By Rick Stroup, Assistant Director King County Law Library
Whether it’s a spark born deep inside or nurtured by family, friends, and the big, wide world around them, some people are simply adventurous people. They naturally seek the new. If there’s a boundary, they want to reach beyond it. If there’s an obstacle, they find a way around it. And equally important, they often seem to take as much pleasure in the process as they do in the end game. Barbara Engstrom is just such an adventurous person. You can be sure that with her, a slippery slope almost always involves snow and skis and is rarely a bad thing.
Barbara’s wanderlust is likely the product of both nature and nurture. Growing up the youngest in a family of ten in the Adirondacks, she had numerous siblings to challenge her, annoy her, inspire her, and fuel her competitive nature. If a nascent love of the natural world wasn’t just waiting to break free anyway, easy access to some of the East Coast’s most beautiful landscape certainly helped to cement what became a life-long love of wild places. It’s little wonder many years later Barbara would also fall in love with the equally spectacular environs of the Pacific Northwest. But that took a while.
Before that love could take root, there were several years of travel. Travel with a capital “T.” Expansive, beyond-
the-usual-travel. Two stints in Kazakhstan, the second being a one-year stay during which she taught English Literature, studied Russian, and got to ski in the Tian Shan mountains. Then she hopped in a car with a group of friends and drove across Central Asia, an experience even she admits was “nuts.” From there, it was a big latitude hop south to Cape Town, where she managed a small café and travelled around southern Africa. With these and many other trips in between, far-away places spoke to her need to see things for herself, challenge her preconceptions of countries and cultures, test her patience and ingenuity, and understand kindness, human connection, and gratitude in a new way.
Eventually, Barbara’s thoughts turned to graduate school. Having fallen in love with the wild beauty of Wyoming, she thought opening a small law practice in a Wyoming mountain town would be ideal. Yet the twists and turns of life’s trails can be as unexpected and unpredictable as any new ski run. While in law school in Wyoming, Barbara realized that Law Library Director Tim Kearley, a Fulbright Scholar who shared her interest in international law, was “the happiest person there.” Tim encouraged her to consider becoming a law librarian. This advice would eventually change the course of her professional career, a fact for which we at King County Law Library are eternally grateful. Thoughts of a sleepy mountain town law practice were at least suspended, and Barbara instead moved West to attend the University of Washington’s acclaimed Law Librarianship Program. She freely admits now, that Professor Kearley was right; law librarianship was and is a perfect fit.
Not yet truly under the spell of the Pacific Northwest however — there was not enough sun, too much rain and wet, heavy snow — Barbara’s first position with her newly minted master’s degree took her back to the Mountain West, to the University of Utah School of Law. There, she spent two years as a law librarian, developing a new interest — teaching legal research. More importantly, she logged “two glorious years” as a season pass holder at the legendary Alta Ski area outside Salt Lake City.
But there was one draw in Seattle that no amount of champagne powder could match, Barbara’s future husband Kurt. Upon her return to Seattle, Barbara started what would become a 15-year tenure as a reference librarian and adjunct professor at Seattle University School of Law. At SU, Barbara was able to return to her international law roots and “do tons of really interesting foreign, international, and comparative law research.” Among many accomplishments at SU, Barbara partnered with colleague Kerry Fitz-Gerald to produce the university’s first completely online, asynchronous class, a first for the entire university, not just the law school. She would also have the pleasure of working closely with colleagues at SU that she now considers family.
Barbara shares her passion for the outdoors and adventure with her kids. Her son Moss will tell stories of going for six-mile rides as a 5-year-old on a Strider bike (a bike with no pedals) as mom chanted the names of Tour de France riders and “Alpe d’ Huez” to encourage him up the hills. Hazel recounts watching other kids pack up and leave the ski area when it started to rain, whereas her mom would pull out a second, dry set of ski clothes for them and insist on finishing out the day saying: “You’re Seattle kids — this is what we do.” Yes, she grew to love the Cascade concrete.
