JHU Students Explore Langsdale's Special Collections on Baltimore 'Gayborhoods'

Langsdale’s Special Collections was recently featured in Johns Hopkins University HUB after their students took great advantage of the wealth of resources at home in UB’s Learning Commons: “Students sift through archives to uncover the history of Baltimore’s ‘gayborhoods’”.

Johns Hopkins students of the Intersession course “Gayborhood” Histories visited Langsdale’s archives to learn both the history of Baltimore’s “gayborhoods” and to learn how to work with archival resources.

Special Collections is the home to the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center of Baltimore and Central Maryland’s archives. The GLCCB is committed to “uniting and empowering sexual and gender minorities in Baltimore and Central Maryland and advocating for a better quality of life the entire community” (GLCCB). The center recently celebrated its 35^th anniversary and is working with MICA on their LGBTQIA History Project.

This is the second time the course has been taught by JHU doctoral student Mo Speller. The class incorporates a breadth of unique experiences to expose students to the history of Baltimore’s gay community. These experiences include neighborhood tours, readings, short reflections, and an explorative group project.

Request an appointment with Special Collections today to explore the archives and learn about Baltimore’s ‘gayborhoods.’

RED Talks: Research Engagement Day

RED Talks, Research Engagement Day, is next Tuesday and Langsdale can't wait to celebrate the research and creative works of UB's faculty and graduate students!

RED Talks is an opportunity for faculty and graduate students to share their research with the UB Community through highly-focused 5 minute presentations. The program is now available online so you can learn more about their presentations and pick and choose which you want to attend.

We encourage you to stay for all!

Final Finish Strong

Final Finish Strong

                  Do you find yourself looking for a place to study late night on campus to get ready for finals?  Are you looking for a one stop shop where you can get academic support?  If you answered yes to either of these then Final Finish is the event for you!  Don’t be a procrastinator this semester, come to this event and let it be the jumpstart you need to start your finals preparation. 

            On Wednesday, November 29^th Langsdale Library will stay open until 1:00am for the Final Finish event.  There will be writing consultants, tutors in many disciplines, academic coaches, and librarians to provide you with academic support as you prepare for your finals or final projects.  The event starts at 6:00pm which is when you can start dropping by to see any of the services listed above.   Writing consultants will be able to help you with all of your writing needs such as brainstorming, reviewing various drafts, help with structure, organization, punctuation, grammar, style, etc.  Be sure to bring any papers or outlines that you may need help with.  Tutors will be able to help you with content specific questions regarding your classes.  Be sure to bring your notes, textbooks, and any other class resources so that your tutor can best help you.  Academic coaches will be able to help you with time management techniques, studying strategies, setting goals, getting organized, etc.  Coaches can help you set your final exam and project study schedule so you will most likely to succeed.  The librarians will be able to assist you with your research needs.  They are knowledgeable about the databases and other resources available to UB students.

            If you are planning to attend this event it would be helpful to start thinking about what it is that you are trying to achieve with each service.  The more specific your questions are to the various service the better help you will receive, so help the consultants, tutors, coaches, and librarians help you by preparing before the event.  We hope to see you there!

                 

Meet Mike - Reference and Instruction Librarian at UB

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For more videos by Langsdale's librarians click here.

Getting to Know Jessica Reeves

Hi. My name is Jess Reeves and I am one of the new library technicians at Langsdale. I’ve been here about three months and spend most of my time behind a computer, though you may catch a sighting of me wandering the stacks. I have a BA in English from Salisbury and before UB, I worked in circulation and tech services at Harford Community College.

