Anders Johnson, Montana Transportation Department Librarian
Anders Johnson is the new Montana Department of Transportation (MDT) Librarian and came onboard in July 2023. Here’s some impressive numbers: the MDT library serves about 2,000 employees in 5 districts throughout the state and contains about 30,000 holdings, of which about 20,000 are print resources. This is even more impressive when you consider that Anders is a solo librarian (he is grateful to have a recent graduate intern who is helping him). While he is making progress through a cataloging backlog, he’s also performing outreach with different MDT departments and learning more about the field of transportation librarianship.
Anders received his bachelor’s degree in rhetoric (which is the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing) from University of California, Berkley, where he worked in the university library and paved the path to his future career. He received his PhD from University of California, Irvine in September 2023, following his successful dissertation defense on European literary modernism (think Joseph Conrad). He also got a master’s degree in literature along the way, as well as a graduate degree in library science from Indiana University, Bloomington.
Through all his studies, Anders continued to work in libraries – including the Fine Arts Library at Indiana University, Bloomington where he was the supervisor of circulation and technical services and an internship in cataloging at University of California, Irvine.
PhD students don’t have much spare time, but Anders is looking forward to getting back into playing the synthesizer and collecting more movies. He has a sizable collection (lots of horror movies) and may open a movie archive to the public someday.
What are some of the gems in your collection? There is a very cool book called Taming Big Sky Country by MTD resident historian John Axline about the history of Montana transportation back to 1860. The author is still at MTD and Anders is considering hosting a book talk about the book at the library.
Another gem (especially since Anders likes horror movies) is "The Whale" - a digitized video recording with footage from 1970 which shows Oregon DOT staff exploding a dead whale carcass with dynamite. In the video, some of the exploded whale blubber crushes a person's car. Please note, soon after the video was taken, legislation was passed forbidding this type of handling.
The library also has an Overdrive collection through a partnership with the Montana State Library. This collection contains electronic books and audiobooks on many topics, such professional development, time management, etc. Anders hopes to grow this collection to include books on the history of transportation.
A question on storm-water management was memorable, and the MTD library contained a lot of books and DVDs for Anders to dig into (pun intended). It was also the first question Anders received in his new role, which made it especially memorable, and helped him to familiarize himself with the collection.
While Anders’ most well-known superpower may be his adaptability, he also has a secret (till now) superpower: After he healed from a motorcycle accident, he can predict when it is going to rain by how his foot feels.
“The process one goes through to obtain a PhD provides a substantial background in research. You need to navigate numerous resources which more than prepares you for a library role. You certainly get to know a library when you are writing a dissertation,” says Anders. Like many PhD candidates, he was an instructor while studying for his PhD, and feels that the process of teaching can prepare one for many aspects of library outreach and public speaking.
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