Alumni Achievement Award (AAA)
The AAA is given to alumni who have excelled in their profession by contributing extraordinary advancements to their field or improving the quality of life in a certain area of society through their professional achievements.

Mark Dimunation ’74, Chief, Library of Congress’ Rare Book and Special Collections Division
Washington, D.C.

From the Hill of Manitou Heights to Capitol Hill, Mark Dimunation ‘74 has made remarkable achievements in a rare line of work — rare books, to be exact.

In 1998, Dimunation was appointed chief of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division of the Library of Congress. In addition to managing acquisition of new materials, developing programs and maintaining North America’s largest collection of rare books, he oversees the interpretation of the collections to the public. His role is crucial to the upkeep and improvement of this vast collection of knowledge.

Dimunation graduated from St. Olaf with a Paracollege major in history and psychohistory, social studies education, and American racial and multicultural studies. He studied at the Christ Church College in Oxford, England and went on to complete an M.A. degree in American history and an M.L.I.S. degree, both from the University of California at Berkeley.

“St. Olaf College allowed me to discover my individual passions while learning to live in a community dedicated to ideas and expression,” says Dimunation. “My Paracollege studies and my participation in theater and music and dance shaped what I do, but living at St Olaf taught me how to do so with compassion and commitment.”

After completing his M.A. degree, Dimunation worked at the Bancroft Library at Berkeley while continuing his graduate research. There, he discovered his passion for working with rare books when he served as assistant chief of acquisitions. In 1983 he was appointed rare book librarian and assistant chief of special collections at Stanford University. In 1991, Dimunation moved on to Cornell University, where he taught in the English Department and served as curator of rare books and associate director for collections.

In January 2007 Dimunation had the honor of hand-delivering Thomas Jefferson's own 1764 copy of the Quran for the swearing in of Minnesota Representative Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress. Jefferson had sold his copy of the Quran to Congress in 1815 as part of a 6,487-volume personal collection that served to replace the library burned by the British in 1814.

Dimunation dedicates much of his time to his passion for rare books and learning. In his own research, he specializes in 18th and 19th century English and American printing. He is past chair of the Rare Books and Manuscripts Section of the Association of College and Research Libraries and is active in such organizations as the International Federation of Library Associations, Special Collections Task Force of the Association of Research Libraries, and the board of the Council on Library and Information Resources. Dimunation is a faculty member of the Rare Book School at the University of Virginia and is regularly invited to lecture and present papers all across the country, and he has authored several exhibition catalogs.  He is a member of the Grolier Club and was recently elected as a member of the American Antiquarian Society.

Although Dimunation works at the largest library in the world and is personally responsible for more than 800,000 volumes in the Rare Books Collection, he has not forgotten his passion for learning and making materials accessible to the public.  Dimunation’s stated personal and professional commitment is to "the principle on which the Library of Congress has been built –that knowledge and free access to it, by both leaders and the governed, are essential to democracy."