What do you consider to be your hometown? Harford County, MD
What are your hobbies? Hiking, snowboarding, reading, cooking new things (or trying to), and pretty much anything that involves going outside
How about a brief list of your favorite books? A Moveable Feast (Hemingway), The Big Sea (Langston Hughes), The Town and the City (Kerouac), Player Piano (Vonnegut), Father Sergius (Tolstoy)
What are some of your favorite movies? Blues Brothers, Deathproof
Name some of your favorite foods. Ice cream
What do you like best about Baltimore? The Baltimore aquarium
For your a.m. fix, do you prefer coffee or tea? I prefer tea but usually need coffee
If I didn’t work in a Library I’d probably…... Be looking for a job in tutoring or some form of education.

Getting to Know Erin Toepfner

Welcome to the fourth and final installment of Getting to Know U: our staff's chance to show off their collections and suggest some of the books they like the most.

Our current display was created by Erin Toepfner, well know to most regular users of the Langsdale Library as one the customer-service driven members of our circulation department.

Erin has a wide variety of interests, but since many of her other collections are "too large" for our display case (think large antique furniture) she decided to share her latest passion: collecting vintage Pyrex. We asked Erin how she started collecting these colorful bowls and serving dishes.

Get to Know Jeffrey Hutson

Jeffrey Hutson, Associate Director

Jeffrey received a master's degree in library and information studies from Simmons College in 1999, where he graduated with honors. He also holds a master's in theology and a bachelor's in education, from St. John's University School of Theology and St. John's University, respectively.

Prior to arriving at UB, Hutson worked as a religious studies librarian at the Catholic University of America's Mullen Library, and as a public services librarian at St. John's before that.

As Jeffrey is sharing his collection of postcards in the display case located on the first floor of Langsdale, we asked Jeffrey to tell us a little about his collection:

For many years I’d been interested in postcards and would pick them up here and there. Then for a few years I managed a small library gift shop which afforded me the opportunity to go yearly to gift fairs in New York and/or San Francisco where I’d notice these free modern advertising postcard racks in restaurants and bookstores and movie theaters. So I’d make it a point to grab one of each of the cards. My collecting really took off when I was living in Boston while working on my library degree; the postcard racks were all over Boston and I had a list of venues where they were placed, so when I needed a break from studying, I’d go around and pick up cards on a monthly basis. With the help of friends who live in large cities, I’ve been able to add to the collection and over the years I’ve acquired about six thousand cards. My most recent acquisition (picked up at the American Library Association meeting in June) is a set of seven postcards promoting the services of a company named Backstage Library Works.

Welcome to A Few New Faces!

This summer Langsdale is fortunate to be joined by two budding librarians, Lindsay and Rachel. You may have seen their faces at the reference desk over the last few weeks or months. Now is your chance to learn a little bit more about them and what they’re doing here:

Lindsay has a master’s degree in library science from the University of Maryland. She has been loving her time at Langsdale and appreciates the variety of questions students ask at the reference desk because she gets to learn something new every shift. Lindsay currently works full-time at another career and we’re lucky to have her one night a week. She hopes to transition into the library field and wants to continue working with students in higher education or high school. When Lindsay is not at Langsdale or working at her other career she stays very busy. She plays rugby for the Chesapeake Women’s Rugby Football Club in Baltimore City. She has played for eleven years and been playing for the Chessie for more than five years. She finds that it’s a great community of athletes and a home away from home.  Please stop by and say, “Hi,” to Lindsay if you see her at the reference desk!

Rachel is dangerously close to receiving her master’s in library science from Drexel University. One of her final hurdles is completing her practicum at Langsdale, though we’re trying not to be too hard on her.  She has been enjoying her time at Langsdale thus far and has enjoyed meeting the students, library guests and librarians. Rachel is interested in librarianship because it allows her to support research, learning and curiosity. She loves research and trying to figure out how to make it easier and more effective. Her experience at Langsdale gives her the opportunity to apply what she has learned in school to the “real world.” When she leaves Langsdale, Rachel hopes to become a full-fledged librarian at a college or public library somewhere in the Baltimore area. If you see Rachel at the reference desk, please stop by and say, “Hi,” or ask her a challenging reference question!

