摘要：The Director of the Boston Medical Library, Mr. James F. Ballard, died 15 May 1955, with, as they used to say, his boots on. A few months short of his 77th birthday, he still, because he wanted to, guided the destinies of the great library which he had served for 63 years. At the time of his death, he was preparing to leave his home to attend the Annual Meeting of the Medical Library Association at Milwaukee. A past president of the Association, and the second recipient of its Marcia C. Noyes Award, he would there have been welcomed by a large number of colleagues with whom he would genially have talked shop, wined and dined, and probably danced the polka-and who know that they will not look on the like of this shrewd, occasionally exasperating, but fundamentally warm-hearted pioneer again. Through virtue of longevity, at the least, he had come to be regarded as the dean of American medical librarians, an honorary status which he appeared to enjoy. He was, also, though in no way demonstrative, their male equivalent of the prima donna assoluta, quite possibly the most widely known medical librarian in the world. It will be some time, indeed, before the hypothetical letter addressed simply "Ballard-Boston" could fail to be deposited promptly at 8, The Fenway.
