Jacqueline Kennedy notes rediscovered | American Libraries Magazine

Note by Jacqueline Kennedy on White House stationery, November 22, 1963

In the summer of 2015, Gil Wells found his 79-year-old godmother with a plastic sleeve holding two small sheets of White House notepaper. Wells pulled them out, turned one sheet over and stopped cold. “I saw ‘Nov. 22’ and ‘pink and navy Chanel suit,’” he recalled. The handwriting was Jacqueline Kennedy’s, and the notes were a list she had drawn up before the fateful trip to Dallas in November 1963. Since March 2016, they have been housed at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston.

New York Times, July 2

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There was no shortage of laughter or conviviality among the more than 21,400 library workers and exhibitors who gathered for the ALA Annual Conference and Exhibition, held June 20–25 in Washington, D.C. But the subject matter commanded a sober tone, as speakers and panelists touched on some of the most complex and urgent issues facing the country in 2019. Award-winning YA author Jason Reynolds kicked off the conference with a stirring address, challenging librarians to facilitate understanding and empathy in their communities.

American Libraries feature, July/Aug.
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ALA President Wanda Kay Brown writes: “Libraries are essential for the health of our democracy, our communities, and our future. But too often we hear from elected officials and regular citizens alike that libraries are relics that are no longer necessary in our modern culture. ALA’s strength in representing and advocating for librarians and library workers is likewise critical. However, the feedback we frequently receive is that getting involved in an association as complex as ours is daunting. Over the course of my presidential year, I will work to promote both the value of libraries and ALA, broadly speaking, through a lens of social justice and inclusion.”

American Libraries column, July/Aug.
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ACRL has published 2018 Academic Library Trends and Statistics, the latest in a series of annual publications that describe the collections, staffing, expenditures, and service activities of academic libraries in all Carnegie classifications. The one-volume title includes data from associate of arts colleges, baccalaureate, master’s colleges, and universities and research/doctoral-granting institutions. The 2018 survey data is also available through ACRL Metrics, an online subscription service that provides access to survey data from 1999 to 2018.

ACRL Insider, July 17
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A set of notebooks dating from 1788 that record the first attempts at communication between British settlers and Indigenous Australians reveals language that is still in use in Sydney Aboriginal communities. The Dawes notebooks, named for First Fleet Officer William Dawes who recorded his discussions with Aboriginal people of La Perouse, are on international loan from the SOAS University of London to the State Library of New South Wales’s landmark exhibition, “Living Language: Country, Culture, Community,” which opened July 13. The notebooks are important because they retain the conversational context that is crucial for contemporary language revival work.

Sydney (N.S.W.) Morning Herald, July 14
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Principal Library Officer Ernest Nyari vividly remembers the scramble that would ensue every morning when he opened the doors of the library at University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. Students got stuck at the doorway as they rushed in. The library didn’t have enough space or books to serve the growing student population. At a cost of $41.28 million, China’s Aid program helped Tanzania build a new library at the university in 2018. The largest university library in Africa, the facility is staffed by 147 librarians and features high-speed internet and improved digital resources.

China Daily (Beijing), July 10
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Olivia Páez writes: “ARCs, or advance reading copies, are a small selection of proofs that are provided to bloggers, journalists, and librarians to review before a novel is published. They are used to generate buzz among reviewers and those with influence in the book community and get readers excited about a book’s upcoming release. These are not finished copies. In fact, some ARCs say ‘uncorrected proof’ on the cover, meaning that they may contain typos or grammatical errors. Another important detail on the cover is the statement ‘not for sale.’ Here are some ideas for what to do with copies of ARCs that you may want to unload.”

Book Riot, July 17
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The ASGCLA Accessibility Assembly completed a revision of its Service Animals Tipsheet in June. Focusing on the definitions and expectations of service animals identified in the Americans with Disabilities Act, the tipsheet notes that support animals are different from service animals and serve different purposes. Libraries will find a set of tips about practice and procedures regarding service animals in a library.

ASGCLA Direct, July 17

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