Category Archives: Langsam Library

Rebecca Olson Joins UC Libraries as Business and Social Sciences Informationist

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Today, Rebecca Olson joined UC Libraries as business and social sciences informationist. Rebecca has many years of experience as a law librarian. She was certified in 2018 in School Media from Southern Connecticut State University.  Prior to beginning her career in libraries, Rebecca received her MLS from Indiana University and her BA from the University of Connecticut.

Rebecca’s main responsibilities will be to develop and deliver innovative research and instructional services to the UC communities in business and the social sciences. She will work collaboratively with business and social science faculty and with UC Libraries faculty and staff to design, develop and implement a suite of cohesive services for faculty and students in business and the social sciences for data access, management and preservation.

Welcome to UC Libraries, Rebecca!

 

 

Hannah Stitzlein Joins UC Libraries as Metadata Librarian

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Today, Hannah Stitzlein began work at the University of Cincinnati Libraries as the metadata librarian. Hannah was previously visiting metadata services specialist for the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In this role, she developed best practices for the Illinois Digital Heritage Hub, taught metadata workshops, assessed digital collection metadata and developed workflows. Prior to her visiting position, Hannah spent three years with the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County. Her library experience also includes internships with Wisconsin Library Services, the Lloyd Library and Museum and the Henry R. Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions. Hannah holds an MLS from the University of Wisconsin, Madison and a BFA from Pacific Northwest College of Art.

In the role of metadata librarian, Hannah will be responsible for providing leadership and guidance in the development and implementation of metadata and data management strategies to support discovery, access, management and preservation of the libraries physical and digital collections.

Welcome back to Cincinnati and to UC, Hannah!

Jelly Beans and Politics

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By:  Alex Temple, Benjamin Gettler Papers Project Archivist

I’m currently working through Benjamin Gettler’s political work, and have just finished the first of six folders on his political correspondence.  So far I’ve identified 150 items, representing approximately 30 years of his work, views, correspondence, and recognition.  Largely, Gettler placed his energy into the Republican party, notably towards the Reagan/Bush campaigns.  His campaign aid for politicians earned him various accolades, such as an honorary address to the House of Representatives from Representative Brad Wenstrup; invitations to Inaugural Balls for Ohio Governor Bob Taft and President Ronald Reagan, and an invitation to visit the White House in 1982.

White House InvitationWhite House Invitation Continue reading →

Most UC Libraries Closed Labor Day, Monday, Sept. 3

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labor dayUC Libraries will be closed Monday, September 3 for Labor Day, except for the Donald C. Harrison Health Sciences Library, which will be open 9am-5pm. This closing includes the Walter C. Langsam Library 4th floor space, which will close Sunday, September 2 at 11pm and re-open Tuesday, September 4 at 7:45am.

A complete listing of library hours can be found online at www.libraries.uc.edu/about/hours.html.

Enjoy the long holiday weekend.

Join UC Libraries for “The Great American Read” and Vote for Your Favorite Novel

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The Color Purple, Harry Potter, Gone Girl – is one of these your favorite novel? Did you enjoy or struggle reading The Grapes of Wrath, War and Peace or Heart of Darkness when assigned for class? Did you sneak read The Stand or Twilight when your teacher wasn’t looking? These favorite, or not-so-favorite, books are amongst the 100 best-loved novels up for consideration as “The Great American Read.”

The University of Cincinnati Libraries and CET are partnering to host three screenings of “The Great American Read,” 8-9 p.m., Tuesdays, Sept. 11 and 25 and Oct. 9 in the Digital Commons Space on the fourth floor of the Walter C. Langsam Library. The PBS series features some of the 100 best-loved novels with testimonials from celebrities, authors, notable Americans and book lovers across the country talking about their pick for “The Great American Read.” Fresh popcorn and refreshments will be served.

