March/April 2013

Features & Trends

Cultivating a Special Collection

One telling image embodies the ridicule he endured. In it, his face and that of his wife Mildred are superimposed on a drawing of two monkeys’ bodies. Movie stills and ephemera from the making of Inherit the Wind (1960) document the celebrity status achieved by his attorney, Clarence Darrow (fictionalized as the thinly veiled Darrow … Continue reading Cultivating a Special Collection →

To Protect and Preserve

By Jeanne Drewes

The voice on the phone sounded exhausted. “I have lost my life’s work,” the man said. He was an artist who had his paintings stored in a basement somewhere in Lower Manhattan in New York City. It was November 2, 2012, four days after Hurricane Sandy hit the New Jersey coast, and the call came … Continue reading To Protect and Preserve →

Ellis Island, 1913. An image from DPLA's exhibition on emigrants leaving Europe for America.

A Digital Library for Everyone

By Megan Cottrell

Two Italian kids, planting their feet in America for the first time on Ellis Island in 1913. What had they left behind? And what lay ahead for them? It’s this photo—and others like it—that got Maura Marx into a bit of trouble. Marx is director of the effort to launch the Digital Public Library of … Continue reading A Digital Library for Everyone →

Columnists

Something Old, Something New
By Laurie D. Borman
Follow Yourself
By David Lee King and Michael Porter
Managing the Managers
By Linda W. Braun
Too Eager to Please
By Will Manley
Community Building
By Maureen Sullivan
There Are No Free Libraries
By D. J. Hoek
Just-for-Me Training
By Meredith Farkas
Visiting Two Medicine Country
By Bill Ott
Leadership and Advocacy
By Karen Muller
Making Friends with Research
By Joseph Janes
The Tao of Tablets
By Carolyn Meier and Heather Moorefield-Lang and Rebecca K. Miller

Latest Library Links

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Librarians joined the world in mourning Dolly Parton and remembering both her artistic achievements and her philanthropy. Parton’s award-winning Imagination Library initiative, inspired by her father’s inability to read or write, has put hundreds of millions of books into the hands of children, and she considered it one of her greatest achievements. ALA conferred Parton with honorary lifetime membership, its highest honor, in 2023. American Libraries interviewed Parton in 2018 as the Imagination Library was delivering its 100 millionth book. Libraries, including Knox County (Tenn.) Public Library and Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Public Library, created commemorative displays and book lists, while the University of Louisville (Ky.) Archives and Special Collections and the University of North Carolina Libraries shared rare photos and recordings.

I Love Libraries, Aug. 27; American Libraries Trend, Jan./Feb. 2018; Knox County (Tenn.) Public Library, Aug. 26; Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Public Library, Aug. 26; University of Louisville (Ky.) Archives and Special Collections, Aug. 27; Chapelboro.com, Aug. 27
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Yasir Mahmood writes: “I’ve been gradually building up my Excel shortcut knowledge over time, and it has genuinely helped me work with spreadsheets more efficiently. Once you start incorporating shortcuts into your daily workflow, there’s honestly no going back to the old way.” Shortcuts can speed navigation, data selection, formatting, formula-building, data management, and simply working with worksheets.

MakeUseOf, Aug. 27
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Dan Johnson writes: “Viktoria Haidai surveys the mangled remains of the printing press, which should have been busy churning out textbooks ready for the new school year. The plant, on the edge of Kyiv, was hit during the night by a Russian missile, just as production was ramping up to deliver 1.3 million books—10% of Ukraine’s schoolbooks. Russia has hit printing presses and publishing houses across Ukraine in a series of recent attacks, destroying 12 million books and damaging other icons of Ukrainian history and culture.”

BBC, Aug. 30
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“Public libraries nationwide are reaching a breaking point as a result of mounting pressures to censor collections, increased intimidation against library staff, and disruptions to library operations, according to a September 1 report by PEN America. Out of Circulation: Expanding Censorship in Public Libraries examines the fallout from book bans, canceled story hours, harassment of librarians, funding cuts, and the undoing of libraries’ independent governance. Taken together, the report argues, these actions threaten ‘the very existence of public libraries’ as a cornerstone of democracy.”

PEN America, Sept. 1
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Hana Lee Goldin writes: “More than half a billion people around the world now listen to podcasts, across more than 4 million shows. Buried in that catalog is a kind of source material that barely existed a generation ago: experts talking about their own work, at length and in their own words. The clearest proof that podcasts already work as sources is how often we quote them. Each repetition runs on memory alone. So the archive is already in use as a source, just without a way back to the moment.”

Card Catalog, Sept. 1
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Leah Weinryb-Grohsgal writes: “As the steward of over 200 petabytes of data, the Library of Congress (LC) has spent decades building infrastructure and services to preserve and provide access to digital materials. Artificial intelligence (AI) technologies offer enticing possibilities for maintaining, delivering, and analyzing some of the nation’s most influential research and treasured cultural and historical artifacts. Yet the use of these technologies requires extensive evaluation and monitoring before implementation. In 2025, LC introduced its AI Sandbox for Staff to do just that. The most recent cohort of the Library’s AI Sandbox for Staff supported over a dozen small-scale experiments.”

Library of Congress: The Signal, Aug. 31
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Tess Vrbin writes: “Saline County, Arkansas, agreed this week to pay $275,000 to Patty Hector, the former library director who was fired in October 2023 after speaking against local conservatives’ push to limit children’s access to books. County Judge Matt Brumley’s firing power came from an ordinance approved by the all-Republican quorum court, which previously urged Hector to move books with ‘sexual content or imagery’ out of children’s reach. The books in question pertained to LGBTQ+ topics, sex education, and systemic racism, which Saline County conservatives called ‘indoctrination’ and inappropriate for children.”

Arkansas Advocate, Aug. 27; Oct. 9, 2023; Aug. 21, 2023; Apr. 17, 2023

View more Latest Library Links

March/April 2013

Features & Trends

Cultivating a Special Collection

To Protect and Preserve

A Digital Library for Everyone

Emerging Leaders: Class of 2013

Filtering and the First Amendment

Investing at the Library

Meet the Candidates for ALA President and Treasurer

Newsmaker: Caroline Kennedy

Columnists

Something Old, Something New

Follow Yourself

Managing the Managers

Too Eager to Please

Community Building

There Are No Free Libraries

Just-for-Me Training

Visiting Two Medicine Country

Leadership and Advocacy

Making Friends with Research

The Tao of Tablets