She is the mom of two handsome and amazing grown sons, the elder, Luke, is an aspiring writer and musician; the other, Dylan is a vegan cook. Their dad, her husband, is Stan Arnold, history professor at NIU, (also quite handsome).
While born and raised literally on the shores of Lake Erie in the small town of Conneaut, Ohio, located in the most northeastern of said state, she has moved around quite a bit primarily for educational and vocational reasons, but occasionally for pleasure.
She holds her BA from Goucher College, living therefore in Baltimore, MD for five years. She took a hiatus from school between her undergraduate and graduate degrees, living in Washington DC, for three years where she worked as a nurse’s aide and in Paris France for two years, where she functioned as the housekeeper, amanuensis, housecleaner and general factotum for an aged artist, as well as an au paire, and English tutor.
She moved to Philadelphia PA where she earned her PhD in Comparative Literature with an emphasis on reformation. She was very lucky to have spent a year while earning that degree studying at the University of Geneva, Switzerland where she learned, among a good deal else, the rudiments of paleography in French Renaissance handwriting.
After teaching literature on the college level at Le Moyne College in Syracuse NY and Rockford College in Rockford IL, she earned a MLIS from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and then a graduate certificate in Health Sciences Librarianship from the University of Pittsburgh. She has been working at NIU Founders library since March 2011 in the capacity of Health Sciences librarian. Upon the retirement of William Baker, esteemed member of both English and Library faculties, she assumed the role of English subject specialist.
It has been said by those who know her well that Beth reads like she eats. Her reading includes literature, gender studies, religious studies, book history, library history, and politics. She would define herself as a mediocre but enthusiastic gardener, a better than average cook and baker, an occasional choir member, knitter, and crocheter.
She is currently writing a biography of the first woman director of Baltimore’s Enoch Pratt Free Library, Amy Winslow, a woman she cared for while a nurse’s aide.
Beth is happiest when conversing with interesting people, reading, gardening, cooking, hiking, traveling, or attending live performances. She is least happy when there are dishes to wash, housecleaning to do, things to iron, a need to drive in bad weather, or any kind of self-evaluation or self-description, such as the present piece, to write.
To recover she plays with her sweet and cute cockapoo, Bijou.
