Erin McGuirl

As Curator of Rare Books, Erin McGuirl (she/her) stewards the Mortimer Rare Book Collection (MRBC). Erin seeks to build on the MRBC’s strengths and expand the collection into new areas to support the expansive and diverse curriculum of the College, both for researchers and faculty teaching in Smith Special Collections from across the Five Colleges.

Prior to joining Smith College Special Collections staff in July 2025, Erin served as Executive Director of the Bibliographical Society of America, Special Collections Librarian at the New York Society Library, and as a curatorial consultant to a private collector of screenplays. She began her career at ArtBook @ MoMA PS1 and then in the Avery Classics Collection at Columbia University. Her research focuses on the labor of the secretaries and typists who produced and edited texts in 20th century American offices. When not at work, she takes great pleasure in her garden, seeing movies in the theater, and dancing to her spouse’s collection of soul, glam, and country 45s. Her miniature poodle, Mona, is the best girl.

Committees

Discovery Team

Research & Professional Interests

Book history, feminist bibliography, film & media studies

Publications

“Women’s Work in Film Production and the Documents of Film History,” Journal of Cinema and Media Studies, September 2025. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jcms/images/18261332.0064.519.pdf

“Office Practices" and "Sales Catalogs” in Information: A Historical Companion, ed. Ann Blair, Paul Duguid, Anja Goeing, and Anthony Grafton (Princeton University Press, 2021)

“Printing the Screenplay in Hollywood and Beyond,” Printing History 25 (2018), 28-40. https://works.hcommons.org/records/nr7yv-c0k90

Professional Affiliations

The Bibliographical Society of America, The Grolier Club, Society for the History of Authorship, Reading, and Publishing (SHARP)