - 1994. Juan Gonzalez: Home-run hero - 1995. Presidential elections - 1995 Deion Sanders: Prime time - 1996. Italy - 1996. Women's voting rights - 1996. The fall of the Soviet Union - 1998. Look what came from China - 1998. Look what came from Egypt - 1998. Look what came from Italy -  1998. Look what came from Mexico - 1998. Look what came from France - 1999. Look what came from India - 1999. Look what came from Japan - 1999. Look what came from Russia - 1999. Look what came from Africa - 2002. Look what came from Ireland - 2002. Look what came from Switzerland - 2002. Visual Materials Kits With Kimmel, Eric A., Iijima, Geneva Cobb, et al. Tales from other lands: Japan. With McDermott, Gerald, Millen, C.M., et. al. Tales from other lands: Ireland #1. With Mehta, Lila, Pluckrose, Henry Arthur, et. al. Tales from other lands: India. Articles (Compiler) The outside canon. Outside Magazine - May 1996    Mr. Bland's evil plot to control the world: In the dusty world of map collecting, one man cut a darker figure than his milquetoasty colleagues. Outside Magazine, 22:6 - June 1997 Interview: Matters of life and death: Studs Terkel. MotherJones.com - November/December 2001 The bad guy: Gangbanger, fifth columnist, radical Muslim, poor fatherless Puerto Rican - is it mere coincidence that in Jose Padilla the government has the perfect fall guy? Notebook: justice. Mother Jones - March/April 2003 [Available in Looksmart database] Judging the jury: Has our system of justice ever worked? Utne Reader Online - April 27, 2004 The primordial schmooze: Was gossip the evolutionary spark for human speech? Utne Reader - April 27, 2004 The Drought. Ploughshares: The literary journal at Emerson College - Fall 2004

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• They didn't throw the book at him; Suspect in thefts from rare volumes is let go in Baltimore. Washington Post - December 16, 1995

• Bland mess. [Msg. 199512240413.UAA00639@ix3.ix.netcom.com]. Message posted to the University of California-Berkeley's ExLibris electronic mailing list, archived at http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/ - December 23, 1995

• Antiques dealer admits slashing rare book; Peabody increasing security in wake of map thefts. The Gazette. Retrieved September 23, 2004, from the Johns Hopkins University website http://www.jhu.edu/~gazette/janmar96/jan0296/02thefts.html - January 2, 1996

• Florida man held in theft of rare books. Plain Dealer, 3A - January 6, 1996

• Man held in theft of rare documents. Washington Post, B05 - January 6, 1996

• Map thief turns himself in to Florida police.  The Gazette - January 8, 1996

• Florida nab map thief. The Cavalier Daily  - January 17, 1996

• Bland denied bond; Police, FBI continue map search. The Cavalier Daily, Inc.  - January 26, 2996

• Librarians track down missing rare documents. Washington Post, D06 - June 10, 1996

• Bland thefts. [Msg. 199606272310.QAA24796@dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com]. Message posted to the University of California-Berkeley's ExLibris electronic mailing list, archived at http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/ - June 28, 1996

• Re: Map thief Gilbert Bland [Msg. 199704120121.UAA21614@dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com]. Message posted to the University of California-Berkeley's ExLibris electronic mailing list, archived at http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/ - April 11, 1997

• Re: Map thief Gilbert Bland [Msg. 2107C8B5659@herschel.ras.org.uk]. Message posted to the University of California-Berkeley's ExLibris electronic mailing list, archived at http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/ - April 10, 1997

• Re: Map thief Gilbert Bland [Msg. 9704101253.AA18858@mercury]. Message posted to the University of California-Berkeley's ExLibris electronic mailing list, archived at http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/ - April 10, 1997

• Re: Map thief Gilbert Bland [Msg. 2CC7F17777E@sperrin.ulst.ac.uk]. Message posted to the University of California-Berkeley's ExLibris electronic mailing list, archived at http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/ - April 10, 1997

• Hitting back against library thieves. The North Carolina Archivist, 49/50 - Fall/Winter 1997

• The true story of the Alderman map thief. Inside UVA Online. [University of Virginia] - September 22-28, 2000

• An audacious map thief revealed. Johns Hopkins Magazine: Humanities & the Arts. [Johns Hopkins University] - February 2001