New YA

The Pesky Library Flickr page now has a set for New Acquisitions. Young Adult fiction titles were recently added to this set. We love to see these titles fly off the shelf and into the hands of our students. In Flickr you can view the Young Adult books added this fall and see the notes listed on many of the titles for further information. Other titles not highlighted by the notes include: Life on the Refrigerator Door (FIC KUI), M is for Magic (SC GAI), The Last Chicken in America (FIC LIT), Parrotfish (FIC WIT), American Youth (FIC LAM), Gifted (FIC LAL), and Territory (FIC BUL). We are excited to provide a new list of acquisitions as orders arrive along with a great visual that Flickr allows us to provide.

Laptops on the Move

I think all would agree that the laptops are our most popular service. We have five that students or faculty can check out to use within the library. Even when there are available desktops, students prefer the laptops to take to a quiet corner or a comfy chair. We have started documenting the places they go. Take a look at The Life of a Pesky Laptop.

Seniors

While the Juniors are busy researching their American History papers, the Seniors are focused on next year. There is a steady buzz of conversation as they visit colleges and return with new information. Many students began their search during Junior year or during summer visits to campuses everywhere. You can almost feel their anxiety now that the time has come to make decisions about where to apply. Most are looking forward to having the application process finished. Of course, then there is a new level of anxiety as they wait to hear about their acceptances. Senior year is a roller-coaster ride, but one that most students will say they enjoyed when they finally get off.

More on Lori Ehrlich and the Convocation

Lori Ehrlich was the Academy’s first Spirituality speaker of the year. Her speech centered on three cases which drew her into the environmental movement: the Salem Power Plant owned by P.G. & E, Erin Brockovich’s research into P.G. & E. and health issues in Hinckley, California, and the Wenham Lake Reservoir. If you want to read further, here are the websites she referenced in her talk. HealthLink has the list of what you can do to be part of the solution.

• HealthLink
• Her Truth and Progress Blog
• Wenham Lake Watershed Association
• Blanket the Globe
• Environmental League of Massachusetts
• Ceres

Also, the library has many books on environmental topics. Three of the newest are Feeding the fire : the lost history and uncertain future of mankind's energy addiction by Mark E. Eberhart, Moving mountains : how one woman and her community won justice from big coal by Penny Loeb, and Lights out : the electricity crisis, the global economy, and what it means to you by Jason Makansi.

What’s New in History

The library loves to share new book titles with students, faculty and staff just as much as we enjoy opening that new box of delivered books. Usually we pull together a list of the latest and greatest titles and will share this with the community, as well as post them to our Library Thing account. We are adding a new dimension to our “New Titles” list by taking a photograph of the newest books in a given category. Today we begin with new history titles. The full listing of new history books can be found with it’s photograph in Flickr. Stay tuned for other categories of new books in the coming weeks.

Life of a Book - from Selection to the Reader's Hands

Building the library's collection is my favorite professional task. I enjoy reading reviews, gathering suggestions from students and colleagues, or simply going to the Jabberwocky and filling my arms with books. There's nothing like the satisfacton involved in matching a reader to an author or a researcher to a text. BUT, selecting the books is simply the beginning of the books becoming part of the collection. Processing, being entered into the database and added to LibraryThing comprise many steps which different hands complete. We are more focused on the steps involved during the fall when we are adding many books (new and used) to support the Junior History thesis topics chosen. Curious one week about how many steps there really are, we created a step-by-step montage of what is involved. Take a look.....

Academy Alum Invented Wire Trap

The wire lobster trap was created by James M. Knott, Class of 1947. First used off the coast of Gloucester in 1957, the trap was found to be lighter out of the water but heavier in it. Water flowed more easily through the wire mesh than through the wooden slats so the traps stayed on the bottom during rough seas. As the years passed, the traps found more and more acceptance with lobstermen who discovered the traps required less maintenance and had a longer lifespan than the standard wooden traps. On exhibit is a wire trap given by Mr. Knott, articles outlining its invention, and books on lobsters and lobstering. The Gulf of Maine Aqaurium has some great information and pictures on lobsters and the history of lobstering. Visit The Lobsterman’s Page to learn more about the fishery and how the gear is handled.