Shhh ... It's Time for Some Independence Day Action

The holiday is almost here. You're probably very relieved because this leaves lots of time to read and play with your Librarian Action Figure and maybe trade your Librarian Trading Card.

You don't have a Librarian Action Figure?

You didn't even know a Librarian Action Figure existed, except for Batgirl? You didn't know Batgirl was a librarian? Well, I didn't either until I got my first Librarian Action Figure, Nancy Pearl. From reading, yes reading, the back of the box, I learned that Batgirl was a librarian, too. She had her doctorate in library science and was the head of the Gotham City Public Library in the 1960s Batman series. O.K., so you've heard of Batgirl.

But who is Nancy Pearl? Nancy Pearl is a regular commentator on NPR and she has also served as Director of Library Programming and the Washington Center for the Book at the Seattle Public Library. She is apparently best known for the project "If All Seattle Read the Same Book" which was the inspiration for a similar project in Maryland (One Maryland, One Book, which Langsdale was a part) and around the country. Nancy Pearl has reviewed books for PBS Morning Edition, The Seattle Times, Library Journal, Booklist, and more. In addition to reviewing books, Pearl has written several, as well.

Friday is Librarian-Work-Out-Video Day

It's not really. But, oh my God, what if it was?! Imagine.

Anyway, it is Friday. I didn't lie about that. And I am, as I'm sure all of you are, very tired. I've had to walk to work in the rain way too many times this week. I've had to deal with the hordes of swarming shoppers nervously buying every loaf of bread and carton of milk in sight because the seasonal thunderstorms that were, at the time, approaching us had an exotic name (Derecho) reminiscent more of a lucha libre fighter than a natural, and not all that exciting, weather event*. Then to add to my Illiad of inconveniences (as Thomas Phynchon would put it), I spilled coffee on my shoes, stepped in a puddle, and overslept because of a blown fuse (though the latter had nothing to do with the storm, but was the result of my girlfriend turning the air conditioner up too high).

So, now that the week is about over and the bold, red headlines that spelled doom and Apocalypse are gone from the Weather Channel's home page, we can rest easy and await a weekend that looks to be mild and clear -- that is, if we can still trust in weathermen that have given us little reason to.

And what better way to end a rainy week (or any week, for that matter) than watching a ridiculous and slightly creepy video of librarians doing aerobics to the sweet sounds of Van Halen (amongst a slew of other 1980's gems).

Enjoy:



By Adam Shutz

*Though sounding slightly inauspicious and, maybe more to the point, like something that will beat you up or run you over, Derecho actually just means "straight winds." Pretty anticlimactic, I know. But well suited to the week, as it turns out.

Columbus and a Sea of Blue Ideas

Columbus Breaking the Egg (Christopher Columbus) by William Hogarth

For a scientist -- or anyone for that matter -- to proclaim the discovery of a physical thing (a country, a particle, a planet, a new species of fish) has always rubbed me as a potentially childish endeavor, and, maybe more to the point, an altogether arrogant claim.* How could they possibly know, for sure, that in the thousands of years of recorded history no one else has found what they have?

Since we have recently celebrated Columbus Day, let’s use him as an example. “He,” the claim goes, “discovered America.” Well, actually, no. There are lots of things wrong with this claim, but I’ll only go into a few very briefly because the topic has been belabored by so many historians and activists that my adding to that body of lit. will do no one any good:  (1) he found a country/continent that was inhabited for about 12,000 years prior to his arrival, by an Asian population that walked an unimaginably long and icy bridge into Canada (which now, of course, isn’t there); (2) even if we try to claim that he was the first European to find the continent, there are problems here too; Vikings living on the southern tip of Greenland had traded and frequented the continent (they called it Vinland) long long before Spain traveled much further west than the Canary Islands; (3) he didn’t find America, he found Cuba.

