Library Stories · · C.B. Greenberg
The Huxleys
“…black marks on a page can move a man to tears, though the bones of him that wrote it are long ago crumbled to dust.” - Julian Huxley
Libraries abound, and in surprising places sometimes. Until I read the excellent “The Huxleys: An Intimate History of Evolution” by Alison Bashford (2022), I could not have guessed that papers and books from Julian Huxley’s personal life and library are held, or more accurately “sequestered,” in this country, in Rice University Archives. Julian was grandson of Thomas Henry Huxley, close associate of and advocate for Charles Darwin. Julian, renowned in his right for many accomplishments, was the founding head of the biology department at Rice University, Rice Institute. Bashford is Laureate Professor in History and Director of the Laureate Centre for Population at the University of New South Wales in Australia. The overlapping span of the two Huxley lives, 1825-2075, marks an immensely…