Kenneth Clayton cuts James Trautman’s hair during a Barbershop in the Library event on June 20, 2016. Photo: Rebecca Lomax/American Libraries

Bookend: The Cutting Edge

July 13, 2016

“Teens wanted a space to talk about what was happening in their communities,” says Adewole Abioye, teen program director at the West Englewood branch who organized and facilitates the program. “The barbershop concept was used as a catalyst to get them talking.” The program debuted in December 2015 and is held the third Monday of … Continue reading Bookend: The Cutting Edge


Cara Bertram. (Photo: L. Brian Stauffer)

Bookend: ALA through the Ages

June 1, 2016

The ALA Archives have been around since 1973, and Bertram—who describes herself as an “archivist through and through”—knew about the Association and “how large an impact it had on history.” But she has been especially impressed with ALA’s World War I records, which she says are among her favorite items. Also prized is a scrapbook of … Continue reading Bookend: ALA through the Ages


Tiah Edmunson-Morton, archivist of the Oregon Hops and Brewing Archives at Oregon State University Photo: Krista Joy Johnson

Hoppy Days

May 1, 2016

Edmunson-Morton had been at OSU Libraries for seven years and had the itch to do something different. So in 2013, she pitched the idea of collecting and telling the intertwined story of hops and beer—the first such archive in the US—and within a couple of months it became reality. The first hops were planted on … Continue reading Hoppy Days


Clockwise from left: AFU Director Anders Liljegren and librarian Ingrid Collberg; one of several alien models in the AFU archive; the AFU library walls, decorated with UFO book covers; UFO modeled after photos taken by US contactee George Adamski in the 1950s; The Supernatural Magazine, published in Dublin in 1809. (Photos: Clas Svahn)

Bookend: The Real X-Files

March 1, 2016

Director and archivist Anders Liljegren, who created AFU’s specialized subject classification scheme, works with Collberg and more than 20 volunteers. “Since 1973, AFU has grown from a single bookshelf to a facility used by researchers from many countries,” Liljegren says. “Ingrid’s background in working with French materials is particularly valuable.” AFU also houses 50,000 issues … Continue reading Bookend: The Real X-Files


Christy Karpinski and a selection of political buttons from the Busy Beaver Button Museum in Chicago. Photos: Rebecca Lomax/American Libraries (Karpinski); Busy Beaver Button Company (buttons)

Bookend: Pushing Buttons

January 2, 2016

Enter Christy Karpinski, who has since turned that internship into a permanent position as digital librarian and museum manager at Busy Beaver’s Button Museum, which now displays 9,000 pinback pieces of cultural history and ephemera. Karpinski’s background is in photography, but she has also made websites and organized digital collections of photos, which spurred an … Continue reading Bookend: Pushing Buttons


David Gibson. (Photo: Geo. Willeman/Library of Congress)

Bookend: Game On

November 1, 2015

David Gibson, a moving image technician, is LC’s videogame steward, and he earned the role by chance. “I was the youngest person in the office, so they gave me the job,” he says, laughing. He does credit gaming as a youth and while in graduate school with providing a background to archive the 4,000 videogame … Continue reading Bookend: Game On


K. C. Boyd (Photo: Andrew Nelles)

Bookend: Urban Renewal

September 1, 2015

“These are stories that are about inner-city life and urban life, and the kids could really relate,” says Boyd, now library media specialist and director of social media at Wendell Phillips Academy High School, where she has worked since 2010. When Boyd began advocating for the urban fiction genre, she was sometimes misunderstood. Many people, … Continue reading Bookend: Urban Renewal


Counterclockwise from top right: Keith Lu, bookmobile driver and library tech, waves a rainbow flag from the SFPL bookmobile; collections management assistant Alan Wong (center) and collections librarian Erin Dubois (right) strike a pose while waiting for the parade to begin; adult services librarian and bookmobile librarian Connie Porciuncula wears a pink wig in front of the TechMobile; Annemarie Dompe, student at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, holds a sign for Radclyffe Hall’s 1928 book The Well of Loneliness in front of the bookmobile; SFPL city librarian Luis Herrera rides a balloon-covered bike, and SFPL deputy city librarian Michael Lambert rides a skateboard ahead of SFPL’s marchers. (Photos: San Francisco Public Library)

Bookend: Librarians Show Their Pride

July 14, 2015

Counterclockwise from top right: Keith Lu, bookmobile driver and library tech, waves a rainbow flag from the SFPL bookmobile; collections management assistant Alan Wong (center) and collections librarian Erin Dubois (right) strike a pose while waiting for the parade to begin; adult services librarian and bookmobile librarian Connie Porciuncula wears a pink wig in front … Continue reading Bookend: Librarians Show Their Pride


Heidi Abbey Moyer (Photo: Bob Skalkowski)

Bookend: A History of Women’s Lives

June 1, 2015

The Alice Marshall Women’s History Collection is named for Alice Kahler Marshall (1923–1997), a local journalist, researcher, and avid collector, who was fascinated by the “contradictions between the realities of women’s lives and the stereotypes of women’s behavior.” The collection, compiled over 50 years, encompasses material on all areas of women’s lives from the 15th … Continue reading Bookend: A History of Women’s Lives


Ginny Evans (Photo: Brent Alexander)

Bookend: Library of Delight

March 1, 2015

Evans loves involvement with the community. “We don’t have an arts council, we don’t have a chamber of commerce, we have little Delight library.” The declaration signing party was so successful, Evans told Stripling that she plans to repeat it “for at least another 15 years” when she’ll be ready to retire. She’s 73.


Casey Davis (Photo: Lisa Abitbol)

Bookend: In the Vault

January 2, 2015

That’s where Casey Davis, project manager for the American Archive of Public Broadcasting at WGBH Educational Foundation in Boston, comes in. Davis (standing in the WGBH vault) works with a team at the WGBH Media Library and Archives and the Library of Congress to coordinate a national effort to identify, preserve, and make accessible as … Continue reading Bookend: In the Vault


James L. Gates Jr. (Photo: Milo V. Stewart Jr./National Baseball Hall of Fame)

Bookend: National Pastime

November 1, 2014

Since its opening in June 1939, the Hall has served as the cornerstone of baseball, honoring the sport’s greats and marking its significance in history over the years. Pictured here, James L. Gates Jr., library director, holds the promissory note for the sale of Babe Ruth from the Boston Red Sox to the New York … Continue reading Bookend: National Pastime