In conjunction with the founding of the Hermon Dunlap Smith Center for the History of Cartography in 1971, the Library hired its first staff member concerned solely with the Library's map collections, Map Cataloguer (later Curator of Maps) Robert W. Karrow. Beginning in 1976, Karrow headed the Maps Section of the Reader Services Department. In 1988, the Maps Section was absorbed into the Special Collections Section.

Incoming and outgoing correspondence of Robert W. Karrow, Curator of Maps, with map librarians, scholars, donors, publishers, and others. Includes reference requests and letters regarding gifts, the Newberry map cataloguing manual, the Checklist of Printed Maps of the Middle West, and other projects. Among the correspondents is David Woodward, first Director of the Hermon Dunlap Smith Center for the History of Cartography.