http://www.nypl.org/news/index.cfmUpdates on New York Public Library news, programs and eventshttp://www.nypl.org/databases/images/onsite.gifhttp://www.nypl.org/news/index.cfmFeedSpring - http://feedspring.com/Fri, 06 Mar 2009 14:49:00 GMThttp://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/26/nyregion/26libraries.html March 26, 2009 Job Seekers Turn to the Library as a Base of Operations By JOSHUA BRUSTEIN Anthony Morris’s job search hit a snag earlier this month when the Queens Borough Public Library notified him that he could not get a new library card until he paid about $80 in outstanding fines. Mr. Morris, 31, had been unemployed for eight months and did not have the money. But he had amassed an armful of library books he needed to prepare for an exam that was part of the application process for a job at Con Edison, and he also needed a library card to browse online classified sites. So he asked if he could work off his debt. After 22 hours of sorting books in the reference section at the Jamaica branch, Mr. Morris got his new library card — and was asked to apply for a part-time position at the library. “It’s just minimum wage, but it beats a blank,” said Mr. Morris, who lives nearby and previously worked at a chemical plant that manufactured leather dyes. He is waiting to hear whether he got the job. While such direct results are certainly rare, the city’s public libraries are increasingly serving as makeshift employment centers. At the 58th Street branch of the New York Public Library in Manhattan, out-of-work professionals crowd the computers in the afternoon, a time that had previously been dominated by elderly patrons, and books on résumé writing are hard to keep on the shelves. The Bronx Library Center drew 700 to a career preparedness fair in January and recently doubled the number of computer classes it offers to the elderly because people looking to re-enter the work force had packed the existing classes to overflow levels. “We’ve been in the job-search business for decades,” said Paul LeClerc, the president of the New York Public Library, noting that President Obama has said that a librarian helped him find his first job as a community organizer. “This is a continuation.” The new role comes amid a broader surge in demand for libraries’ free goods and services that is typical during economic downturns. In the fourth quarter of 2008, circulation rose 16 percent compared with the previous year at the New York Public Library, which serves Manhattan, the Bronx and Staten Island; 9 percent at the Brooklyn Public Library; and 2 percent in Queens. All three systems also report significant increases in the number of visits. But the libraries are facing steep cuts in the mayor’s proposed budget for next year, and have other economic woes. Brooklyn has already shuttered its branches on Sundays and is considering trimming hours further. Earlier this month, a hotel company backed away from its pledge to purchase the Donnell Library, a five-story building on 53d Street, whose sale was intended to help pay for the $250 million renovation of the New York Public Library’s headquarters on Fifth Avenue. At the Bronx Library Center, near Fordham University, Janice Moore-Smith, an education and career counselor, has over the years typically helped half a dozen people a day with their résumés. In recent months, it is often 10. And Ms. Moore-Smith said that she had increasingly been scheduling joint sessions for husbands and wives in which she doles out emotional support along with employment tips. “I’m doing couples therapy,” she said. The most common service being sought, librarians said, is computer time. At the Queens Library for Teens in Far Rockaway, more and more teenagers are showing up to sign on, saying their parents have canceled Internet service at home. And with Web sites largely having replaced newspapers as the most common job-listing venue, finding work without Internet access has become increasingly difficult. Kerwin P. Pilgrim, division manager of the Brooklyn Public Library’s education and job information center, said that he began training 15 staff members to provide individual assistance to job seekers last summer, in anticipation that demand would rise as the economy worsened. In January, the library announced that there would be one such staff member available at all times in at least one branch within each group of four branches. Until recently, Mr. Pilgrim said, most people who came to the library’s résumé workshops were looking for entry-level jobs. Now, the proportion of professionals in the classes has soared. “When the banks started going down, we saw some people who had been employed for a long time and had never taken the time to write résumés or work on interviewing skills,” he said. “People got comfortable, and basically their résumés were never updated.” Mitch Baucus has long been a regular at the Flushing branch of the Queens library, but lately it has transformed from a place of leisure to his virtual office. When he was working as a legal researcher for a lawyer in Great Neck, Mr. Baucus regularly spent an afternoon each weekend reading newspapers and magazines at the library. Since he was laid off in early December, Mr. Baucus has been showing up five or six days a week to scour the Internet for employment opportunities. He spent several months searching without success, then noticed something he had overlooked. “I realized there was a person sitting there and his job was to help people with their résumés and interviewing skills,” he said. “So I went up to him and asked him for help.” http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/23/opinion/23strouse.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=Jean%20Strouse&st=cse When the Economy Really Did ‘Fall Off a Cliff’ By JEAN STROUSE IN what may come to be the definitive line about our current economic crisis, Warren Buffett said on the CNBC program “Squawk Box” this month that the United States economy has “fallen off a cliff.” The most trusted investor in history went on the air to talk, with characteristic candor and humor, about the horrendous truth we pretty much know, possibly in an effort to calm things down and point toward some answers we don’t yet know. He proceeded to give his views on what went wrong (“everybody thought house prices could go nothing but up ... so you had $11 trillion of residential mortgage debt built on this theory ”), on people’s paralyzing fear and confusion (“We are in a very, very vicious negative feedback cycle .... I don’t want this to be the last line of the movie”), and on the absolute necessity of fixing the banks and taking clear, decisive action. A look back at the handling of another financial crisis a full century ago underlines the point about decisive action. You just don’t want to take the wrong decisive action. Markets today are immeasurably more complex, global, fast-moving and regulated (a lot of good that did) than they were a hundred years ago, but the need for strong leadership has not changed. In early 1906, the banker Jacob Schiff told a group of colleagues that if the United States did not modernize its banking and currency systems, its economy would, in effect, fall off a cliff — that the country would “have such a panic ... as will make all previous panics look like child’s play.” Yet the country failed to reform its financial institutions, and conditions deteriorated steadily over the next 20 months. There was a worldwide credit shortage. The American stock market crashed twice. The young Dow Jones industrial average lost half of its value. In October 1907, when a panic started among trust companies in New York and terrified depositors lined up to get their money out, Schiff’s dire prediction seemed about to come true. The United States had no Federal Reserve, the Treasury secretary did not have much political authority, and the president, Theodore Roosevelt, was off shooting game in Louisiana. J. Pierpont Morgan, a 70-year-old private banker, quietly took charge of the situation. In the absence of a central bank, Morgan had for decades been acting as the country’s unofficial lender of last resort, gathering reserves and supplying capital to the markets in periods of crisis. For two harrowing weeks in 1907, with the whole world watching, he operated like a general, deploying three young lieutenants to do leg work and supply him with information, and bringing two other leading bankers, James Stillman of National City Bank and George Baker of the First National Bank, into a senior “trio” to make executive decisions. (First National and National City eventually combined to form what is now Citigroup — are the shades of Baker and Stillman writhing over what has become of their descendant institution?) The Morgan teams ran “stress tests” on the unregulated trust companies, figuring out which were impossibly overleveraged and should be allowed to fail, and which were basically sound but crippled by the panic. Once they had determined that a trust was essentially healthy, the bankers supplied it with cash, matching their loans dollar-for-dollar with the trust’s collateral assets. When the New York Stock Exchange nearly closed early one day in October 1907 because financial institutions calling in loans were choking off the market’s money supply, Morgan summoned the presidents of New York’s major commercial banks to his office and came up with $24 million to lend to the exchange. Next, New York City ran out of cash to meet its payroll and interest obligations; Morgan and company conjured up a $30 million loan and prevented default. At the end of Week 1, President Roosevelt sent a letter to the press congratulating the “substantial businessmen who in this crisis have acted with such wisdom and public spirit.” Shipments of gold were on the way from London to New York, and confidence had returned to the French Bourse, “owing,” reported one paper, “to the belief that the strong men in American finance would succeed in their efforts to check the spirit of the panic.” During a panic, confidence is almost as good as