Southern California

The Southern California SLA Community is saddened to report the passing of Bob Bellanti.

Bob was SoCal Chapter President from 1989 to 1990, was inducted as an SLA Fellow in 1999, was involved with SLA Business and Finance and was awarded the Dow Jones Leadership Award in 2003.

This obituary was sent by Marion Peters, another UCLA librarian emeritus, and current SLA member.

Robert Bellanti, UCLA Librarian Emeritus, passed away on April 24, 2022.  Robert was born in New York City on August 15, 1945, to Sebastian Bellanti and Josephine Caruso.  He attended the Baruch School of the City College of New York and completed his B.A. at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV).  He earned an M.L.S from the University of Washington, Seattle, and an M.B.A. from UCLA. 

He met his wife, Claire Quinte, while both were working in the UNLV library. They married in 1971 and celebrated their 50^th wedding anniversary in November of 2021. 

Bob's career at UCLA began in 1973 with a post-graduate internship in medical librarianship at the Biomedical Library.  He managed the Biomedical Library interlibrary loan operations, and from 1979 to 1982, he was the associate director of the Pacific Southwest Regional Medical Library, based at UCLA's Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library.  Bob spent most of his library career as the head of the UCLA Management Library (1982-2002) and Associate Director of Anderson Computing and Information Systems (1996-2002).  Among his accomplishments was supervising a move of the library to its new location in the Anderson School of Management (ASM), newly named the Rosenfeld Library. He oversaw the shift from print publications in the 1980s to mainly online resources in the 2000s.  He and his colleagues in the ASM Computing Center integrated their operations, a first in management libraries in the country.  Bob held a two-year adjunct faculty position in the Department of Information Studies during 1996–97, teaching courses and lecturing on business information and librarianship. From 2003 to 2005, Bob served as interim associate university librarian for research and instructional services.  Bob chaired the Librarians Association of UCLA (LAUC) from 1982 to 1983 and was statewide LAUC Chair from 1985-86.  

Bob was an active member of the Special Library Association in the business and finance division and its Southern California chapter.  He held many offices on the Board of the Southern California chapter, including President from 1989-90.  He also chaired the SLA Business and Finance Division from 1992-93. He was named an association Fellow in 1999 and received the Southern California chapter's Billie Connor Award in 1997, the association's Dow Leadership Award in 2003, and the business and finance division's Distinguished Member Award in 2004. He was also a founding member of Academic Business Library Directors, which he chaired from 1997–99.

Always an avid traveler, Bob devoted himself to more travel after his retirement in 2005.  He also enjoyed living in LA with so many performing arts opportunities including the opera, live theater, and live music.  He was once so determined to see a seldom-performed Shakespeare play, that he and Claire flew to the UK on a Thursday, saw three plays at Stratford on Avon, and flew home the next Monday.  In retirement, Bob became a volunteer reading tutor at a nearby elementary school and a board member of the Friends of the Mid-Valley Regional Library.  Although recruited under duress, he joined Claire in her activities with the Jane Austen Society of North America and turned into an enthusiastic member.  He participated in a book-group and, perhaps most of all, enjoyed old movies in real movie theaters.  All his life he reached out to help younger people, and in retirement he devoted himself to mentoring, educating, and supporting the children in his life.  Some of these children are godchildren, and some became part of his life serendipitously, and all of them became successful young adults under his gentle instruction.  Bob is loved and dearly missed by his wife, family, and friends.

The family will hold a celebration of life in June.  Donations to the UCLA Library Bob & Claire Bellanti Performing Arts Special Collections Discretionary Fund (61317O) are welcome; www.uclafoundation.org, specify fund.  Donations may also go to the Multiple Systems Atrophy Coalition https://www.multiplesystematrophy.org/about-msa/.

This, from, Information Outlook, details many of Bob's services to UCLA and SLA-SCC.

Information Outlook; Washington Vol. 2, Iss. 1,  (Jan 1998): 16.

ROBERT BELLANTI is head, Rosenfeld Management Library and assistant director, Research and Instruction, Anderson Computing & Information Services, University of California, Los Angeles, CA. 

Past Employment: associate director, Pacific Southwest Regional Medical Library Service, Biomedical Library, UCLA (1979-82); head, Interlibrary Loan Division, Biomedical Library, UCLA (1974-79); serials librarian, University of Nevada, Las Vegas (1969-73). SLA Member Since: 1982 

Education: M.B.A., University of California, Los Angeles ( 1981 ); M.L., University of Washington (1969); B.A., University of Nevada, Las Vegas (1968). 

SLA Chapter Activities: Southern California Chapter: chair, Scholarship Committee (199596); member (1996-97), (1997-98); chair, International Relations Committee ( 1994-95); SLA Winter Meeting, Local Arrangement Committee (1992-93); Strategic Planning Committee (1991-92); Nominating Committee (1991-92); Area Meeting Coordinator (199192); Chapter Representative to the California Library Networking Task Force, Network Steering Group (1990); president (1989-90); president-elect and program chair (1988-89); chair, Hospitality Committee ( 1987-88); Management Seminar Planning Committee (198586); Ad Hoc Committee on Chapter Finances (1985-86); treasurer (1984-85), (1986-87); co-chair, Management Seminar Planning Committee ( 1984-85); Ad Hoc Committee on Long Range Planning (1983-84).