Of course, this, the historical, empirical version of Columbus is not the person that we celebrated this past Monday. We celebrated the symbol of Columbus. A symbol that, for better or worse, is the symbol of America: determined; individualistic; steadfast in the face of the great, dangerous expanses of the unknown; slightly arrogant and reckless; and ultimately victorious in his endeavor to go where no one thought was possible – to add icing to the cake, he also came back rich. The story of Columbus mirrors the founding story of the US so well that to critique Columbus, even Columbus as myth, while continuing to sing the refrain of our own origin story, would rival the appearance of a patient suffering a traumatic brain hemorrhage caused by a great unknown cognizant dissonance. So here we are, kind of stuck with him, and a story we now know to be bull--

Getting to know U, Junior Year

Meet Ivy Patterson Owens. Ivy is the full time cataloger for the Langsdale Library.

Ivy absolutely belongs in a library. Reading is her passion. She enjoys old fashioned mysteries, historical novels, fairy tales and anything Jane Austen.

As part of our "Getting to know U" summer display series, Ivy has shared her collection of children's books illustrated by the acclaimed artist, Trina Schart Hyman. Many of you might remember enjoying these exquisitely illustrated fairy tales from your youth.

We asked Ivy a few questions about her collection, here are her responses:

What do you collect?

"Trina Schart Hyman’s illustrated books."

Why did you start collecting?

"I love her illustrations.  She won the Caldecott Medal!"

How long have your collected?

"I have been collecting her books for about 25 years."

Which one is your favorite?

"I’m torn between St. George and the Dragon, especially the dragon picture, and Little Red Riding Hood, with all the cats on every page." (Little Red Riding Hood, illustrated and retold by Trina Schart Hyman, based on the Brothers Grimm version of the tale.)

In 1989 the Empire and Culver City, California school districts banned this Caldecott Honor award winning version of the fairy tale because the cover shows a bottle of what might be wine in Red's basket for her grandmother. Authorities said the story "condones the use of alcohol." My daughter (and I) love Hyman's versions of classic fairly tales and she received this one, and several others, as gifts as a child."

We asked Ivy to recommend some materials from our collection;

"I made a list of all the fairy tale materials we have here in Langsdale, and that is what I would display.  The movies that I like best are not available on DVD: 'The 39 Steps' (1976 with Big Ben & sword sticks) and 'The Winged Avenger' episode of the 1967 Avengers (John Steed & Emma Peel)"

Here is a link to a list of books that Ivy encourages anyone with a fondness for fairytales to enjoy.

Busman's Holiday

Trinity College Library
Photo by Brett Jordon /flicker

A Busman’s Holiday is defined as “A vacation during which one engages in activity that is similar to one's usual work.” by the American Heritage Dictionary. The Urban dictionary adds “Comes from the late 1800's, where a man who drives a bus for a living goes on a long bus journey on their holiday.”

So, do people who work in libraries also visit libraries while on vacation. I had the good fortune to visit the library at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. Famous for having the Book of Kells, a 9th-century gospel manuscript famous throughout the world. After viewing the book, you proceed upstairs to the magnificent Long Room which houses 200,000 of the Library’s oldest books in its oak bookcases. It is beyond doubt, one of the most beautiful libraries in the world.I posed this question to several other members of our staff here at Langsdale Library, and I’d like to share a portion of those responses here.

