ALEXANDRIA, Va. – Centreville resident R. Lee Hadden, a technical information specialist at the Engineer Research and Development Center’s Topographic Engineering Center (ERDC-TEC) was recently selected as vice president of the Defense Technical Information Center® (DTIC®) User Council. Hadden, who works in TEC’s Geospatial Information Library (GIL) (Map Library), represents the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on the committee. "There hasn’t been a Corps of Engineers representative on the DTIC® council for some time," Hadden said.
DTIC®) is a Department of Defense (DOD) field activity which serves the DOD community as the largest central resource for government-funded scientific, technical, engineering, and business-related information. The agency provides the Warfighter and researchers, scientists, engineers, laboratories and universities access to more than two million publications covering more than 25 subject areas.
During his two-year service on the council, Hadden would like to lead an effort to "make other federal agencies aware of what the council is doing in relation to the production, use and distribution of maps. Of particular interest would be the distribution and archiving of maps to enable people who are not necessarily the intended audience locate and use them."
According to Hadden, a recurrent problem exists with map production. "Many maps are being produced solely for those individuals who are involved in their immediate use. The maps aren’t committed to paper and are therefore not available later. If someone has a need for the same information contained in the maps later, they have to start from scratch. It’s much better to retain the information and use it as a stepping stone to build upon."
Many of the maps produced by the Corps accompany congressional projects which are produced as part of the Congressional Record. However, many of these maps are not subsequently added to the DTIC® library collection where they can be accessed by other users. "The council is looking to make more of a one-stop shopping service available for federal researchers were it is appropriate," Hadden said. Hadden has extensive knowledge in the area of library science. During a 25-year career, he has worked both as a reference librarian and as a curator of rare books at the U.S. Geological Survey; a medical librarian at the Regional Medical Center Library, Clark Air Force Base, The Philippines; and served in medical libraries in Saudi Arabia and the Army Ballistics Research Laboratory, Aberdeen, Md.
As a technical information specialist, Hadden provides data, mapping and imagery support to humanitarian relief efforts during natural disasters such as the earthquake last year near Yogjakarta, Indonesia and provides information that assists in well-drilling operations that provided humanitarian relief for refugees such as in Darfur, Sudan, and relief efforts after the Tsunami of December 2004. He has also provided terrain analysis to support America’s contingency operations mission and provided geospatial information that supported USACE hurricane relief efforts in the southeastern United States.
Recently, Hadden was a featured speaker at the Cartographic Users Advisory Council (CUAC) annual meeting conducted at the Library of Congress Geography and Map Division Conference. The CUAC is comprised of representatives from seven national and regional library organizations. The council was formed to provide a unified effort to distribute U.S. government cartographic products to include paper or digitals maps or spatial information and improve public access to these materials.
"I would like to also see the CUAC expand its representation to not only focus on how maps are preserved, documented and retrieved but also how maps were previously used," he said.
Following the Leyte mudslide, the GIL received a request for information on the water, soil and slope characteristics of the mountains in the area. The most recent materials were produced for Gen. MacArthur in preparation for the invasions of Leyte in 1944. "Not only were we able to get the engineers on the ground the water and soil information they wanted, we were also able to pinpoint the location of Japanese fighter planes at the same time," Hadden said laughing.
Hadden earned a bachelor’s in modern European history from the University of North Carolina, a bachelor’s in science from Excelsior College and a master’s in library science from East Carolina University. He is a member of the Special Libraries Association, Geoscience Information Society, Geological Society of Washington, D.C., and the Friends of Library Outreach (Loudoun County, Va.). He is the author of numerous bibliographies, articles and books.
TEC provides the Warfighter with a superior knowledge of the operational environmental and supports the nation’s civil and environmental initiatives through research, development, and the application of expertise in the topographic and related sciences. The ERDC is the premier research and development facility for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, consisting of seven laboratories at four geographical sites with more than 2,000 employees and an annual research program exceeding $1 billion. It conducts research in both military and civil works mission areas for the Department of Defense and the nation.