First Settlers

Did you know that the Pescosolido Library is used for other purposes beyond student and faculty research and book borrowing? We have groups that meet here and use our facilities as well. This week, for example, “The Sons and Daughters of the First Settlers of Newbury”, a genealogical society, met in our Glass Room, a beautiful round room with large windows overlooking our athletic fields. Mr. Carl Panall, the husband of our head librarian, Ms. Susan Chase, is a member of this group, as is Peter Swift, a member of the GA staff. We are happy to accommodate groups such as these in our spacious facilities. The sole criteria for reserving a room would be that there is an educational purpose for the meeting. See you at the library!

Banned on Flickr

Banned Books can be found not only in libraries and bookstores, but on Flickr as well. We have recently discovered a Banned Books Week group where libraries of all kinds are adding their banned books photos. One of the Pesky Library favorites is from the Dayton Metro Library East Branch. The picture includes 99 of the top 100 banned books and they are still looking for someone to come up with the one title that is missing. Can you figure it out? Read the comments below the picture to see what people have guessed so far.

Banned Books Ahoy!

We celebrate our right to read freely this week, a right to cherish and not to take lightly. Book censorship has been with us in America (especially Massachusetts) since our earliest days. The first book was censored in 1650 on the grounds that it challenged Puritan doctrine and was heretical. As time went on "Banned in Boston" became a familiar phrase. According to the Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins, 2d ed, 1988, "During the 1920s the phrase banned in Boston became famous because the long-established Watch and Ward Society of the so-called Hub of the Universe was forever getting the city censor to ban books from sale. Many publishers actively sought to have their books banned in Boston because they knew the label would increase their sales in the rest of the country..." Now individuals challenge and hope to suppress books that they feel are subversive, especially to young minds. U Penn has a good overview of Banned Books On-line and the reasons for the challenges. Stop by the library and see if you have read any of the titles in our display. You might be amazed at what you find. Read a banned book today!

Bags all around

As part of their orientation freshmen received welcome bags from the library with supplies to help them as they embark on their first year at The Governor’s Academy. Juniors are the next group to receive bags as they embark in a different type of journey: the U.S. History Thesis paper. When Juniors attend their reference interview with a librarian, they will be given a thesis bag with supplies to help them as they research. The bag includes, a highlighter to help locate keywords, sticky notes to mark important pages, note cards to help create and outline, a first edition Pesky Library pen and pencil, and holding it all together is a clip and Moo card. The Moo card will give Juniors the address to the U.S. History Moodle page and library contact information.

Juniors: Step Two

Last week we shared with you in the Pesky Blog how the Junior American History classes were coming to the library for a preliminary introduction to their thesis research. The library has now begun individual reference interviews with each Junior. The interview allows students to further explore their topic to see what resources are available to them by searching OPACs and journal databases, conducting effective internet searching and taking note of citing sources. All of these resources have been pulled together and are part of the US History Thesis course in Moodle. Students can access the Moodle course from on or off campus. Ms. Chase has worked with a number of students this week and all of the librarians are looking forward to assisting Juniors over the coming months.

Favorite author

Do you have a favorite author? Someone who, when you finish his or her book, you feel sad that the characters are no longer in your life? Someone who, when a new book by the author is announced, you get excited at the prospect of a new story that you know you will love? Richard Russo is one of those authors for me. I feel that I know his characters like I know my relatives. His characters are just as quirkey and flawed and lovable as people we know in real life. While reading his stories I feel close to them and feel their joys and sorrows. He wrote Empire Falls, Straight Man and a short story collection titled The Whore's Child. I loved them all. His new book is titled Bridge of Sighs and has been well reviewed. I can't wait to get my hand on it.

A Job Well Done

Attempting to get the workroom organized (finally,) the librarians hauled shelving home from Sam's Club and spent a morning putting it together. It was a truly cooperative effort! Ms. Pinkham and Mrs. Brown are pleased and proud with the results!