gold. At the end of Week 2, Morgan called 50 presidents of trust companies to his private library on East 36th Street, locked the doors, and did not let them out until they had signed on to a final $25 million loan. The scholar of Renaissance art Bernard Berenson told his patron Isabella Stewart Gardner that “Morgan should be represented as buttressing up the tottering fabric of finance the way Giotto painted St. Francis holding up the falling church with his shoulder.” Though Morgan had a large sense of public duty, he had not shouldered the falling church out of pure altruism. His self-interest operated on a national scale. His clients — many of them Europeans who had invested for decades in the emerging American economy through the House of Morgan — had billions of dollars committed in the United States. In watching over their long-term interests, trying to control the excesses of the business cycle and maintain the value of the dollar, Morgan had come to serve as guardian of American credit in international markets. His power in 1907 derived not from the size of his own fortune but from the trust placed in him by investors, other bankers and international statesman. After Morgan died in 1913, the newspapers reported his net worth as about $80 million — roughly $1.7 billion in today’s dollars. John D. Rockefeller, already worth a billion in 1913 dollars, is said to have read the figure, shaken his head, and remarked, “And to think he wasn’t even a rich man.” Trust in Morgan was by no means universal. In 1907, some of his critics charged that he had started the panic in order to scoop up assets at fire-sale prices and line his own pockets. In fact, the Morgan banks lost $21 million that year. The difficulty today of assigning dollar values to “toxic” assets makes Morgan’s job look easy. Yet though the amount of money required for the 1907 bailouts is pocket change compared to the current trillions, at the time, the troubles and the numbers seemed enormous. No single figure, much less a private banker, could wield the kind of power in today’s gargantuan collapsing markets that Morgan had a hundred years ago. And so far, not even the combined official powers of the Fed and Treasury have been able to stop the cascading disasters. Paul Volcker, the former Federal Reserve chairman, said recently that he couldn’t remember a time “maybe even in the Great Depression, when things went down quite so fast, quite so uniformly around the world.” Perhaps new economic leadership will emerge during this crisis, under our gifted, charismatic president. It seems likely to consist of people who have the kind of experience, judgment and authority Morgan had — possibly a new “trio” made up of the current Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke; Paul Volcker; and Warren Buffett. Only Mr. Bernanke is formally in a position to exercise that high authority now, which he is doing — he announced last week that the Fed would inject an extra $1 trillion into the financial system. Mr. Volcker, chairman of the White House Economic Recovery Advisory Board, could easily be promoted to a more dominant role. Mr. Buffett has already stepped up in public, praising the steps the Fed took last fall to insure money markets and commercial paper as “vital in keeping the place going” (if the Fed hadn’t acted, Mr. Buffett told his CNBC interviewer, “we’d be meeting at McDonald’s this morning”). Moreover, Mr. Buffett said he could “guarantee” that in five years or so “our great economic machine” will be running a lot faster than it is now, with the government playing an enormous role in how quickly it recovers. Last fall he declared that we had just been through an “economic Pearl Harbor.” Last week he said that in order to fight this economic war the country has to unite behind President Obama, the government has to deliver “very, very” clear messages and we all have to focus on three jobs: Job 1: win the economic war. Job 2: win the economic war. Job 3: win the economic war. Just what Morgan would have said. Jean Strouse is the author of “Morgan: American Financier” and the director of the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at The New York Public Library. http://gothamist.com/2009/03/06/dave_smith_nypls_librarian_to_the_s.phpDavid Smith has worked at the 42nd and 5th branch of the New York Public Library for 30 years, starting as a clerk and eventually landing at the General Research Division. Before becoming a librarian he was a bookstore clerk, Queens College student, cab driver and under the employ of Sufi Bakery and a butcher shop on Queens Blvd called Joe Salta's Meats. Currently he's a supervising librarian (and a librarian to the stars), but on top of directing New Yorkers to the information they seek, he's also a member of PEN American Center, on the Board of the Accompanied Literary Society, and an advisor to many. He's also a vault of information, and a teller of some fascinating stories. Recently he told us about giving Werner Herzog an insider's tour of the NYPL, about how stacks run all under Bryant Park and about his dear friend Joey Goldstein. When was your first visit to the NYPL? My first visit to the Library at 42nd Street & Fifth Avenue was in 1975. I was living on Third Street between First and Second Avenue and working part time as a clerk for a Doubleday Bookstore, (which enabled me to pay my rent of $135.00.) I used to enjoy reading in the Main Reading Room for a couple of hours before going to work. What is your day-to-day like there now? I administer two rooms for writers, the Wertheim Study and the Frederick Lewis Allen Room. About 230 people are signed up all told; many authors with book contracts, many graduate students and PhD candidates from CUNY and other colleges in the NY area, and several people working on book proposals. I also work the reference desk in the Public Catalog Room 2-3 hours a day where my colleagues and I assist patrons using the Library's catalog, databases and reference works. Prior to working at the library, you drove a cab (amongst other things), can you tell us when that was, and a particularly interesting anecdote from your time behind the wheel? I drove for one month, August 1977; was mugged twice and quit. Between the hack license fees and the robberies, I lost about a hundred dollars. After that I got a job at the Doubleday Bookstore on Wall Street. Much safer. Louis Auchincloss used to come in the store from time to time. You've helped a lot of authors out, is there one whose project you had the most fun with? Gregory Gibson's book Hubert's Freaks; The Rare Book Dealer. The Times Square Talker, and the Lost Photos of Diane Arbus. A true story and an excellent read. The NYPL has a short film of Hubert's Dime Museum which I made arrangements for Greg to see. I invited Greg down to NY from Gloucester, Mass. to attend a preview of the Diane Arbus exhibition "Revelations" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2005. Greg's a rare book dealer, a great writer and a good friend. (Buy his book!) What's been the oddest request you've dealt with? Did WWI fighter pilots use horseflies in their cockpits before pressure gauges were fully functional? (Note: After several inquiries. Answer: It was not an actual process.) What book would you recommend to someone just looking for a good read? The History of Love by Nicole Krauss and Double Down by Frederick and Donald Barthelme. What is your favorite novel? The Human Stain by Philip Roth. (I'm a fan of Roth, Saul Bellow, Nicole Krauss, Nick Tosches, Jonathan Safron Foer, Peter Matthiessen, Richard Ford, Calvin Trillin, Kiran Desai, Charles Willeford, Charles Portis, Donna Tartt, Hari Kunzru, Andrew Sean Greer, Beryl Bainbridge, Nick Antosca, Joseph O'Connor, Colum McCann, Ellen Feldman, Heywood Gould, Jhumpa Lahiri, Vincent Patrick, Jane Schwartz, and more.) Can you tell us any secrets about the NYPL? Are there any interesting hidden rooms not open to the public? There are catwalks above the ceiling in the Main Reading Room that run the full length of the building. Stacks run underneath Bryant Park all the way to Sixth Avenue. Please share your strangest "only in New York" story. Leslie Silbert, author of The Intelligencer, a New York City writer and private investigator, asked if I could find a copy of an article in Burlington Magazine about Caravaggio. Her first book, a mystery, was about Christopher Marlowe, the second in the series is to be about Caravaggio. I found the article for her. A week later, I met a man at the reference desk in Room 315 who notified me that he would only be in New York City for a month, from Malta, on a fellowship at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and he was looking for materials at the Library. I took his information, we traded business cards, and I told him I'd work on having the books he needed ready for him on his next visit to the Library. I discovered he was Dr. Keith Sciberras, a pre-eminent Caravaggio scholar at the University of Malta It turned out that Dr. Sciberras had written the article about Caravaggio that Leslie was looking for. Later, I was able to connect the two and Keith eventually invited her to Malta to further her research. (I call this 'reference work through networking' and it's been very effective over the years for many authors.) Which New Yorker do you most admire? The Late, great, Joey Goldstein, a dear friend who just passed away February 12. Eighty-one years young, Joe was a sports publicist, former journalist, who knew everyone, (journalists, publicists, athletes, historians, scholars), and referred to himself, correctly, as a practitioner who enlightens the American populace and brings joy to the world. Joe was kind enough to invite me to lunch at the Carnegie Deli on several occasions where I had the honor of meeting Ira Berkow, Dave Anderson, Al Silverman, Marty Appel, Rob Fleder (and Marilyn Johnson, through Rob), and Jeremy Schaap, among many others. The first time I met Joe was in 2004 at the Library's reference desk when he was doing some research about the boxer James Braddock for