Still, life wasn’t finished throwing challenges and opportunities her way. Yet another fork in the trail appeared when the Executive Directorship of King County Law Library became available. Were it to be rated by the Washington Trails Association, the challenges associated with this position might be scaled as “at least 4 stars,” in skiing terms, a double black diamond. Was it new? Absolutely. Were there boundaries to reach beyond? Definitely. Was there a map? Sort of. Public law libraries are the wild west of law librarianship. You can work with an attorney, a bailiff, a judge, a law student, and self-represented litigant — all in the span of a single afternoon. Like with skiing or hiking, you might need to change gear depending on the conditions and you often need to make choices about which route to take. You need to be focused, nimble, open to experimenting, and willing to learn from your mistakes. In other words, the job was a perfect fit for Barbara.
Under her energetic, considered, and let’s-give-it-a-try leadership, King County Law Library has been improved in just about every way possible. The projects she has either brought to fruition herself or worked with the staff to create all revolve around a set of basic questions. What can we do to remain relevant? What can we let go of in view of changing times? What do our patrons need today? Regardless of our real-world constraints, how can we expand or improve our services? In tandem with these are a handful of verbs which directly reflect Barbara’s approach to the world: seek, invent, try, adapt. As Tamara Hayes, our Technical Services Librarian, observes: “From the beginning of Barbara’s arrival she’s not been married to how the library has always operated and instead has thought about how we can improve things. I’ve especially appreciated her willingness to brainstorm ideas with the entire staff and try out those ideas. She’s unafraid of making mistakes and is more than willing to pivot when and/or if needed.” Projects like creating KCLL’s award-winning Self-Represented Litigants Workshop series, Civil Lawsuits Without Tears; revamping the physical space to create better work flow for both staff and patrons; reorganizing staff roles to recognize skills and accomplishments; and working hard to stabilize library funding all revolve around responding to the aforementioned questions.
One of Barbara’s biggest accomplishments was establishing the KCLL Foundation, the Law Library’s non-profit partner. Through the hard work of Barbara, the law library staff, the foundation board of trustees, and the foundation’s executive director, KCLL was able to replace all the staff and public computers during the uncertain budget circumstances of the pandemic. No small feat considering the public computers had been in service for 18 years!
When the pandemic struck, Barbara’s leadership and never-say-die attitude were critical. As Stephen Seely, our former Outreach Services Attorney and now Director of the Pierce County Law Library attests: “The pandemic had caught the law library off guard and completely changed the library environment but Barbara’s ability to quickly adapt meant that the law library could continue to fulfill its fundamental purpose of taking questions and getting information into the hands of the people who need it.” This meant finding legal vendors who would license remote access to public libraries, facilitating video chat reference for our patrons, and supporting icon-oriented website redesign to allow visitors to find information faster.
Never one to get stuck in the past, Barbara understood that many of our pro se patrons no longer want to read information, they want to watch it. KCLL quickly pivoted from long-form written research guides to shorter videos including the What to Expect When . . .” and “How to . . .” video series to explain basic court procedures and pandemic related changes. She also encouraged staff to create infographics as an effective way to present step-by-step information.
Legal publishers hold a notoriously tight leash on public law libraries’ allowing remote access to their content. Barbara understood that the pandemic presented a unique opportunity to bring KCLL, which had a print dominated collection for the past 100 years, into the next century. In a remarkably short span of time, KCLL was able to make the bulk of our collection available as both print and remotely accessible digital content.
Though hiking, biking, and skiing can be rewarding solo treks, they are often more enriching when experienced with buddies. Her “traveling companions” at KCLL are the five staff members who work between the Seattle and Kent branches. To a person, they would tell you traveling with her is always a rewarding adventure. She welcomes new ideas and rethinking existing practices. She is neither afraid to test new waters nor to regroup if those waters are deeper than expected. She puts in a tremendous amount of personal energy to foster collegiality among the KCLL staff, which in turn encourages creativity, exploration, and growth.
An avid year-round bike commuter, Barbara has talked at least a few of the staff into bike commuting. When asked about what you do when it rains, she will inevitably reply “a little wet, a lot wet it’s all the same” — which may in turn lead you to spending thousands of dollars on a bike (which you may or may not refer to as “Precious”) and diving into bike commuting full steam. Which all leads to this conclusion, if Barbara mentions something about a slippery slope, your best bet is to join her. It’s likely to involve snow, skis, and be tons of fun.