To Our Great Surprise

Over the past two years the Pesky Library has plunged into the great wide world of Web 2.0, building on the Pesky Blog by creating a Flickr site for photo sharing, a del.icio.us account for sharing professional library links, and utilizing Library Thing to post new books. We have learned a great deal and continue to learn from those who are also out there posting with these tools, and we are connecting with libraries across the country and overseas. While browsing through the most recent edition of Library Journal, we were amazed to find the Carl A. Pescosolido (Pesky) Library mentioned in the article, “Tags Help make Libraries Del.icio.us” by Melissa L. Rethlefsen. The library was referred to for its use of tagging in Library Thing by adding call numbers to the book tags. With the many libraries out there plugging away and making the effort to connect users with these new tools, we were taken by surprise and felt honored to be mentioned among those who are using tags successfully. To read the complete article click here, you will need to scroll down through the table of contents to view the article. Who knows where the Pesky Library will turn up next!

The Junior Thesis at the Beginning

Students in U.S. History classes started exploring topics for their thesis papers with us today. Mrs. Brown introduced them to the Moodle class designed for this paper. She also refreshed their memories on working within our OPAC and with the Infotrac databases. She then brought them out to Reference, pointing out generalized resources to explore ideas and our resource stacks on specific topics. Ms. Chase and their teacher Mr. Delay helped enlarge upon the possibilities of some of their thoughts and ideas. Some students were raring to go and made appointments with the librarians for one-on-one instruction specific to their topics.

Library Thing

After entering new book titles into Library Thing this evening I was thinking about how our library borrowers might also use this service. Library Thing is an on-line tool that lets people catalog their own book collections, while at the same time learning who owns the same or similar titles, and even lets you "talk" to the books' authors. It is often described as the "mySpace for books" or "Facebook for Books". Check out Library Thing and experience a whole new world of book sharing from the comfort of your own computer. You can even buy a Library Thing T-Shirt.

Art in the Ol’ Barn

Students and teachers alike are taking advantage of each beautiful day we are given here in Byfield before the temperatures begin to dip down. Ms. Struck’s class found a lovely location for their sketching assignment today; a bit of sun, a bit of shade, the birds chirping, the chipmunks scurrying about the stone wall, it is a quiet, peaceful location. The stone you see behind the students has been there for hundreds of years: it is the foundation of the cattle barn from the original farm before the school was established. Ms. Chase mentioned the cattle barn to our new students during orientation, along with many other interesting facts and “things to see” around campus that are of historical significance. The area where the students are seen sketching is located just behind the library, it was nice to see people enjoying the space on such a fine day.

All's well at the Library

The year always starts with a rush at the library - processing the new books, putting displays together, preparing for orientation, greeting returning students, working with new faculty, resetting expired passwords, revisiting all those ideas which sounded great at the end of last year (are they still good?) And then, preparing for the U.S. History thesis process takes over. So, it was a clickable moment for me when I came around the corner and saw these toes with a laptop. I stopped and took a deep cleansing breath. Students are back in our lives and it's swell!

On the Road at 50

Jack Kerouac's seminal novel of the Beat Generation turned 50 0n September 5. The library celebrates with a display featuring a book taken from the original scroll, a couple of contemporary posters, some classic cars, and quotes from Kerouac. You can be "Present at the Creation", an NPR presentation which includes many multi-media links to Kerouac reading from his book or watch curators unroll the scroll.
Although I read the book and encountered the Beat Generation in high school, my loveliest encounter with On the Road came when I myself was on the road in England. A friend and I had traveled to a village in Norfolk to visit a neighbor whose husband had been transferred there. Leaving her, we started a Jane Austen pilgrimage, boarding a train at King Lynn’s station to make our way to Winchester. The tracks went along a canal populated by swans and behind community garden plots complete with dilapidated and tipsy sheds made with scavenged materials. When a young woman sat next to me, I was feeling the effects of being truly in a different place. She was on her way to take a job lettering signs for a traveling circus. She was excited to chat with an American and pulled her favorite book from a rucksack. Had I ever read On the Road, simply the best book ever written? So there I was, on an English road discussing a journey by an author who had lived not 30 minutes from my home. When I tried to tell her about my Austen road trip, she was uncertain who Austen was (but was very polite about my enthusiasm.) Message to me: there’s a literary road for each of us.