ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 45 | June 2000
Hans
Zwillenberg:
Pioneer in information technology
Hans Zwillenberg, who died in Canberra in March aged 85 years, was one of the first in Australia to recognise the potential automation could offer in the processing of library information.
After an extensive career, which started in 1945, he came to the National Library in 1975 when he was close to retirement but with his zest undiminished. Born in what is now Poland, he arrived as a young man in Australia in November 1938, a story he told with much relish. In the Oral History interview in 1986 with Peter Biskup, he outlined what must have been a difficult start but with no complaints on his part.
His first proper job, as he described it, was as a technical officer with a chemical factory in South Australia, which set up a research and development department. He took over the library when George Buick, another notable Australian librarian, left. He moved to Broken Hill Associated Smelters in Port Pirie in 1950 where he had his first exposure to automation in the form of punched cards. He joined the Weapons Research Establishment in 1962 and was one of the first to do the IBM training course.
He then moved to the Department of Supply, which did pioneer work on the use of computers and automated information processing. He was appointed to the Library as Director, Technology but later had a formative role in the early days of the Australian Bibliographical Network, now Kinetica. He was a real character, never frightened of controversy, with a wide variety of interests including military history.
Maintaining his life-long interest in technology, he organised a major Library display in 1986 called The History of Mining. He is shown second from the left, next to Warren Horton, then National Library Director-General and Sir Ninian Stephen, then Governor-General of Australia, who opened the exhibition, and Lady Stephen.
Marie Sexton
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