Christmas movie suggestion

My all-time favorite Christmas movie is Desk Set. Of course, I love all Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy flicks, but this one takes place around Christmas AND Hepburn plays a librarian! How could it get any better? All librarians should see Desk Set, but anyone who loves old movies would get a treat out of this film. So give it a try, then let us know which part you liked best: the scene on the roof or the shoes in the stove. And if you disliked it, then tell us about your favorite Christmas movie instead!

Kodachrome, give us those nice bright colors

"I've spent 30 years looking at black-and-white images of this era, and they're full of meaning, but the color ones have a different dimension," says Beverly Brannan, a curator of photography at the Library of Congress. "This is how the world actually looked."

The images seen here are part of a 70-photograph exhibit, titled "Bound for Glory: America in Color, 1939-1943." It is the first major exhibit that the Library of Congress has mounted from its collection of more than 1,600 little-seen color images taken for the Farm Security Administration and the Office of War Information. They were produced at a time when the United States was slowly emerging from the Depression and heading into World War II.

According to Brannan, color photography had just begun in earnest in 1935. By 1937, Kodak Co. felt secure enough in the medium that it distributed color film to government photographers so they could experiment. The results are simply stunning.

All of the color photos -- as well as more than 160,000 black-and-white images of the period -- can be viewed here.

The 70 images in the exhibition were chosen from among 175 photographs found the companion book Bound for Glory by Paul Hendrickson, available at Allen County Public Library. The book includes Library of Congress reference numbers for each of the photos, which allows readers to search for the specific image online or order prints from the LOC’s Photoduplication Service.

Wikipedia rivals Britannica on scientific accuracy

Wikipedia, the web-based free encyclopedia written and edited by volunteers, apparently stacks up pretty well against the oldest English language general encyclopedia, according to an online article in Nature. Check out the Wired News article, or the Nature article.

I think there's a tendency to doubt the accuracy of Wikipedia, but perhaps that tendency will lessen as information like this comes to light. It's also worth mentioning a book that speaks to our tendency to trust experts over common wisdom - it's called The Wisdom of Crowds: why the many are smarter than the few, and how collective wisdom shapes business, economies, societies, and nations, by James Surowiecki. I first read about this book in an article by Orson Scott Card, and that convinced me to read it.

eAudiobooks

Audio versions of bestsellers like Jan Karon's Light from Heaven, Frank McCourt's Teacher Man, and Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins' Regime are available to download now via NetLibrary. Don't wait another day to hear the latest from these popular authors. Connect to downloadable audiobooks at ACPL to sign up for a free account and start downloading. Then let us know what you thought about the experience and the books themselves!

Fort Wayne artists making a splash!

We've just started a blog for Fort Wayne Area Artists. Try it out at fortartists.blogspot.com. You can read about Robbin Melton's venture into television and the newest Fort Wayne gallery, the Kachmann Gallery.

Game Knights Unplugged

Turn off the power to your gaming console and try some old school games. Fine tune your strategy with games like Pirates of the Spanish Main, Scrabble, Continuo, and Make 'n' Break. Thursday, December 15, 7:00 pm, Young Adults' Services (at the Main Library).

What is this?

Welcome to our blog!

What's a blog, you may ask? Short for "web log," a blog is simply a type of web page where the author, or "blogger," can make note of any items of interest he or she finds while surfing the web.

On our blog — acpl.info — we'll post cool websites, highlight materials available at the library, and share information about library services you may not have heard of before. You're welcome to add your two cents, ask questions, make comments, and generally take part in the conversation. We want to hear from you!

One Search

Try One Search: http://search3.webfeat.org/clients/allenco/wf3_allenco.html

Q: Why is it called One Search?
A: Patrons helped us choose a name which describes what One Search can do - search a lot of resources all in one place! One Search - great results. There is so much information that is not available for free on the internet - One Search searches beyond Google!

Q: Will users able to access One Search from home?
A: When linking to One Search, it determines (by your IP address)
whether you are on a library computer or not. If you are outside the library's
network, you may enter your library card number to start searching

Q: With the library's "e-resources", and patrons could only access some services if they used the library's dial-up system.
A: Once you enter your library card to show you are a legitimate user, you can use One Search to search almost all of our resources from home. There are only eight databases which can only be used in one of our libraries (Ancestry.com, D&B Million Dollar Business Database, Heritage Quest, Morningstar, New England Ancestors, NewsBank, RDS Business Suite, and World Geography), the rest can be searched by ACPL card holders from home.