Jeremy Schaap's book Cinderella Man. I mentioned that I knew someone writing a book about Joe Louis and Max Schmeling and Joe immediately said "David Margolick! When is he going to finish writing that book!" Given the opportunity, how would you change New York? I'd bring back rent control so people who work in the city could afford to live here. (I know it's a lost cause.) Under what circumstance have you thought about leaving New York? No circumstance whatsoever. New York's my home and I love it here. As a "Librarian to the Stars,” do you have a favorite New York celebrity sighting or encounter? The handle is only a novelty. (My author friend Christine Whelan gave me some business cards with that printed them.) The majority of people I assist are people who come in off the street who I help at the reference desk. High school students doing term papers, homeless people looking for city shelters, college undergraduates working on research projects, people looking for general information. Many of the authors I help are 'everyday people' with families and day jobs as well. I consider all the authors and scholars I help as 'Stars'. I'm proud and honored to be able to help them use this wonderful library. They work hard over years to research, write, publish, and promote their books and I admire them all very much. Here are some celebrities I've helped briefly over the years: George Carlin came up to the reference desk one day when he was researching "Carlin, Sometimes a Little Brain Damage Can Help". I helped him find a 1946 edition of Ripley's Believe it Or Not. Tony Randall strolled in, Felix Unger in person, in 1995 and asked me for information about Tomasso Salvini's friendship and correspondence with Emma Goldman. (The most difficult question I've ever had. I lucked out and found an online reference to Salvini's friendship with Emma Lazarus, which was what he was looking for.) Mr. Randall comped me to a pair of tickets to the Sunshine Boys, which my wife Debbi and I enjoyed. I later learned in Mr. Randall's obit that he named his son Jefferson Salvini Randall. I had the pleasure of giving a library 'insider's' tour to Werner Herzog and his wife Lena and son Simon. Sandra Bullock and Douglas McGrath were in the library researching Truman Capote's papers for the movie Infamous. I gave them both my card in case they needed further library assistance but didn't hear back. Prominent authors I've helped include Robert Hughes, Edna O'Brien, Nuala O'Faolain, Colum McCann, Sean Wilentz, Roy Blount, Jr., Peter Carey. I had the honor of helping David Halberstam several months before he passed away. He gave me an acknowledgment in his last book, The Coldest War. A very gracious man. What's your current soundtrack? Tom Waits "Step Right Up" Best book store (past/present) in the city. Present: Strand & Skyline Books. Past: Coliseum. My son Aaron worked at Coliseum books. He's in living in Rochester now. Both Coliseum locations are now ATM machines. A shame. Best cheap eat in the city. Mike Edison, author of I Have Fun Everywhere I Go turned me on to Eisenberg's Sandwich Shop. I discovered B&H Dairy back in 1973 when I lived on east Third Street. (Yes, I remember Dave, the counterman, who pulled a fast one on me.) Dave: "My mother in law's in the hospital." Me: "Sorry to hear it." Dave: "Yeah, she sat on a jelly donut and got her ass in the jam." http://gothamist.com/2009/03/06/dave_smith_nypls_librarian_to_the_s.phpFri, 06 Mar 2009 14:48:41 GMThttp://blogs.wnyc.org/culture/2009/02/27/talk-to-me-shepard-fairey-at-the-nypl/By WNYC Culture | Fri, Feb 27, 2009 Art and Design, Events, Feature, Lecture Podcast Last night the NYPL and Wired presented a discussion about making art and commerce work together. It posed the question: What is the future for art and ideas in an age when practically anything can be copied, pasted, downloaded, sampled, and re-imagined? … you know, like how you’ll use or be inspired by this lecture that that we’ve made it available for streaming, or how street artist Shepard Fairey’s iconic Obama portrait was inspired by an AP photo he saw. He was there actually - Shepard Fairey - with cultural historian Steven Johnson and Creative Commons founder Lawrence Lessig. http://blogs.wnyc.org/culture/2009/02/27/talk-to-me-shepard-fairey-at-the-nypl/Wed, 04 Mar 2009 16:08:44 GMThttp://papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/steal-this-blog-post/February 27, 2009, 2:17 pm Steal This Blog Post! By Jennifer Schuessler Photo by The New York Public Library; photo illustration by obamicon.meThe hot ticket in New York last night was a panel discussion at the New York Public Library between Lawrence Lessig and the artist Shepard Fairey. Who, you ask? Lessig, a Stanford law professor and the author of “Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy,” is a rock star to anyone who celebrates Americans’ inalienable right to post mashups of “Starsky and Hutch” on YouTube. Fairey, the creator of the famous Obama “Hope” poster, is now pretty much just a rock star. Their conversation was moderated by Steven Johnson, the tech-savvy author who is, according his introduction last night, “the 35th most popular man on Twitter.” The event felt a little like Burning Man for the so-called Copy Left, with body art to match. Shortly before the talking started, two big guys with big cameras ushered a woman with a cool shoulder tattoo of Fairey’s Obama poster out of her seat. Enforcers from the Associated Press, which is suing Fairey over alleged copyright infringement, perhaps? Lessig began with a witty PowerPoint presentation, effectively a stump speech for the party of free culture. In one powerfully persuasive sequence, he demonstrated how the history of Western art can be seen as a series of knockoffs and mashups. He showed a hilarious video of George W. Bush and Tony Blair singing “Endless Love.” He also referred to people who support our current oppressive copyright regime as “good Germans,” but let’s be nice and ignore that. Fairey’s Obama poster, Lessig said, was an “authentic grassroots” gesture, in keeping both with centuries of artistic practice and with Obama’s message of bottom-up democracy. As part of Fairey’s defense in the A.P. case, Lessig’s Fair Use Project is using crowdsourcing to track down photographs that show Obama with a similar expression. As Fairey discussed his own work, there seemed to be general agreement in the room that The Associated Press was acting like Big Brother — or worse, the record industry — by suing him for unauthorized use of Mannie Garcia’s photograph. And I would agree that Fairey, with the help of the millions of people who forwarded, reproduced and made their own spoofs of the Obama poster, took a fairly mundane background image and turned it into a powerful and complex new work. Whatever the legal arguments, the A.P.’s suit certainly seems like boneheaded P.R. When Johnson asked Fairey where he drew the line on reuse of his work, he replied, “I believe in intellectual property,” but said he makes case-by-case decisions about his own. “I have people who look out for my interests, but I often disregard their advice,” he said, apparently referring to lawyers. For the most part, he said, he only goes after “straight bootlegging” by those out to make money. “One guy bragged about buying a Mercedes” with proceeds from a ripoff of the Obama poster, he said. But, he asked, what if the A.C.L.U. — one of the charities to which he has donated proceeds from his work — “needs a new Mercedes?” (In a case Fairey did not mention, his lawyers issued a cease-and-desist order to a graphic designer named Baxter Orr, who created and sold a version of Fairey’s famous Andre the Giant “Obey” image, to which he had added a respiratory mask and the word “Protect.”) It wasn’t clear from the discussion, however, why the A.P. shouldn’t be able to make similar decisions about the use of Garcia’s photograph. This question seems especially important (self-interest alert!) as news organizations struggle to survive in the era of free content. As a freelance journalist I know recently put it, “Information wants to be free, but my writing wants to cost money.” http://papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/steal-this-blog-post/Fri, 27 Feb 2009 22:16:27 GMThttp://www.myfoxatlanta.com/dpp/news/dpgo_Libraries_See_Upswing_In_Recession2197948Last Edited: Saturday, 21 Feb 2009, 6:31 PM EST Created On: Saturday, 21 Feb 2009, 6:28 PM EST By ANTHONY BARTKEWICZ, MyFox National NEW YORK - As more and more people look for ways to weather the tough economic storm, some are finding relief is as close as their local library. Paul LeClerc, president of the New York Public Library, said he started noticing a large increase in library attendance when the stock market went into its steep decline. And that attendance has continued to build. "We've got more people visiting us now than we've had in half a century," he said. New York library customer Elle Byram said she's trying to avoid coffee shops where she'll end up spending money. She said the library "is spacious, it has free internet access. You meet cool people, but it's not really supposed to be a social place." "What the down economy is doing is reminding people that these libraries are there for them," LeClerc said. "Lots of folks have been going around, I think naively in the past, saying 'do we still need libraries?' Well the proof in the pudding is now 'yes.' Libraries are as essential, if not more essential, now than they have been in the last fifty years." http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/dpp/news/dpgo_Libraries_See_Upswing_In_Recession2197948Wed, 04 Mar 2009 16:02:55 GMThttp://www.foxbusiness.com/story/personal-finance/lifestyle-money/libraries-vogue-economy-sours/Dunstan Prial FOXBusiness Why go to Barnes and Noble to buy that new John Grisham novel when you can take it out of the library for free? Why spend $40 on movie tickets (and another $20 on popcorn and soda), when you can get a classic film at the library for free? More importantly, why sit around in your pajamas