30 April 2025
Debbie Quare, St Hugh’s Librarian from 1980 to 2009, has died
Generations of members of College will be saddened to learn that Debbie Quare, Librarian from 1980 to 2009, died on 30 May. She had been seriously ill for several years.
Debbie oversaw a vast increase in the holdings, and a considerable expansion in the physical space, of the Library. What former undergraduates, research students, and certain members of the SCR will remember, however, is an antinomianism now quite uncharacteristic in her calling. For those with essay, thesis, or book crises, help would be offered and regulations bent in the interest of a greater good. She was that increasingly rare phenomenon, a librarian who liked (most) readers, loved books, and took pleasure in marrying up the two.
Debbie’s funeral will be at the North Oxfordshire Crematorium at 3pm on Friday 16 June.
