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Home > About SI > Giving to SI > Scholarships & Fellowships > Morris and Ida Fine Scholarship
Morris and Ida Fine Scholarship
(May 2001) The School of Information wishes to recognize the late Ruth Fine (ABLS '29) for her extraordinary bequest of approximately $500,000 that will ensure access to graduate studies for future generations of students.
The School, in accordance with the wishes of Miss Fine, who died in April 2000, has established the Morris and Ida Fine Scholarship Fund in memory and honor of her parents. Miss Fine valued highly her education in library science at the University of Michigan. After her graduation, she worked as a reference librarian for the Detroit Public Library.
In 1937, Miss Fine accepted a position as reference librarian with the Department of Labor Library in Washington, D.C. In 1941 she started a library for the former Bureau of the Budget which had been established in 1939 within the newly formed Executive Office of the President.
The administrative officer for the new Bureau of the Budget, while a staff member on the Central Statistical Board, had used the Labor Department library frequently and was impressed with Miss Fine's knowledge, skill, and abilities. He later offered her the opportunity to set up a library for his new agency and she accepted. Over the ensuing 30 years, she built the collection to the point that it was one of the finest management and policy libraries anywhere. The library included an extensive collection of legislative histories of presidential reorganization plans during the 20th century. The Bureau of the Budget library, under her leadership, provided support to many presidential committees and commissions, including most notably the first and second Hoover Commissions.
In addition to serving the Bureau of the Budget, during Miss Fine's tenure as library director, the library also served the Council of Economic Advisers, the National Security Council, the President's Committee on Science and Technology (and predecessor organizations), as well as the White House, which, interestingly, did not establish its own library until the Carter Administration.
Miss Fine believed strongly in the service mission of the library, in public service, and in professional library associations. She was at various times president of the District of Columbia Library Association and the District of Columbia Chapter of the Special Library Association.
After her retirement, she was recruited to study the library and information service needs of the federal General Accounting Office. Her study and report, done with her usual care and thorough attention to all relevant matters, was the basis for a revitalized library program in the GAO.
The School of Information wishes to thank Elisabeth (Betsy) Knauff, retired circuit librarian for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Judicial Circuit, for compiling this biography of Ruth Fine.
Last updated: Sep 13, 2005
Home > About SI > Giving to SI > Scholarships & Fellowships > Morris and Ida Fine Scholarship
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