lamenting the fact that you got laid off when you could be down at the library taking a computer course or sending out a resume for free? Well, millions of Americans are apparently doing all of the above. “We always see an increase in library usage when the economy or the job market takes a hit. It’s fact of library life,” said Sandra Fernandez, manager of public relations for the Houston Public Library. All of the usage figures are up in Houston, from circulation (up 7% in fiscal year 2009) to the number of visitors systemwide (up 5%). Houston’s library staff has conducted research showing that the average visitor checks out 2.8 items with an estimated retail value of at least $60. That’s $60 that can go toward groceries or gas or the mortgage. It’s the same story in New York, said Herb Scher, a spokesman for the New York Public Library. Circulation at New York’s libraries has risen to 19.5 million items from 16 million a year ago, he said, and visits to New York’s libraries are up by 13%, or 2 million people. In fact, it’s the same story all across America. “We’re definitely seeing an increase,” said Jennifer Petersen with the American Library Association. While the traditional library services remain in demand -- services such as recreational reading and research materials -- the real growth has been in newer services, primarily those related to computers. Petersen said many people are saving money by canceling their home Internet services and coming to the library, where they can access the Internet for free. And many of those people are using the Internet to look for jobs, she said. One recent study showed that nearly half of all job applications are now taken over the Internet. Unfortunately, not everyone knows how to use the Internet, let alone how to send a resume over it. That’s where the library steps in. “People are coming in and asking for help on job searches and attaching resumes to e-mails -- technical things. A lot of our librarians spend a good portion of their day helping people with activities that people who spend a good portion of their day on the computer take for granted. For many people, attaching a resume on an email is a new activity,” said Houston’s Fernandez. The Houston Public Library offers an array of computer classes to help people find work or further their careers. “We are pleased to offer those services. It’s what we’re here for,” said Fernandez. The ALA’s Peterson said many others are using the library as a free resource to help with their personal finances. Libraries now offer a variety of workshops and seminars covering how to invest in the stock market, plan for retirement, establish a household budget, understand foreclosure, start a small business, and prepare taxes, among other financial topics. To assist in that effort, the ALA and the Financial Industry Regulation Authority’s [FINRA] Foundation have established a grant program called “Smart Investing @ your library.” Under that program, Finra has provided grants to libraries so they can establish programs that help people gain access to and better understand information that will help them make better financial decisions. http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/personal-finance/lifestyle-money/libraries-vogue-economy-sours/Fri, 06 Feb 2009 21:48:28 GMThttp://www.timeout.com/newyork/articles/features/71102/who-knows-more-new-york-librarians-or-the-pintchik-oracleTime Out New York / Issue 696 : Jan 29–Feb 4, 2009 New York answers Who knows more: New York librarians or the Pintchik Oracle? By Kate Lowenstein A battle between the NYPL librarians and the Pintchik Oracle*, as posed by TONY trivia master Noah Tarnow. Question 1: What percentage of outer-borough residents have never set foot in Manhattan? NYPL: While we find limited anecdotal reports of residents who rarely visit Manhattan, we can’t find a reliable source (or even an unreliable source) that offers any statistics. Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz’s office replied with, “The real question should be how many Manhattan residents have never set foot in Brooklyn?” Oracle: Being an equal-opportunity oracle, I will not respond to questions whose language discriminates against double amputees. Question 2: What percentage of the world’s languages are spoken in New York City? NYPL: Roughly 2.5 percent are spoken by NYC residents. This can vary greatly depending on whether the United Nations is in session. Oracle: This is a more complicated question than it might at first appear, because (a) there is no definitive tally of world languages; (b) while languages are supposedly “dying” all the time, words and phrases continue to be used in other languages, so where does that leave us?; and (c) I don’t “speak,” although I do use a language, so where does that leave me? Question 3: If every toilet in NYC were flushed at the same time, what would happen? NYPL: We calculate that the mother of all flushes (MoAF) would consume about 12 million gallons of water. Given the sheer size of the water and sewer system, one would hope that the MoAF’s 12 million gallons all at once would not overwhelm the capacity to discharge freshwater or to receive the wastewater. Oracle: All of the shit would disappear at once. Question 4: What’s the single most expensive thing in New York City? NYPL: If by expensive you mean “for sale,” the most expensive thing ever sold in New York (that we were able to find) was Boston Properties’ 2008 $2.9 billion purchase of the GM Building. If by expensive you mean “valuable,” the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s General Public Affairs office confirmed that it has $180 billion in gold bullion (6,000 tons). Oracle: Is the Empire State Building a thing? Presumably. Is Michael Bloomberg a thing? He is, but how would one evaluate his “expensiveness”? His net worth? His ransom, if he were kidnapped? (The Oracle does not condone kidnapping.) And what do you mean by expensive? The one that would, theoretically, cost the most money if sold? But what about priceless things? My answer is breathable air. * - The New York Public Library's Ask NYPL service provides answers by phone (917-ASK-NYPL) and online via chat and e-mail (ask.nypl.org). The Pintchik Oracle answers questions (but only when it feels like it) posed to it through the old pay phone outside Pintchik Hardware (478 Bergen St at Flatbush Ave, Prospect Heights, Brooklyn; 718-783-3333). http://www.timeout.com/newyork/articles/features/71102/who-knows-more-new-york-librarians-or-the-pintchik-oracleWed, 04 Feb 2009 16:37:11 GMThttp://www.ny1.com/content/ny1_living/92959/job-search-events-prove-important-tool-for-many/Default.aspx01/28/2009 10:35 AM Job Search Events Prove Important Tool For Many By: Monica Brown Hundreds of the newly unemployed flocked to Midtown earlier this week for a massive daylong job search event. NY1's Monica Brown filed the following report. Debbie Kaplan, who was laid off three-weeks ago from a non-profit, was one of the many who attended a free daylong job search event Monday hosted by the New York Public Library and Vault.com. "The last hired is usually the first out. So I knew it was coming down," she says. Job-seekers spilled out into the hallway to listen to advice on how to talk to recruiters. They packed the tables at speed-coaching sessions to get any advice they could on how to land that next gig. "Unfortunately, in this climate, I think everyone has to got to think of their different skill sets and perhaps market themselves to different segments of the market," says job-seeker Agnes Melvin. Career coach Bernie Siegel says those seeking jobs should remain energetic and optimistic, which are both attractive to recruiters. And, he suggests being specific about the job you want, while never underestimating the power of networking. "Most jobs aren't publicized. And if you meet enough people, and tell them what it is you're interested in doing, you might know someone who knows of an opening that isn't a publicized opening," says Siegel. Career coaches tell NY1 that it's not just about beefing up your resume and getting an interview. There's a lot more, they say, that has to be done now to get that competitive edge. "The web is a wonderful thing," Siegel says. "If you can identify an industry that you're really interested in, you can go on the web and find people that are in the industry, maybe they wrote an article, maybe they're an executive, and contact them. Ask for 10 minutes of their time, just to talk to them about their industry and their company." Siegel says you should make the initial contact through email, and then set up a time to call. Officials at both Vault.com and the public library say they saw a need for this event, and they're changing the way they do business because job-seekers need them more than ever. "We're in the process of adding a ton of new content related to careers in healthcare, energy, government and education," said Vault.com Chief Executive Officer Erik Sorenson. "These are the hot four areas that in 2009 will open up a lot of career opportunities." The library has added industry-specific databases for job seekers to research. "We're about 30 percent more than we were before January. And I see it," said John Ganly, assistant public director of the New York Public Library. "The last time we had a recession that I remember was 1989-1992, and it was about three years, and I would say this is going to be about equally as long, if not longer." http://www.ny1.com/content/ny1_living/employment/Default.aspxhttp://www.ny1.com/content/ny1_living/92959/job-search-events-prove-important-tool-for-many/Default.aspxWed, 28 Jan 2009 17:05:33 GMThttp://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Looking_for_a_Job__Try_the_Library_New_York.htmlNBC New York: Looking for a Job? Try the Library If you're among those looking for work, you can follow the example of President Barack Obama, who used all the free resources at the Mid-Manhattan Public Library to help him land his first job. Look where it got