Hwa-Wei Lee

Hwa-Wei Lee, Ph.D., passed away peacefully on December 17, 2023, surrounded by his family and friends at the Cypress Village retirement community in Jacksonville, FL. Just a month shy of his 93rd birthday, Hwa-Wei left this world after living a full and celebrated life as a devoted husband to Mary, his wife of almost 65 years, a loving father to their six children, a doting grandfather to 11 grandchildren and a proud “Poppy” to three great-grandchildren. He was known for his devotion to family as well as for his generous heart and gentle spirit.

Professionally, Dr. Lee earned a tremendous reputation in the field of international librarianship and was a Fulbright Scholar who reached the highest leadership position of any Asian American librarian when he served as chief of the Asian Division at the Library of Congress from 2003-08. In 2015, he was awarded the Melvil Dewey Medal by the American Library Association to honor his lifetime of achievement in the field.

Hwa-Wei was born in Guangzhou, China, on January 25, 1931, the third of seven children to his mother Hsiao-Hui Wang and his father Kan-Chun Lee, then the governor of Shihui County in Guangdong Province. Much of his childhood was affected by the chaos of war and natural disasters that frequently interrupted his schooling and caused him to live at different times – sometimes with his family, sometimes on his own – in the Chinese cities of Nanjing, Guilin and Chongqing as well as Haiphong, Vietnam, and ultimately Taichung, Taiwan, after the Communist takeover of China in 1949.

In Taiwan, he graduated from high school and National Taiwan Normal University. Hwa-Wei then completed 13 months of ROTC training, was commissioned as a first lieutenant reserve officer and began his career as dean of students at an elementary school in Taipei. After a brief stint as a teaching assistant and student organization advisor at his alma mater, he passed his examination to study abroad and received a scholarship to work toward his master’s degree in education at the University of Pittsburgh, where he met Mary Kratochvil – a fellow graduate student – in 1957.

After they both earned their master’s in education, they wed on March 14, 1959, in Mary’s hometown of Jeannette, PA. Hwa-Wei went on to earn a master’s in library science from Carnegie Mellon University in 1961 and a Ph.D. in education from the University of Pittsburgh in 1965 while employed at the libraries there and at Duquesne University. He then served as library director at Edinboro University, founding library director of the Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok, Thailand, associate director of libraries and professor of library

administration at Colorado State University and dean of libraries at Ohio University, where he served for 21 years until his retirement in 1999. In addition to bestowing Dr. Lee with the title of dean emeritus, Ohio University named a new building the Hwa-Wei Lee Library Annex and its main library’s first floor the Hwa-Wei Lee Center for International Collections.

After a few years as a distinguished visiting scholar for the global library association OCLC and as a Fulbright senior specialist to design a library science graduate program at Chiang Mai University in Thailand, Dr. Lee was coaxed out of retirement by the Library of Congress to become the first Asian American to serve as chief of its Asian division.

Over his professional career, Hwa-Wei authored seven books and hundreds of published academic articles. He was best known, however, for his passion for bridging the world together through teaching, sponsoring students and connecting libraries to share and exchange books, resources and ideas all while displaying charm and kindness to his colleagues, staff, neighbors and friends. His biography “The Sage in the Cathedral of Books” was published in 2011, and an English version was printed by Ohio University in 2016.

In addition to the American Library Association’s John Ames Humphrey Award (1991) and Melvil Dewey Medal (2015), he was the recipient of the Chinese American Librarians Association’s Outstanding Library Leadership Award in Memory of Dr. Margaret Chang Fung (2016) and the Medal of Appreciation from Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn of Thailand (2018). He has been honored with awards from the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association, the Library Association of the Republic of China (Taiwan) and OhioLINK, a statewide academic library consortium of which he was a founding director, among others.

Hwa-Wei was preceded in death by his brother Min Hwa-Hsin Lee and his aunt Phyllis Hsiao-Chu Wang, who was instrumental in bringing him to the United States.

He is survived by his wife Mary (Kratochvil) Lee of Jacksonville, FL; children Shirley Kennedy (Jon Mulloy) of Rockledge, FL, James (Lisa) Lee of Rockledge, FL, Pamela (Beth Beglin) Lee of North Liberty, IA, Edward (Amy) Lee of Appleton, WI, Charles (Erika) Lee of Bedford, NY, and Robert (Cara) Lee of Westerville, OH; grandchildren Kristen (Matt Gromlovits) Kennedy of Melbourne, FL, Christopher (Chelsea) Lee of Richmond, KY, Kyle Kennedy of Austin, TX, Tyler (Caroline Durkee) Lee of Los Angeles, CA, Austin Lee of Troy, OH, Hannah Lee of Appleton, WI, Madison Lee of Boston, MA, Elissa Lee of De Pere, WI, Seth Lee of Westerville, OH, Owen Lee of Bedford, NY, and Avery Lee of Westerville, OH; great-grandchildren Kennedy, Camden and Cole; brothers Hwa-Ming, Hwa-Nin and Hwa-Tsun; sisters Hwa-Yu and Hwa-Chou; and numerous nieces and nephews including several who lived with his family for brief but meaningful periods: Elizabeth Yuan, Jean Chi-Jen Chen, James Hao-Sheng Lee, Qing Wang and Dr. Steven Lee.

A memorial service will be held in Dr. Lee’s honor on February 17 in Melbourne, FL. In lieu of flowers, Dr. Lee wished that any gifts in his honor be made to the Hwa-Wei Lee Center for International Collections Endowment at Ohio University Libraries. Gifts can be mailed directly to: The Ohio University Foundation, PO Box 869, Athens, OH 45701-0869. Please include a note stating the gift is a memorial gift and to direct the gift to the (Hwa-Wei Lee) Center for International Collections Endowment.