DESPITE not having any formal qualifications in her profession, Enid Foster became a librarian of eminence.
Born Enid Mary Muriel Turner in 1925, she joined the library of the British Drama League in 1941 as a 16-year-old shorthand-typist. She retired as its longest-serving chief librarian 49 years later, by when it had been renamed the British Theatre Association. (It was disbanded in 1990.)
Also an accomplished amateur actress, Foster appeared with Peggy Ashcroft in the opening production at the Practice Theatre (in the basement of the League’s headquarters in Fitzroy Square). She became deputy librarian in 1948 when the BDL’s library expanded into a neighbouring house.
Foster became head librarian in 1967. She was appointed MBE in 1989 in recognition of her work to promote the library, to improve the standard of theatrical research and to assist researchers who ranged from schoolchildren, students and small amateur companies to the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre.
After retiring, Foster spent 11 years as part-time librarian of the Garrick Club. There, in addition to receiving such visitors as the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh, she was a devoted archivist and the scrupulous guardian of the club’s unique collection of theatrical memorabilia. She also advised on purchasing decisions, book-binding and online access.
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A first-rate judge of character, Foster combined a receptive and incisive mind with firm self-discipline and a dry sense of humour. This last characteristic appealed to the British Drama League’s visitors, some of them also stern judges of humanity.
One of her early acquaintances as librarian was George Bernard Shaw, a keen supporter of the BDL, which had been founded in 1919 by Geoffrey Whitworth as an umbrella for societies and organisations working for the development of drama.
Other visitors to call upon Foster’s expertise included a youthful Kenneth Tynan in quest of theatrical history, the actor and playwright Emlyn Williams — who wrote his autobiographies at Fitzroy Square — and James Roose-Evans, the director and playwright, who signalled his gratitude to Foster with pots of honey from Wales.
A searching test of a librarian’s skills and organisational abilities is to move a library and re-establish it on another site. Towards the end of its 70-year service to the British stage, the BTA library was obliged to move not once but twice, in the space of two years.
In 1989 it went from Fitzroy Square to Regent’s College (where it was reopened by the Queen Mother), and in 1990 it transferred to the Hippodrome in Leicester Square. So far as is known, not a single volume was lost in either move, and Foster remained imperturbable throughout.
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Foster is survived by her husband, Douglas. There were no children.
Enid Foster, MBE, librarian, was born on May 25, 1925. She died on May 26, 2005, aged 80.