him! http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Looking_for_a_Job__Try_the_Library_New_York.htmlhttp://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Looking_for_a_Job__Try_the_Library_New_York.htmlMon, 26 Jan 2009 15:08:55 GMThttp://www.cmarket.com/auction/AuctionHome.action?vhost=tiarasFrom January 1-31, 2009, tiaras decorated by celebrities, authors, and designers such as Julie Andrews, Vera Wang, Tommy Hilfiger, Lauren Conrad, Julianne Moore, Bobbi Brown, Austin Scarlett, Nicole Miller, R.L. Stine, Chris Van Allsburg and Princess Marie-Chantal of Greece, just to name a few, will be auctioned off to celebrate the publication of FOREVER PRINCESS, the tenth and final book in the Princess Diaries series by best-selling author Meg Cabot. All proceeds from the auction will go to benefit essential teen programs at The New York Public Library's 87 branches. You won't want to miss your chance to bid on (and possibly win) a tiara decorated by these creative geniuses, as well as play a part in helping a very worthy cause! The tiara is the iconic symbol of the Princess Diaries books. These tiaras are one-of-a-kind collectors' items that were hand decorated by the celebrities! These tiaras are fragile, which means they're better off being proudly displayed on a shelf, never worn (they'll last longer that way)! As a bonus, each tiara comes with a tag signed by the decorator!http://www.cmarket.com/auction/AuctionHome.action?vhost=tiarasMon, 12 Jan 2009 15:36:54 GMThttp://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/newsThis week in SundayArts News: check out “Curtain Call: Celebrating a Century of Women Designing for Live Performance” at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, The Brooklyn Museum of Art’s Costume Collection makes a move to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet’s winter season begins, Parsons Dance returns to […] http://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/newsWed, 14 Jan 2009 16:00:27 GMThttp://www.timeout.com/newyork/articles/tv-dvd/70271/new-york-public-librarys-flickr-streamTime Out New York / Issue 693 : Jan 8–14, 2009 I’m officially obsessed with… New York Public Library’s Flickr stream The Commons project is Flickr’s ongoing attempt to make publicly held photos more accessible—and to have the nerdstorm of the Internet rain down its knowledge on those pictures, with users adding comments and notes. So far, it’s a big success: The Library of Congress has posted nearly 5,000 photos, and more and more cultural heritage institutions have been joining in. Last month, the New York Public Library got in on the action, posting around 1,300 of its photos (flickr.com/photos/nypl/), and sweet zombie Jesus, it’s fantastic. The 16 sets of photos include images of early modern dance, Egypt, Japan in the late 19th century, cinema from 1912–14 and cyanotypes of British algae, among others, but my favorites are the pictures of New York. The shots from Ellis Island are fascinating but not sentimental. Berenice Abbott’s famous “Changing New York” series perpetually absorbs new meaning. And the library’s documentation of its own history, in a set called “NYPL: Work with Schools,” shows that even in 1910 there were kids as geeky as I am, climbing all over each other to get to more books. The images themselves are of course engrossing, but maybe more interesting is what projects like this say about the future democratization of access. I like knowing I’m not just looking at old-timey photos: I’m also looking at a coming attraction for how people will be sharing information in the years to come. — Margaret Lyons http://www.timeout.com/newyork/articles/tv-dvd/70271/new-york-public-librarys-flickr-streamFri, 09 Jan 2009 14:41:33 GMThttp://www.silive.com/entertainment/recreation/index.ssf/2009/01/wrestling_vet_shares_his_ups_d.htmlby Jodi Lee Reifer Thursday January 08, 2009, 1:00 AM STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Turns out road rage didn't inspire the first Staten Island smackdown. Pro-wrestling was a major draw here in the late 1950s. Grapplers did double-duty at Port Richmond's Weissglass Stadium and Madison Square Garden. All the biggest names dropped bodies at the now-defunct venue: Antonino Rocca, Bruno Sammartino, the Graham Brothers, Haystacks Calhoun and Skull Murphy. By the '60s, Al Samson Vass had stepped into the ring with them as a wrestler for three years, and later as a referee all over New York state. The Great Kills resident's career spanned 31 years with the All-American Wrestling Federation, East Coast Pro Wrestling, Xtreme Professional Wrestling and World Wide Wrestling Federation (later the WWF, and now the WWE). With the Oscar buzz-worthy flick "The Wrestler" in theaters now, Vass and the New York Public Library are tag teaming to exhibit his collection of pro-wrestling posters from the '60s through the '90s at the St. George Library Center, 5 Central Ave., where "The Wrestling Posters of Al Vass" is up through Feb. 28. Vass speaks on "The Ups & Downs of Professional Wrestling" Jan. 10 at 2 p.m. AWE caught up with him for a quick chat before the main event. Q. How is pro-wrestling different today than it was when you got involved? A. When I was in it, there were no storylines. Now the wrestlers' antics are a lot of show-biz type, instead of showing skills and agility. Today, these referees, they have a head piece in their ear and they're told by the producer and the director what to do. When I was in Madison Square Garden, I made the calls. Q. What's the craziest thing you experienced in the ring? A. Bruno Sammartino and George "The Animal" Steele. I had to referee them in Madison Square Garden. They were in the steel cage. To be in with them, it felt like I was being chased by a pitbull. You're in there with two strong guys who are both over 265 pounds. I'm 150 pounds and they're chasing the referees. Sometimes they don't like the decisions I'm making. Q. I realize you haven't seen "The Wrestler" yet. Are you worried about how it reps wrestling? A. From what I understand, it's pretty close to life as to what these guys go through because they do have a tough life. They get paid not too well. They have no benefits. The guys, years ago, they were traveling by car. They would have to wrestle five nights a week just to make a living. And if you got hurt, you had to pay yourself because they had no benefits. Q. Is it any better today? A. Professional wrestlers today have a contract. But even now, [some of] these guys, they work as independent contractors. The injuries are really tough. There are no labor laws for these guys. Q. Your talk is called "The Ups & Downs of Professional Wrestling." You've discussed the downs. What are the ups? A. It's a great feeling to walk into the arena and have people cheer you. Or maybe if you're a bad guy, for people to boo you. The good guy, in the wrestling dressing room, they call him the "baby face." And the bad guy, they call him the "heel." Sometimes the baby face wins and sometimes the heel wins. But first of all, you've got to be a good shape. I was a body builder when I wrestled. It's good for your physical health and also you have a lot of enjoyment when you entertain people.http://www.silive.com/entertainment/recreation/index.ssf/2009/01/wrestling_vet_shares_his_ups_d.htmlFri, 09 Jan 2009 14:37:04 GMThttp://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/08/ask-about-the-new-york-public-library/#more-5231December 8, 2008, 6:32 am Ask About the New York Public Library By The New York Times Paul LeClerc. (Photo: Richard Corman)This week, Paul LeClerc, the head of the New York Public Library, will be answering selected readers’ questions about the library, its services and its future in an era of changing information needs. Submit questions online; the first set of answers will appear in a new blog post on Wednesday. Dr. LeClerc is president and chief executive of the New York Public Library, which is broadly recognized as one of the pre-eminent ones in the world. He oversees a system of 87 branch libraries in Manhattan and the Bronx and on Staten Island (Queens and Brooklyn have separate library systems) and four major research libraries with collections numbering about 55 million items. The library estimates that it is used by 17 million patrons who come through its doors annually and 26 million additional users worldwide who make use of its collections and services through its Web site. Dr. LeClerc was raised in Queens, where he attended parochial schools. He graduated from Holy Cross High School in Flushing in 1963 and spent the next year studying at the Sorbonne. He completed a Ph.D. in French literature with distinction at Columbia University, writing a dissertation on Voltaire. Dr. LeClerc had a distinguished academic career, teaching at Union College from 1966 to 1979; in the administration of the City University of New York, where he served successively as university dean for academic affairs and acting vice chancellor for academic affairs; and as provost and vice president for academic affairs of Baruch College. In 1988, he was appointed president of Hunter College. He became president of the library in December 1993. Under his guidance and with the support of its board, the library has by all accounts increased its standing as a leader in the field of information collection and distribution. These include: forming alliances with major libraries internationally; digitizing collections and creating a robust online site that serves readers from 200 countries; acquiring prestigious new research collections and gaining new public financing for branch library collections; systematically renovating the library’s historic buildings; creating a new Center for Scholars and Writers; and developing plans for a transformation of the library system that will prepare it for its next generation of service. Dr. LeClerc is the author or co-editor of five scholarly volumes on writers of the French Enlightenment, and his contributions to French culture earned him membership in the French Legion of Honor (Chevalier) in 1996. He has honorary doctorates from the University of Paris III-La Nouvelle Sorbonne and Oxford, among others. Dr. LeClerc is currently a trustee of the library, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Carroll and Milton Petrie Foundation, and the J. Paul Getty Trust. President Bill Clinton appointed him to the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities, and he is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a director of the American Academy in Rome and the American Philosophical Society. http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/08/ask-about-the-new-york-public-library/#more-5231Tue, 09 Dec 2008 15:57:18 GMThttp://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/03/nyregion/03library.html?