UK Serials News and others have announced the death of Maurice Line during the weekend of 18/19 September 2010.

For those who use the British Library’s Document Supply service and its services to business, science and technology, Maurice’s work at the BL was pivotal to the services we see today and to the development of the BL as a leading international research library. As Librarian at the University of Bath he had directed a study into the scope for automated data processing in the new British Library. He was Librarian of the National Central Library (NCL) from 1971-1973 and a member of the British Library Organizing Committee which undertook preparatory and planning work for the UK’s new national library which was to start operating in July 1973. He joined the British Library in 1973, when the NCL was incorporated into the BL, as Deputy Director-General of the Lending Division. He became Director General in 1974, a post he held until 1985. From 1985 until his retirement in 1988 he was Director General, Science Technology and Industry.

For the next 12 years Maurice worked as a consultant specialising in the management of change, and advising organisations in many parts of the world. He was editor of Interlending and Document Supply and Alexandria, the journal concerned with national libraries, their roles and functions and international issues. He also edited, and contributed to, many books in the field of librarianship.

An obituary has also appeared in Times Higher Education.