After 27 years in the San José Public Library system, the last 10 of which were with the Willow Glen branch, the 56-year-old is ready to end this chapter of his life. He leaves behind admiring coworkers and library patrons who hold him responsible for transforming the Willow Glen Library from a mere repository for books and periodicals into a well-frequented gathering place.

"He's a special person," says Stevenson's longtime co-worker and fellow librarian June Hayashi. "He's always been fair and calm."

Hayashi says that Stevenson, with help from staff and the Friends of the Willow Glen Library, was instrumental in getting the library equipped with Internet-ready computers. He also helped with the library's landscaping and back patio, arranged bookshelves to give the rooms more of a bookstore feel, and added free coffee and tea for patrons.

"He really helped create an environment that made the library attractive and accessible," she says.

Jenny Verdonk, a member of the Friends group who has enjoyed working with Stevenson for the past five years, says, "His main concern has always been for the library and to stretch every dollar."

His casual work clothes, however—usually short-sleeve shirts and khaki slacks—created a perception of him as a rather laid back.

"I've seen him several times wearing jeans and a Hawaiian shirt," Verdonk says.

His appearance only added to the comfort of question seekers.

After nearly three decades of service to the San José Public Library Stevenson and his wife, Marsha—a retired librarian from the Evergreen School District—plan to explore many of the places described in the travel books that line the library's bookshelves, such as the Canadian Rockies and Mt. Whitney.

And in the meticulous fashion of a librarian, he made a list of these places while taking a retirement class put on by the city of San Jose.

One of the exercises in the class was to write down 30 things he planned to do when he retired.

"The problem is that you can come up with a list that is overwhelming," he says. "There would be more things to do than there are hours in the day."

But Stevenson's son has a pass to hike Mt. Whitney in October, so that was an easy item to place on the list.

"I told him to make sure he saves a spot for me," he says.

And although he is only 56 and could have continued working with the city, he figured now was the right time to begin a new chapter of his life. Asked why and he contemplates for a few seconds to answer concisely.

"I had an illness four years ago that made me aware of my mortality," he says soberly, "and it got me to thinking about having some time to do more things other than what I've been doing. And that accelerated my thinking about how do I make the time."

In 1999 Stevenson was diagnosed with cancer. During that same year he underwent chemotherapy and the cancer has since gone into remission. Throughout that year he managed to miss only a few months of work, and he was glad when he got the green light to return. So were his co-workers.

"It would be an understatement to say they were welcoming me back," he says modestly. "I was really happy to be back and that feeling was reciprocated by the staff."

Having just welcomed Stevenson back after his illness a few years ago, the staff were less than jovial to hear about his retirement.

Library staff member Debbie Sandell says she will miss Stevenson's influence.

"I like the calm and professional way he would handle customer complaints or quiet the younger patrons when they got rowdy," Sandell says. "He has this quiet strength."

And others who have worked closely with Stevenson, like June Hayashi, have their own reasons why they'll miss his friendship.

Hayashi and Stevenson share the same birthday—April 15—"so each year I can look forward to him bringing in his famous 'death by chocolate' cake," she says.

Stevenson—a recovering chocoholic who is watching his cholesterol—says his chocolate cake is made with chocolate pudding, chocolate chips and powdered sugar.


Portrait of a librarian

The native Floridian, who came to California when he was 5 years old, began developing his research skills when he enrolled at San José State University, majoring in political science. It is at the university that he met his future wife, and it was to SJSU that he returned to earn a master's degree in library science in 1976.

The couple has two sons, John, 28, and Paul, 25, both of whom decided to travel along different career paths. Stevenson says that his sons thought two librarians in the family was enough.

Stevenson says he hadn't planned to become a librarian. It just seemed like a natural thing to do.

"For me, being where there's ideas and information, which essentially is what this business is about. I look back and feel I was involved in something that was extremely worthwhile."


Information evolution

In his 27 years as a librarian, he's witnessed the amazing evolution of information technology, spurred on by the Internet, and its subsequent effect of libraries being caught in the crossfire between censorship and the freedom of expression.

He has found the Internet to be a research tool that has made librarians more useful to the public rather than a medium that some believed would make librarians obsolete.

"Since we as librarians are already trained to do research, we can enhance our service to the public," Stevenson says. "We do this all day so it's hard not to get good at it. We have access to much more information and a lot more expertise in searching databases, and the Internet brought it to our fingertips."

"The Internet" became a household term in the early 1990s, about the same time that Stevenson became the Willow Glen Library's senior librarian. He admits that he wishes the Internet had arrived earlier in his career.

"I could have answered so many more questions," he says almost forlornly.

As a librarian, he also had to answer to patrons who sometimes took offense at what libraries carry or promote.

The public library system has remained true to its original purpose, Stevenson says, and over the years he has seen interest in using the library system increase

"As for how people have used the library, there has been no slackening," Stevenson says. "Computers and technology have had an impact, certainly. They've enabled us to deliver the kinds of information that you didn't have before when you worked at a branch library. The access to information because of computers and the Internet is just mind-boggling."

This access to information was inconceivable in the mid-1970s, especially in a place as small as the Willow Glen Library, Stevenson says. He believes some of the biggest beneficiaries of the Internet have been librarians, who were quick to respond to what it offered.

"I really think librarians have flowed into technology and embraced it," he says. "I think we understood its potential to help people and provide more service and access to information."

But understanding its attributes and then finding a way to share it with the local community was a challenge.

Stevenson says one problem was finding room in the cramped library for all the computers. Staff and patrons have come to rely on them so much if they were out of commission for even short time it would be a disaster, he says.

But computers are still just a tool and can't take the place of a live response, which is evident by the countless times patrons have asked Stevenson for help finding obscure books or references, he says. And it's also what made the job enjoyable and challenging during those years.

People often approached Stevenson saying, "I know this sounds like a really stupid question, but ..."

Stevenson says, "Often that's really the fun of being a librarian. You get a chance to hear just about any question you could imagine and some you never could. That's also the challenge of it: to find these obscure pieces of information and to help people locate them."

Yet there is one request that does stand out in his memory.

"When my oldest son got his first job out of college he called up asking for help on salary statistics for some country," Stevenson says. "It wasn't really a strange request. It was a snap but it seemed rather odd to have my son call me up asking for help."

Being a librarian hasn't always been smooth sailing.

Before transferring to the Willow Glen Library, he worked out of the Santa Teresa Library. During that time the library displayed works by a Palestinian organization, which upset at least one patron.

The display consisted of social and cultural posters, fliers and artwork. "Someone interpreted the display as a commentary on Israel and felt the messages were inappropriate," he says. "I was having a discussion with this person and said, 'This is a matter of freedom of expression. You don't have to agree or disagree with it. This is simply here for you to see and everybody has a chance to form his or her own opinion about it.' "


Final chapter

Stevenson retired a month before the highly anticipated opening of the city's new main library at Fourth and San Fernando streets. The 10-level library is a joint effort between the city and San José State University. Yet for Stevenson it was time to move on.

"The concept of combining a public and university library at one site is unheard of except for a few locations around the world," he says. "Ten years ago in my career I would have wanted to be there. The blending of the staff and functions and the operations is going to be very interesting, and how that works out is something no one can say with finality. There's a lot of potential for some interesting things," he says.

Whatever those interesting things are, he'll be enjoying them from a different vantage point now that he's on the other side of the reference desk. And having spent most of his life indoors—behind desks and shelving books—it's his turn to spend some time outdoors and use all the information he once gave out about hiking, biking and photography.