_r=1&emBy GLENN COLLINS The New York Times Published: December 2, 2008 A day after the official declaration of a national recession, visitors journeyed to the New York Public Library from Atlanta, Palm Beach, Fla., White Plains and Queens to see a $126,000 coffee-table book that is actually the size of a coffee table. “We have to catch a plane to Florida in half an hour, but we wanted to see the most beautiful book in the world,” said Betty Katarain Rosado, an interior designer from Palm Beach who stood in the cold for 20 minutes waiting for the library to open with her husband, Gilbert, an engineer. They had time for just a glimpse of The Book at its first public viewing in the United States. O.K.: it’s more than a coffee-table book. The rare, 61-pound book, made recently by hand, was toiled over by scholars, artists and artisans. Called “Michelangelo: La Dotta Mano” (“Michelangelo: The Learned Hand”), the book, an Italian language celebration of his work, cost 100,000 euros (about $126,864) to make in Italy and was donated on Monday to the library, where it will be on view through Monday. The Rosados oohed and aahed and snapped each other’s photographs with the book when they finally saw it displayed behind Lucite on the western side of the Bill Blass Catalog Room on the third floor. “You’d need your life savings to buy it,” Mr. Rosado said, before racing to La Guardia Airport. Not to be too decadent about it, the cover of the 264-page book — which took months to print and construct employing Renaissance skills — is adorned with a bas-relief depiction of Michelangelo’s “Madonna of the Steps,” sculptured on a piece of white marble from one of the Polvaccio quarries in Carrara, Italy, that supplied stone for the master’s statues. Its positively sybaritic binding is swathed in red velvet from the same Italian workshop that supplied stage curtains to the Metropolitan Opera and La Scala in Milan. And the book’s photographs and plates of drawings and images of the Sistine Chapel are printed on luxurious paper of pure cotton produced in Italy. The creation of the book is “a provocation in the age of the Internet,” said Marilena Ferrari, president of FMR, a fine-art publishing house in Italy. “It is important to reaffirm that books are not disappearing.” She also heads the company’s charitable foundation, which donated the book to the library. Though not the most expensive book ever made — some high-end books have been adorned with precious metals or gemstones — it is “special for its rarity,” said Paul LeClerc, president of the library. So far, only 33 copies of a planned limited edition of 99 have been made; Ms. Ferrari said 20 had been sold. Dr. LeClerc added: “It is one of the single greatest books made in the last 100 years. There is nothing else at this level.” Joan Block, a retired credit-collection manager who traveled from Queens to see the book, gave it a thumbs up, but added, “I guess the price is pretty high in a recession.” She studied it some more. “But for Michelangelo, maybe that’s not a lot.” Can the cost of the book be justified? “Such a beautiful book has relevance in a time of economic hardship,” said Ms. Ferrari, a businesswoman who is not related to the automobile family. “In no way can I change the world, but I can send a message of beauty — because, fundamentally, this is a message of hope. Mankind can create beauty, and that must be remembered.” The donation is the first in the United States; copies were given to the Prado Museum in Madrid and the City Council of Bologna earlier this year. Next week, the book will reside in the library’s rare book division, “where it will join the first copy of the Gutenberg Bible brought to the Americas,” said Michael Inman, the library’s curator of rare books. But not all the visitors were ecstatic. “I’m a little disappointed,” said Muriel Dolinsky, who described herself as a housewife from White Plains, who had traveled with her neighbor, Sandy Meyers, a geriatric social worker, to see the book. “I’d hoped we could see it opened up,” Ms. Dolinsky said. Sealed in its plastic case, though, she could observe the book’s dimensions — 28 inches tall, 18 inches wide and 3 inches thick — up close, Ms. Ferrari said, to the multiples within the sequence of the so-called Golden Ratio, which long represented the universal law of harmony in classical architecture, sculpture and painting. Indeed, to Dr. LeClerc, the work has “symbolic significance, because it reminds us in a dramatic way of the importance of the book in shaping Western culture. It is how enlightenment was disseminated until the advent of the Internet.” http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/03/nyregion/03library.html?_r=1&emWed, 03 Dec 2008 13:59:28 GMThttp://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/02/morrisania-library-celebrates-centennial/New York Times By Sewell Chan At a daylong celebration today, the New York Public Library is observing the centennial of its Morrisania branch in the South Bronx, which opened in 1908 with financing from Andrew Carnegie. The library, at 610 East 169th Street, sits on what was once farmland owned by Jonas Bronck, for whom the borough is named. The library is now one of 87 in the New York Public Library system, which encompasses the Bronx, Manhattan and Staten Island. (Queens and Brooklyn have separate systems.) The library received a two-year renovation, completed in 1997, and has served as a symbol of the rebirth of the South Bronx that started in the 1990s, after decades of decay had made the neighborhood the prime example of urban neglect. The Morris High School Campus Band performed when the library reopened in 1997, and it did so again today, along with children from La Peninsula Head Start, a local child-care business. In 1901, Carnegie, the industrialist and steel magnate, gave $5.2 million to the New York Public Library, which was established in 1895 by the consolidation of Astor and Lenox libraries and the Tilden trust. The Morrisania Library, which was designed by the architects Babb, Cook & Willard, is the third in the Bronx to reach the 100-year mark; the Mott Haven branch was the first, and the Tremont branch was the second. The branch has a marble and heavy oak interior, huge arched windows and a grand “imperial” staircase. Numerous elected officials were scheduled to attend the birthday celebration, including Borough President Adolfo Carrión Jr., State Senator Ruth Hassell-Thompson, Assemblyman Michael Benjamin, Councilwoman Helen Diane Foster and leaders from Community Board 3. http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/02/morrisania-library-celebrates-centennial/Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:22:09 GMThttp://www.ny1.com/content/ny1_living/technology/89609/n-y--public-library-shows-rare-treasures-in-online-videos/Default.aspxA new online initiative is aimed at reminding viewers about some of the hidden gems in the archives at the New York Public Library. NY1’s Technology reporter Adam Balkin filed the following report. The New York Public Library is now expanding to Facebook, YouTube and iTunes, by launching a new online video series highlighting rare documents that can only be seen in person. Such documents include handwritten letters by Katherine Hepburn and menus from long-gone restaurants. “What we've amassed over the course of more than 100 years is one of the single greatest repositories of all kinds of materials about the human experience and there are more than 50 million items in these collections,” said N.Y. Public Library President Paul LeClerc. “This shows the sometimes interesting or quirky or fascinating things we have at the library.” Curators of the collections say part of this effort is to remind people there's more to a library than just books. Featured documents, like maps, often times give a more concrete visual than words alone of what life was like in the past. “We have everything from road maps from the 1920s to 2001, to antique atlases bound in vellum hand drawn on handmade paper beautiful materials,” said Alice Hudson, chief of the library’s map division. “So we go from the mundane to the very exotic.” Many of the resources covered have not been posted to the internet. “There's a myth out there that ultimately everything's going to be online. However, that's a myth,” says LeClerc. “Collections are so immense in this library and other great libraries that for a long, long period of time if you want to dig in deeply, you'll have to come to us.” To whet your appetite for such resources, see the new video series at www.nypl.org/news/treasures. The library says, in addition to continuing work with Google on a project to digitize books from libraries all over the globe, it will join many top-notch libraries in putting more collections, exhibits and even lectures online.http://www.ny1.com/content/ny1_living/technology/89609/n-y--public-library-shows-rare-treasures-in-online-videos/Default.aspxMon, 01 Dec 2008 17:00:48 GMThttp://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/28/arts/28wkids.html?