Rich and Denise Bennett

This fund was established in 2013 by Rich and Denise Bennett to honor the memory of Rich’s parents, Fleming and Violet Bennett, and celebrate the nearly 50 years of Bennett family association with the University of Florida and the UF Libraries. Fleming served as Head of the UF Agriculture Library from 1964-1968, and as Assistant Director for Reader Services of the UF Libraries from 1968 until his retirement in 1976. Rich served the UF Libraries in several different library faculty capacities throughout his entire 35-year professional career (1978-2013), including the final five as Chair, Department of Special & Area Studies Collections. He is now a University Librarian Emeritus. Rich’s wife Denise joined the library faculty in the former Engineering Library in 1984, and has also served her entire professional career at UF as an Engineering Librarian, since 1987 in the Marston Science Library.

Rich also received his bachelor’s degree in Journalism from the University of Florida and his graduate degree from FSU while Denise received both her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Michigan.

The fund is to be used by the Special Collections department chair to acquire, process, and promote new or existing Special Collections materials in areas that were of particular interest to the Bennett family (e.g. environmental protection and natural history of Florida, and the performing arts).