The themes of the three screenings will include:

  • Sept. 11 – The Great American Read Fall Kick-Off
    Join host Meredith Vieira in the search for America’s best-loved novel.
  • Sept. 25 – Heroes
    Take a journey with some literary heroes to examine what makes them complex and relatable.
  • Oct. 9 – What We Do For love
    Fall in love all over again with some of literature’s most beautiful romances.

 

RSVPs not required, but attendees are encouraged to mark “going” on the Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/298457014220539/.

Can’t join us for the screenings? Visit “The Great American Read” at http://www.pbs.org/the-great-american-read/home/ to learn more and vote for your favorite novel.

Dean’s Corner: Welcome Back UC!

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I am currently visiting Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) World Library and Information Congress along with some of my colleagues from UC Libraries, but I’m excited to return to UC and greet our new and returning students and faculty.

At IFLA’s World Conference with Library Chief Technology Officer May Chang and Global Services Librarian Hong Cheng. Behind us is Kuala Lumpur’s famous Petronas Towers.

Before we dive into the fall semester, here’s a brief overview of the last few months at UC Libraries.

Several key library positions were filled over the summer, including: associate director of business affairs Jeremy Berberich; business and data analytics librarian Maggie Patel; associate dean of library services Brad Warren; and content analyst Dorcas Washington. The Digital Scholarship Center also continued to grow, welcoming digital scholarship library fellow Erin McCabe and data visualization developer Ezra Edgerton. They joined software developer Zhaowei Ren, with the support of a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

UC Libraries joined HathiTrust, a national and international partnership of research institutions and libraries.

The Winkler Center Advisory Board hosted the annual Cecil Striker Society Lecture, “Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Impacting the Health of Children in Our Community and the World: The Past, Present and Future,” with co-lecturers Michael K. Farrell, MD and Bea Katz, PhD.

Continue reading →

Jeremy Berberich joins UC Libraries as the Associate Director of Business Affairs

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Today, Jeremy Berberich joined UC Libraries as the associate director of business affairs.  Jeremy comes to UC from Northern Kentucky University where he was the business officer for the College of Health Professions. He previously served as associate vice president for Knowledge Management at Gateway Community and Technical College and prior to that as a reference librarian and associate director for library and information services at Gateway. Jeremy holds a BA in political science with a minor in economics from the University of Louisville, an MLIS from the University of Kentucky and an MBA from Northern Kentucky University.

Jeremy will be a member of the Dean’s Cabinet and will lead the Business Office and HR operations.

Welcome, Jeremy, to UC Libraries.

Native Voices Children’s Programming Event a Success

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Last week several UC Libraries (HSL, CECH, Langsam) collaborated to produce the first installment in our Native Voices: Native Peoples’ Concepts of Health and Illness public programming. This inaugural event focused specifically on children as Langsam Library received a visit from twenty-four students of the Arlitt Child & Family Research & Education Center. Cheryl Ghosh, Senior Librarian at UC’s CECH Library put together an amazing program of dramatic skits, activity stations, and multi-media fun.

First, the 3 to 5-year-olds were treated to an introduction and brief play about the Iroquois legend of the Three Sisters and its corresponding gardening tradition. This tradition of planting corn, beans and squash (the sisters) in close proximity is widespread among Native American farming. At the same time the story functions as a metaphor for supporting and helping one another.

After the skit, the children were divided into groups and each group moved on to an activity station. One group and its chaperones built a teepee. The other, shucked corn and picked beans from bean plants. After ten minutes the groups switched and tried the other activity.

After fifteen minutes of activities, the students had a brief snack then proceeded to the Student Technology Resource Center (STAC) where video was taken of them in front of a green screen. At that point the video was superimposed onto an image of the Great Plains and an American Indian village complete with moving buffalo.

Finally, as a parting gift, each child received the book D is for Drum: A Native American Alphabet by Debbie and Michael Shoulders and Irving Toddy. The event lasted approximately an hour and at no time did our worries of waning attention spans among the children materialize. They never once lost interest. A success, if we  do say so!  And a huge thanks to all who assisted.