_r=1By LAUREL GRAEBER Published: November 27, 2008 The New York Times CHILDREN’S CENTER, NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY Patience and Fortitude, the serenely majestic lions who serve as sentinels at the New York Public Library, have recently acquired a host of animal neighbors. Residing inside the building, they include a fox with a luxurious tail, a brilliant blue bull, a cocoa-colored bear and an aardvark wearing glasses. On Saturday owls, hawks and falcons will join the mix. The menagerie is among the draws at the new Children’s Center, a literary oasis for ages 12 and under that will hold opening festivities on Friday and Saturday. This is the first time since 1970 that the main library has had circulating children’s books. While no new construction was done in this ground-floor space, which used to house the relocated Dorot Jewish Division, the area has shed its drab, institutional skin, acquiring a coat of many colors: murals of urban and exotic scenes by Susy Pilgrim Waters; beanbag cushions in Day-Glo tones; and a bright programming space presided over by a huge cutout Cat in the Hat. “We have the largest children’s collection in the library system,” said Elizabeth Bird, senior children’s librarian, noting that it includes CDs, DVDs, video games and even records. “A lot of people still want to hear an old Pete Seeger kids’ album that was never transferred” to CD, she said. At the other end of the technological spectrum, the center has eight computers and a Wii and a Sony PlayStation for monthly video-game nights. “It’s another way of getting kids into the library,” Ms. Bird explained, adding that when library branches held such events for teenagers, “circulation went up.” And the animals? They’re largely stuffed toys, but the birds will be real: the celebration includes, on Saturday at 11:30 a.m., raptors from the New Canaan Nature Center. On Friday the author and illustrator Chris Raschka will appear (11:30 a.m.), and the Talking Hands Theater and Vital Children’s Theater will perform (1:30 and 3:30 p.m.). Saturday offers Central Park Zoo Wildlife Theater (1:30 p.m.) and intriguing experiments in “The Mad Science Holiday Spectacular” (3:30 p.m.). And, of course, there’s always the year-round entertainment: about 25,000 books. (Room 84, Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street, 212-621-0208, nypl.org; free.) LAUREL GRAEBER http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/28/arts/28wkids.html?_r=1Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:38:37 GMThttp://www.usatoday.com/tech/webguide/2008-11-11-new-york-public-library-video_N.htmBy Anne Godlasky, USA TODAY The New York Public Library quietly rolled out a new video series last month. Titled "Treasures," it showcases 11 gems of the library's vast collection of more than 50 million items. And since then it has joined Facebook, broadening an online reach that already included YouTube and iTunes pages to gain more of an audience — which, for one of the world's largest public libraries, includes "everybody from preschool toddlers to the greatest writers in the world," says president Paul LeClerc. Curators and administrators whittled a list of hundreds of ideas to record videos of the most "visually grabbing," says director David Ferriero. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/webguide/2008-11-11-new-york-public-library-video_N.htmWed, 12 Nov 2008 14:38:00 GMThttp://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2008/11/10/2008-11-10_throw_the_bums_out_board_of_elections_bo.html?page=1I got my job through ... ... the New York Public Library. That might well be the slogan of an ad campaign suited to an era when unemployment is rising and the U.S. is shedding hundreds of thousands of jobs a month. As a reminder that local libraries offer extensive job-search resources, here's how Barack Obama found his community organizing job in Chicago after he graduated from Columbia University. In 2005, he told American Libraries magazine: "People always mention libraries in terms of just being sources for reading material or research. But I probably would not be in Chicago were it not for the Manhattan public library, because I was looking for an organizing job and was having great trouble finding a job as a community organizer in New York. "The Mid-Manhattan Library had these books of lists of organizations, and the librarian helped me find these lists of organizations, and I wrote to every organization. One of them wound up being an organization in Chicago that I got a job with." The help is still there, and in even greater sophistication. Check it out. http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2008/11/10/2008-11-10_throw_the_bums_out_board_of_elections_bo.html?page=1http://broadwayworld.com/article/Photo_Coverage_NYPL_Library_Lions_Benefit_Honoring_Albee_Ephron_Bryan_and_Rushdie_20010101The New York Public Library honored playwright Edward Albee, children's author and illustrator Ashley Bryan, screenwriter and essayist Nora Ephron, and novelist Salman Rushdie at its annual Library Lions black-tie benefit on Monday, November 3, 2008, at the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street. Master of Ceremonies for the evening's program was be Nobel Laureate and Library Trustee Toni Morrison. The evening also featured a disco dance party hosted by the Young Lions, a membership group of New Yorkers in their 20s and 30s who support the work of the Library. "The individuals we are honoring this year embody the highest level of accomplishment in their respective fields. Their achievements encompass a variety of rich forms of creative expression that the Library preserves and makes accessible in its collections," said Library President Paul LeClerc. "We are proud to recognize them as Library Lions for their groundbreaking artistry and for their noble commitment to a life of ideas, inventiveness, exploration, and thought." The event's co-chairs were Mr. and Mrs. Oscar de la Renta; H.R.H. Princess Firyal and Mr. Lionel I. Pincus; Mr. and Mrs. Richard S. Fuld, Jr.; Mr. and Mrs. John B. Hess; Mr. and Mrs. Felix Rohatyn; Mr. and Mrs. Stephen A. Schwarzman; and The Honorable Merryl H. Tisch and Mr. James S. Tisch. The Young Lions dance co-chairs are Mr. Nicholas T. Brown, Ms. Claire Danes, Ms. Amanda Hearst, Mr. Michael Hess, Mr. Hudson Morgan, and Ms. Andrea L. Olshan. "The Library Lions benefit is our most important fundraiser of the year," said Catherine C. Marron, Chairman of the Library. "With the help of a group of dedicated co-chairs we are able to highlight the accomplishments of the Library and generate crucial support for our collections and operations." For more information please visit www.nypl.orghttp://broadwayworld.com/article/Photo_Coverage_NYPL_Library_Lions_Benefit_Honoring_Albee_Ephron_Bryan_and_Rushdie_20010101Wed, 05 Nov 2008 14:50:35 GMThttp://www.vanityfair.com/online/style/2008/11/party-animals-take-over-the-library.htmlThe economy may be tanking, but New York City’s fall gala season is in full swing, as patrons of the arts continue to open up their pocketbooks to attend events at Gotham’s venerable institutions, such as the Met, the Whitney, and Lincoln Center. Last night, the Young Lions, the junior arm of the New York Public Library’s fund-raising efforts, held its yearly fête in conjunction with the Library Lions Gala, whose guests (Barbara Walters, Oscar de la Renta, and Ivanka Trump, among others) honored Edward Albee, Ashley Bryan, Nora Ephron, and Salman Rushdie. At the disco party, which took place inside the white-marble entranceway facing Fifth Avenue, it was hard to miss one particular big cat on the dance floor: Stephen Schwarzman. The Blackstone chief put aside stock-price woes for a moment and, amid pulsating strains of funk’s most memorable anthems, enjoyed some sweet moves with his wife, who was frosted in diamonds. It appeared as if a $100 million contribution can make even one of the grandest buildings in Manhattan feel like one’s personal castle. Schwarzman wasn’t the only one letting loose. Bohemian girl-about-town Arden Wohl flitted about in a retro schoolgirl frock, blowing out tea lights before making an early escorted exit. Fashion editor Stephanie LaCava showed off an avant-garde L.B.D. and super-high heels, while New York Times best-selling author (and one of the Young Lions’ own) Marisha Pessl made her way through the crowd. VF Daily was pleased to spot Dan Abrams, the former MSNBC host who was recently replaced on the roster by Rachel Maddow. But the night wasn’t just about resurrecting one’s inner groove. The Young Lions raises capital that helps contribute to the vitality of the library. With any luck, the event went a long way toward bringing in essential funds without disco-ing out the party animals who need to make it to the polls today.http://www.vanityfair.com/online/style/2008/11/party-animals-take-over-the-library.htmlWed, 05 Nov 2008 14:45:58 GMThttp://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/11/salman_rushdie_graphic_novelis.html"I'm a world expert on superhero comics," Salman Rushdie told us last night at the New York Public Library's Library Lions benefit, where he was among the honorees. "I think maybe only Michael Chabon knows more than me." The Satanic Verses author owns oil paintings of Spider-Man and Wolverine, signed by Stan Lee. Also, he collected comic books as a kid, but, sadly, his father threw them away. "They’d be worth so much money now if he hadn’t done that. You know, 1950s and sixties Dell Comics, and Marvel; it would be worth a fortune,” he said. And while he hasn’t yet written a superhero into one of his novels, Rushdie's actually considering writing a comic book. "Just recently I’ve been approached by a couple of publishers of what are now called graphic novels to say, would I like to do one. And, I mean, I haven’t said yes. But I am quite interested." He added that Doris Lessing told him she’d had a great time writing a graphic novel and recommended it highly. Rushdie wouldn’t say which publisher had made the offer, or which artist might do the drawings. "We haven’t got that far yet. Literally, I just got the letter a couple of weeks ago," he said. "So we’ll see."http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/11/salman_rushdie_graphic_novelis.htmlWed, 05 Nov 2008 14:49:06 GMThttp://guestofaguest.com/nyc-events/2008-library-lions-roar-at-nyc-public-library/The