American Institute of Baking

The American Institute of Baking, now known as AIB International, has been in operation since 1919. The current mission of AIB International reflects their original mission and states to “protect the safety of the food supply chain and grain based production capabilities”. Today, the AIB International School of Baking is closely aligned with the Kansas State University Department of Grain Science and accreditation of AIB is through its affiliation with Kansas State University along with a regional accreditation through the North Central Association of Schools and additional accreditation through the International Association for Continuing Education and Training. Several departments are included at AIB International, the School of Baking is only one of them. Others include, Auditing Services, Food Safety Education, and Research and Technical Options. Two of the most common focus courses at AIB are the baking technologist course (16 weeks) and the maintenance engineering course (11 weeks). AIB International is unique in its offering of the maintenance engineering course, in that the school looks more closely at the technical side of baking, including research, development, and the mechanics of the kitchen rather than solely at baking and baking techniques.
AIB Headquarters was relocated from Chicago, IL in 1978 to Bakers Way in Manhattan, Kansas. This was a large move for the institution and included the movement of their research library that housed this collection prior to its donation. The AIB International research library, originally named the Louis Livingston Library, was founded in 1927 and renamed the Ruth M. Emerson Library in 1984 in honor of Miss Emerson’s 37 years served as its librarian.  Ruth Emerson held degrees in both food science and library science and left an enduring legacy to the baking industry by “…initiating the development of a system that she called her ‘non-electronic computer’, which was a massive author-title-subject card index to articles, formulations, patents, and all types of other baking and food science information…” held within the research library (Wirtz, p.108). In December of 2014, the library’s physical space was downsized and closed to the public. It was at this time that portions of their collection were donated to the Morse Department of Special Collections at Hale Library, Kansas State Libraries. The remainder of the collection is still retained by AIB International for internal staff use.

Wirtz, R. L. (1994). Education and training for the baking industry of the world: A history of the american institute of baking from its origins to the present day (Order No. 9430822). Available from Dissertations & Theses @ Kansas State University; ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (304120934). Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.er.lib.k-state.edu/docview/304120934?accountid=11789
Alisha Rall, arall@aibonline.org
Our Mission. (n.d.). Retrieved October 12, 2017, from http://www.aibonline.org/aibOnline/en/learn-who-we-are.aspx

Creator Source: Local Authority File