Please plan to attend the Native Voices: Native American Concepts of Health and Illness opening event on Thursday, July 26th in the CARE/Crawley Atrium of the UC  Medical Sciences Building.  And stay tuned for the six weeks of supplementary programming the HSL has planned.

Please see the gallery below for more images of the event.

 

Digital Scholarship Center Welcomes a Digital Scholarship Library Fellow and Data Visualization Developer

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Erin McCabe

Erin McCabe

The University of Cincinnati Libraries is happy to welcome the next two hires in the Digital Scholarship Center (DSC) supported by the Mellon Catalyst Transdiscipinary Teams grant.

The digital scholarship library fellow, Erin McCabe, comes to the DSC from Ithaka-JSTOR, where she was a publisher service associate. She previously held positions at Baruch College, Long Island University, and is a member of the NASA Datanauts. She received her MLIS with a specialization in digital humanities from the Pratt Institute in New York, and her BA in French studies from Concordia University in Montreal. She has worked on a wide range of digital projects and at the DSC, Erin will be responsible for organizing and leading the research efforts of our 10 new “catalyst teams” support by the Mellon grant.

Ezra Edgerton

Ezra Edgerton

The new data visualization developer, Ezra Edgerton, has worked as an independent visualization contractor since 2015, and received his B.A. with a double major in computer science and studio art from Grinnell College. Ezra has a rare blend of formal training in both art/design and computer science, and has experience with machine learning, interactive and static data visualization, user experience and user interface design, and front-end web development. Ezra will work in partnership with software developer Zhaowei Ren, who began work in the DSC on May 29, in deploying and refining our Mellon-supported machine learning and data visualization platform for digital scholarship across disciplines.

Zhaowei Ren

Zhaowei Ren

Welcome, Erin, Ezra and Zhaowei!

The University of Cincinnati’s Digital Scholarship Center, located in the Walter C. Langsam Library, is a joint venture between the College of Arts and Sciences and UC Libraries. On campus and in the community, they serve as a catalyst for hybrid forms of research and teaching, bringing together humanistic methods with technical innovations to test paradigms and to create new knowledge at the boundary between disciplines as they are conventionally imagined in humanities.

For more about the Digital Scholarship Center, visit their website at http://dsc.uc.edu.

The Benjamin Gettler Papers: An Introduction to Cincinnati’s New Public Transit

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By:  Alex Temple, Gettler Project Archivist

Book on the Cincinnati Transit CompanyFor the past several months, work has continued on processing the Benjamin Gettler Papers donated to the Archives & Rare Books Library.  Gettler was a notable lawyer, businessman, and civic activist in Cincinnati, an international philanthropist, and a former member of the University of Cincinnati Board of Trustees.  I’ve been fascinated by the amount of public transit-related history in this collection.  An often over-looked part of urban history is transportation infrastructure.  Public transportation records can tell us not only where people lived, worked, and played, but also the routes taken and who the routes served.  They can also provide insight into how, where, or why neighborhoods changed over time.

Cincinnati’s public transportation, as we recognize it today, really began in 1873 when several horse-drawn tram systems merged to form the Cincinnati Consolidated Railway Company.  Nearly a decade later, it was renamed the Cincinnati Street Railway Company (Gettler, 2012).  It remained the Cincinnati Street Railway Company until 1952, after the company had fully transitioned from rail to rubber-tire service, becoming the Cincinnati Transit Company.

Gettler himself was a prominent figure in Cincinnati’s transit history, as his involvement started slightly before the switch from streetcars to buses and through the sale of the Cincinnati Transit Company to the City of Cincinnati, forming the South Ohio Regional Transit Association (S.O.R.T.A.), and finally serving on the S.O.R.T.A. board beginning in 2003.  A good deal of the collection in the Benjamin Gettler Papers comes from his involvement in public transportation, including items such as meeting minutes from the board of directors.  One in particular which I found exciting to study was the meeting minutes from the board of directors from 1952 to 1954. Continue reading →