New York Public Library’s Young Lions Disco Party took place last night at Library Lions and was a total blowout success with over 650 tickets sold. The dancing, dessert, and drinks began at 9:00, and the Literary Lion made quite a hit on the dance floor well into the early morning. Around 11pm, the music switched from the Bee Gees and other disco favorites to a club centric play list whereby guests started to get down. The copious amount of drinks, dancing, and beautiful attendees made it quite the night in the Big Apple. The Young Lions Dance Chairmen include Nicholas T. Brown, Claire Danes, Amanda Hearst, Michael Hess, Hudson Morgan, and Andrea L. Olshan.http://guestofaguest.com/nyc-events/2008-library-lions-roar-at-nyc-public-library/Wed, 05 Nov 2008 14:51:36 GMThttp://www.timeout.com/newyork/articles/books/68270/the-cheapest-bookstoreIt’s called the library, geniuses. Here’s how it will save you money—and more. By Michael Miller, Time Out New York While we would never recommend that you stop buying books, the economic downturn will surely cause some readers to think twice before shelling out $25 or more every time they want to pick up a new hardcover. Especially when you can get them for free at the literary gold mine known as the New York Public Library. With more than 52 million items (books, DVDs, CDs) available in Manhattan (41 branches), the Bronx (35) and Staten Island (12), the NYPL makes your local bookstore look like a veritable grain of sand on the beach. They have great author events (NYPL Live, soon to welcome Joan Didion), nerdy exhibitions (a new one is devoted to the artists colony Yaddo), places to sit, computers and, for laptop luggers, powerful Wi-Fi. Any city resident can sign up for a card at nypl.org. According to David Ferriero, the Andrew W. Mellon director of the NYPL, more people are starting to use the library; here are some reasons why.http://www.timeout.com/newyork/articles/books/68270/the-cheapest-bookstorehttp://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/arts/design/23ouro.html?_r=1&scp=3&sq=the%20new%20york%20public%20Library&st=cse&oref=sloginNew York Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff has given his ringing endorsement: “There is no project today that is more important to the civic identity of New York—or to reasserting a populist ideal that has been dormant for too long.” http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/arts/design/23ouro.html?_r=1&scp=3&sq=the%20new%20york%20public%20Library&st=cse&oref=sloginTue, 28 Oct 2008 15:47:19 GMThttp://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/arts/design/23libr.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=the%20new%20york%20public%20Library&st=cse&oref=slogin&oref=sloginThe New York Times writes: "Norman Foster, the eminent British architect who has made something of a specialty out of inserting contemporary designs into historic buildings, has been selected for a major renovation of the New York Public Library’s landmark 1911 main building, on Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets."http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/arts/design/23libr.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=the%20new%20york%20public%20Library&st=cse&oref=slogin&oref=sloginTue, 28 Oct 2008 15:38:59 GMThttp://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=175The New York Public Library explores the far-ranging influence of Yaddo, and opens a window onto some of the most significant events in twentieth-century life as experienced by its artists, in this richly detailed multimedia exhibition. The free exhibition is on view from October 24, 2008 to February 15, 2009 in the D. Samuel and Jeane H. Gottesman Exhibition Hall (First Floor) of the Humanities and Social Sciences Library at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street. Sociologist and cultural critic Micki McGee, Fordham University, has served as the Spencer Trask & Co. Curator for Yaddo: Making American Culture. http://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=175Tue, 28 Oct 2008 15:51:34 GMThttp://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=176A New York Public Library exhibition explores the rich history, legacy and influences behind Art Deco, a style which visually captured the fascinating decades of the 1920s and 1930s and signaled the birth of our contemporary concept of modernism. Art Deco Design: Rhythm and Verve will be on view at The New York Public Library’s Humanities and Social Sciences Library at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street from September 12, 2008 to January 11, 2009. Admission is free. http://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=176Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:10:40 GMThttp://nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=162The New York Public Library’s ASK NYPL reference service is introducing two enhancements that will improve and expand the service. The Library recently launched 917-ASK-NYPL, a new easier to remember telephone number for Library information and for asking reference questions. In addition, for the first time the ASK NYPL service is now available 24 hours a day, 7 days per week. Library users can ask reference questions in Spanish and English and seek help at anytime through online chat via the Library’s website at www.nypl.org. http://nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=162Tue, 09 Sep 2008 15:39:28 GMThttp://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/12/arts/design/12doug.html?_r=2&ref=arts&oref=slogin&oref=sloginThe New York Times reviews Aaron Douglas: African American Modernest, a new exhibition that just opened at The New York Public Library's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Aaron Douglas (1899–1979) was considered the foremost visual artist of the Harlem Renaissance. In paintings, murals, and book illustrations, he incorporated elements from music, dance, literature, and politics to produce powerful artistic forms that had a lasting impact on American art history and the nation’s cultural heritage. Working from a politicized concept of personal identity, he combined angular Cubist rhythms and seductive Art Deco dynamism with traditional African and African American imagery to develop a radically new visual vocabulary that evoked both current realities and hopes for a better future. Aaron Douglas: African American Modernist, curated by the Spencer Museum of Art/The University of Kansas, is the first nationally touring retrospective to celebrate his art and legacy. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/12/arts/design/12doug.html?_r=2&ref=arts&oref=slogin&oref=sloginMon, 15 Sep 2008 15:15:34 GMThttp://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=109Tony Kushner and Edmund White Help Launch New Support Group for The New York Public Library's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Collections LGBT @ NYPL Announces over $500,000 in Major Corporate Gifts from Time Warner, MAC AIDS Fund, and Estee Lauder and Private Donations at April 3 Kickoff (New York, NY) April 4, 2008 – A new donor support group, LGBT @ NYPL, will help to expand, build, and make accessible The New York Public Library’s extensive Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) collections, one of the few such efforts by a non-LGBT organization. At an inaugural reception last night at the Library, LGBT @ NYPL’s Co-Chairmen Hermes Mallea and Carey Maloney announced it has raised more than $500,000 in corporate and private donations to strengthen LGBT collections across the The New York Public Library’s four research libraries and 87 branches. Mallea and Maloney were joined by Library Chairman Catherine C. Marron and President Paul LeClerc as well as Honorary Chairmen Tony Kushner and Edmund White. (Honorary Chairman Rita Mae Brown was unable to attend.) http://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=109Tue, 08 Apr 2008 17:41:10 GMThttp://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=107The New York Public Library’s Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers announces the selection of its tenth class of Fellows: fifteen exceptional creative writers, independent scholars, and academics, coming to the Library from as near as Brooklyn and as far away as Warsaw. The Fellows, whose appointments were announced today by Library President Dr. Paul LeClerc and Jean Strouse, the Sue Ann and John Weinberg Director of the Center, will use the research collections and online resources of The New York Public Library’s landmark Humanities and Social Sciences Library at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street to pursue a variety of book projects. They will be in residence at the Center from September 2008 through May 2009. http://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=107Tue, 08 Apr 2008 14:09:14 GMThttp://www.nypl.org/press/2007/FacadeRestor.cfmThe New York Public Library Will Restore its Fifth Avenue Building's Historic Facade. Project to be Completed in Time for Building's 2011 Centennial. http://www.nypl.org/press/2007/FacadeRestor.cfmMon, 07 Apr 2008 14:33:22 GMThttp://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=100Five Young Literary Talents Chosen as Finalists for The New York Public Library’s 2008 Young Lions Fiction Award. Winning writer, aged 35 or younger, to be awarded $10,000 prize at April 28, 2008 ceremony hosted by Actor Ethan Hawke. The finalists for The New York Public Library’s 2008 Young Lion Fictions Award are: Ron Currie, Jr., God Is Dead Ellen Litman, The Last Chicken in America Peter Nathaniel Malae, Teach the Free Man Dinaw Mengestu, The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears Emily Mitchell, The Last Summer of the World http://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=100Mon, 07 Apr 2008 14:31:57 GMThttp://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=86A Re-envisioned Library System to Meet the Needs of a Growing, Changing New Yorkhttp://www.nypl.org/press/releases/?article_id=86Thu, 20 Mar 2008 14:46:42 GMT