A delicate balance: collection development and women's history

Argues that women's history is a player in the history of collection development, although its awards are obscured in library history. Pioneer women librarians shaped children's collections beyond the structural initiation of service into an expanded vision of service, a sense of transgressing boundaries in order to advocate and mediate for children and their literature. Considers the philosophy and work of Caroline Hewins and Anne Carroll Moore, which presents a paradigm of building collections for a larger community that is now part of the planning process for public libraries and an ongoing model of activist service through collections.