Lucy Holman, our Director here at Lansdale shared that she visited the Alexandria Library in Egypt a couple of years ago. "It was amazing to visit a library that is both incredibly modern and ancient. The building’s architecture lends itself to a library of the 21st century, but the collections include scrolls and manuscripts dating back to the Roman and Byzantine empires. The library welcomes the average Egyptian student and citizen as well as leading scholars from around the world. Standing near the top of the library looking down at floors and floors of collections and users was dizzying, both literally and figuratively!"
Ivy Owens, our cataloger and member of the Technical Services department recalls libraries in Great Britain.
“Yes, always!—or visited bookstores. I especially like Hay-on-Wye, Wales because it has 38 bookstores and a public library where I picked up library information in Welsh! The Welsh word for Library is “Llyfregell” which is pronounced “clevergueth.” My daughter’s dorm library at Cambridge has everything arranged by the Dewey Decimal System, which they so rudely call the Standard Decimal System. I had to use my Langsdale staff card to be allowed into the main Cambridge University Library to get to the West Room which has all the cool old mysteries.”
Delores Redman, intercampus loan coordinator and member of the Book and Document Delivery department remembers visiting the Library of Congress.“Well, about 6 years ago, when I was helping ILL part time, the MAILL visited the Library of Congress, so that was pretty cool, and it was great being in DC. The Marble room was pretty astounding to see. (made of all marble of course.)”
Erin Toepfner, library technician and member of the Circulation Department also talks about a library close to home.
“I guess the closest I’ve come to sightseeing a library was during an interview I had at the Peabody Library. While I waited to interview for a secretarial position, I was able to visit the library and wow. It’s really amazing. All gleaming wood and old books. My favorite libraries tend to be the old-world kind. Leather-bound books and mahogany—that’s what I look for in a library, and what I’m trying to do with my own mini library at home”
Jeffrey Hutson, Associate Director for Public Services found it difficult to talk about just one visit to a library while on holiday.
“In Europe there are a great many wonderful and beautiful libraries, but most of them are private. Public libraries aren’t nearly as abundant in Europe as they are in the US, but what impressed me about the main public library in Vienna, Austria is that it is built on top of a subway station which happens to be in the middle one of the city’s busiest streets. . .I mean talk about access to the common people. . .it’s genius! Architechturally, the building is quite stunning -- it’s very modern, almost resembling a pyramid, except that it’s quite long and narrow. . .and in true Viennese style, there is a cafe on the uppermost level of the library! “
Adele Marley, Circulation Technician and member of the Circulation Department experience the ultra modern library on her visit with her brother.
“When I visited my brother in San Francisco in the 1990s, he took me to the main branch of the then-recently constructed SFPL. It was really astonishingly modern, and I don’t think I’d seen so many patrons in any library on a Sunday. They were swamped! There were so many places for people to sit and read comfortably or study. This was sort of before laptops were in wide use, so people were actually reading books. I remember thinking that the library was the size of a shopping mall, and it was just filled with natural light.”
Carol Vaeth, Book and Document Delivery Supervisor, joins Ivy in her praise of British libraries.
“Actually, I had the pleasure of going to the library in Oxford, England. We were only allowed on the first floor, so didn’t get to see very much. Such a tease!!”
Catherine Johnson, Instruction Coordinator and member of the Reference department recalls her special grandparent and visits to his “library”.
“I have visited some beautiful libraries but my favorite library was not technically a library at all. I certainly inherited my love of organizing and sharing information from my grandfather. He packed his basement with information and developed his own system for organizing that information. I always enjoyed my trips to Grandpa’s basement because I always found things that were fascinating and unexpected – and I almost always have that same experience in libraries.”
Peter Ramsey, Instruction Librarian and member of the Reference department adds another voice to those praising the U.K. libraries.
“ While in grad school I attended a summer seminar at “The University of Oxford” all about academic librarianship in the UK. As it turns out, the library system at Oxford U consists of over 100 separate libraries, and many of them have aged quite nicely. There were a number of highlights during our various tours, but one that particularly stands out is seeing the basement of the Bodleian Library. There was a cranky old conveyer belt system to move books up to the reading rooms and many of the books were stored in compact shelving that was suspended from I-beams to hang about an inch above the floor
Another highlight was the swearing in process we did in order to get a library card. We each had to recite the following to a staff member:
I hereby undertake not to remove from the Library, nor to mark, deface, or injure in any way, any volume, document or other object belonging to it or in its custody; not to bring into the Library, or kindle therein, any fire or flame, and not to smoke in the Library; and I promise to obey all rules of the Library.