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The St. Louis Police Library, among the first of its kind in the US, is a trove of new and old policing paraphernalia. But after seven decades in service, the library at the department’s downtown police academy is being dismantled, making way for a high-tech active-shooter training simulator. A troop of retired officers is trying to find a new home for the library and its collection, which includes more than 20,000 books, thousands of photos, and hundreds of one-of-a-kind artifacts. The last librarian to care for the collection, Barbara Miksicek, retired in 2016 after 34 years. She hasn’t been replaced.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Sept. 13
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Stephanie Hlywak writes: “Digital Book World 2019, held September 10–12 in Nashville, Tennessee, closed with conversations about the future of libraries with David Burleigh, director of brand marketing and communication at Rakuten OverDrive, and ALA Executive Director Mary Ghikas. On September 12, Burleigh discussed the robust ebook and audiobook lending ecosystem. Rakuten Overdrive began servicing libraries in 2003, before publishers were fully on board with selling to the market. Ghikas began by defining libraries as centers of content—including events, influence, individuals, communities, and, of course, books.”

AL: The Scoop, Sept. 13
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The ALA Ethnic and Multicultural Information Exchange Round Table seeks nominations for its 2020 David Cohen Multicultural Award. The award recognizes recent articles that include significant new research related to the understanding and promotion of multiculturalism in libraries in North America. Works published between January 1, 2018, and December 31, 2019, are eligible. The 2020 award application deadline is January 3, 2020.

Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services, Sept. 13
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Barbara Fister writes: “I was intrigued when I saw some coverage of a recent article in Nature that coined an intriguing phrase: information gerrymandering. The six authors come from disparate fields—biology, economics, and environmental change. But their experiment adds an intriguing wrinkle to the more information-science and sociology-of-information circles where I tend to eavesdrop. They constructed an experiment in which people were recruited to play a voting game, which the researchers ran 120 times involving 2,520 participants, yielding data to analyze mathematically. To win you had to convince people from the other side to join your party.”

Inside Higher Ed: Library Babel Fish, Sept. 12
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Sophie Haigney writes: “At the Betty Cuningham Gallery on the Lower East Side recently, I noticed an arresting painting: It showed a nude woman curled against a window, asleep, with the old New Yorker Hotel and Empire State Building in view and a fish above her, hanging or floating. I opened a smartphone app called Magnus, snapped a quick picture, and clicked ‘Use.’ Seconds later, I got that addictive, satisfying click. The app had found a match. The painting was by Philip Pearlstein, according to the app, known for reinvigorating the tradition of realist figure painting. It was titled Model With Empire State Building and dated 1992.”

New York Times, Sept. 11
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Shannon McClintock Miller writes: “One of the most important things for us to do at the beginning of every year is to make sure we see all of the students to connect them to the library resources and technology that we have at our school. With over 900 students, we have to get creative on how we see and share this information with them and with our teachers and families. This year, I decided to put a new twist on library orientation by putting together a fun Google Slide presentation to share with the students and teachers when I visit their classrooms.”

The Library Voice, Sept. 12
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A resplendent Central Enoch Pratt Free Library has emerged on Cathedral Street in downtown Baltimore. After more than three years of a basement-to-attic renovation, the 1933 main library building is a proud palace of public learning. Patrons who used the Pratt for its books or attended a lecture here will recognize what is one of Baltimore’s most revered interiors. But look again. Paint restorers, plaster artisans, lighting experts, and historians have worked all sorts of magic. There’s also a reliable heating and air conditioning system. The majestic main hall has been scoured and shined, and the place somehow seems larger than it ever was.

Baltimore Sun, Sept. 13