UC Libraries Offering LabArchives Electronic Lab Notebook to UC Research Community

The University of Cincinnati Libraries, with funding from the Office of the Provost, is pleased to present the LabArchives Electronic Lab Notebook to the UC research community.

An enterprise-wide license with LabArchives has been obtained for UC and will last until June 30, 2018.*

LabArchives is the leading secure and intuitive cloud-based Electronic Lab Notebook (ELN) application enabling researchers to easily create, store, share and manage their research data. Far more than an ELN, LabArchives provides a flexible, extensible platform that can be easily customized to match your lab’s workflow providing benefits to Principal Investigators, lab managers’ staff, post doctoral fellows and grad students. LabArchives can be integrated seamlessly with GraphPad Prism, MS-Office, PubMed, BOX, Learning Management Systems and a number of other software tools that are used extensively by researchers of the Academic Health Center and university wide. Additionally, the LA ELN works on multiple platforms and devices including Mac, Windows, Android and iPad devices, allowing researchers to store and access their data from virtually anywhere with Internet access.

For more information about LabArchives: http://www.labarchives.com/.

To sign up for a LabArchives account: https://mynotebook.labarchives.com/. Continue reading

Bloodsport for the Undergrads

By: Kevin Grace

On December 3, 1907, an angry father wrote to the Board of Directors at the University of Cincinnati:

Gentlemen:

     Enclosed you find a doctor bill for treatment of a fractured nose, rendered to my son Armin C. Arend, who was hurt in a flag rush on the 30th of October; the rush being aided and supported by the officials of the University of Cincinnati.  I hope your Honorable Body doesn’t expect that I have to pay this bill since I, as well as my son, am opposed to flag rushes.  Please take this matter into your hands, & judge for yourself who should pay this bill.  Remember, that I paid tuition for this day, which is not given as a holiday in the School Calendar of the University of Cincinnati.

     It is hard enough for me as a workingman to pay tuition let alone such foolish unnecessary expenses.

                                                         Yours Respectfully,

Julius Arend
3318 Bonaparte Avenue, City

The bill in question, for $5.00, was referred to the Board’s Law Committee, which quickly denied the father’s claim.    As no further word was heard from Mr. Arend, presumably he chalked up the medical bill to an educational expense, like young Armin’s textbooks, but literally, a lesson in the “school of hard knocks.”

Because that is what “flag rush” was during the Progressive Era, a bloodsport of occasional broken noses, broken arms, concussions, and countless contusions and abrasions.   A variation on games we know as “capture the flag” and “red rover,” flag rush was a heightened example of these, and was popular on college and university campuses around the country.

Flag Rush at UC

Continue reading

Wallet Hip, Seinfeld, and Dr. Charles Thomas Wehby

Pg. 1, City of Cincinnati Ordinance # 56, 2017. Click to read.

Last week, the Winkler Center received word that in March 2017 a street in Cincinnati had been renamed in honor of Dr. Charles Thomas Wehby, a 1938 UC College of Medicine graduate. Wehby had a general practice office for many years on Broadway between 4th and 5th streets in downtown Cincinnati and served the community as a general practitioner from 1939-1983. His medical practice was noted for its willingness to serve all members of the community regardless of race, ethnicity, or one’s ability to pay. The city ordinance naming the northwest corner of Broadway Street at 4th St. “Dr. Charles Thomas Wehby Corner” also states that Wehby had “donated machines and medical antiques to the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine.” Hmmm? Could those machines or antiques have made their way to the Winkler Center?  It’s possible; but not surprisingly, I uncovered no documentation of a donation. As an archive, the Winkler Center is not alone in its frustration of documentation growing sparser the older the donation. Years ago items often were donated with nothing more than a handshake.

Intriguing as this all was, what intrigued me more on the ordinance was a listing of Dr. Wehby’s research interests. It states that Dr. Wehby “published numerous medical articles and made many contributions to medical science including his discovery of ‘wallet hip’ or wallet syndrome which was published in the Ohio State Medical Journal, 1968.” Wait a second? WALLET HIP!?! WHAT?!? WALLET SYNDROME!?!

We all laughed and scoffed a bit back in the late 1990s at that episode of Seinfeld where George Costanza develops sciatic nerve issues from carrying around a huge wallet. I have to admit that as a wallet carrier at the time, the idea of someone developing lower back issues from frequently sitting on a large lump in one’s back pocket made perfect sense to me. I just didn’t think it was a real medical thing.

So thank you Dr. Wehby not only for the compassion you showed the city in your desire to treat its sick regardless of their circumstance, but also for setting the world straight on Wallet Hip!  We are indebted…and so are our L5s and S1s.

The only data the Winkler holds on Dr. Wehby is an old alumni card kept by the College of Medicine which contains addresses, date of birth, other contact information, etc. So in lieu of any image or further information on Dr. Wehby, enjoy a few minutes of George Costanza’s lumbar destroying wallet found here:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoPf98i8A0g. We think Dr. Wehby would have enjoyed it too.

University-Area Planning in the Gettler Papers

By: Alex Temple, Gettler Project Archivist, Archives & Rare Books Library

Martin Luther King Jr. and Vine Street IntersectionOne of the most notable parts of Benjamin Gettler’s life and work is his time spent on the Board of Trustees at the University of Cincinnati.  He was appointed by Governor George Voinovich in 1993 and elected to chairman of the board in 2000, from which he retired in 2002.  While sorting through the records related to his tenure, I was really struck by the massive amount of thought and work that not only goes into shaping the experience for UC students, but also into the surrounding community.

Among the various campus-life projects represented in the collection, one that is very interesting is the long-term plan to improve the intersection of Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, Jefferson Avenue, and Vine Street.  At that time, Uptown (Avondale, Clifton, Clifton Martin Luther King and Vine Street IntersectionHeights, Corryville, Fairview, Mt. Auburn, and University Heights) accounted for 10% of the city’s population and 14% of the city’s employment, which together provided for over 46,000 workers commuting into or out of Uptown daily.  In addition to the university itself, the hospitals, and the Environmental Protection Agency complex, the immediate area saw the construction of a new office complex, the Vontz Center for Molecular Studies, and a UC conference center, including a Marriott hotel.  I found the moving pieces, stakeholder interests, and politics concerning an area approximately 100,000 sq. ft. very intriguing. Continue reading

Registration Now Open for Third Annual UC DATA Day Scheduled for March 6

The University of Cincinnati Libraries and IT@UC announce the third annual UC DATA Day. Scheduled for 8:30 a.m.-4:15 p.m., Tuesday, March 6 in Nippert Stadium West Pavilion on UC’s Main Campus (see directions), UC DATA Day 2018 offers a full schedule of engaging events that will reveal solutions to data challenges and foster a community of best practices around improved data management. All events are free and include lunch. The public is welcome.

Registration is now open at http://libapps.libraries.uc.edu/blogs/dataday/registration/. Seats are limited, so register early.

Patricia Flatley Brennan

Patricia Flatley Brennan

The UC DATA Day 2018 keynote speaker is Patricia Flatley Brennan, RN, PhD, director of the National Library of Medicine (NLM). The NLM is the world’s largest biomedical library and the producer of digital information services used by scientists, health professionals and members of the public worldwide. Prior to her work at the NLM, she was the Lillian L. Moehlman Bascom Professor, School of Nursing and College of Engineering, at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

The day will include panel discussions on “Game Changing Data: How Data is being used to Affect Change,” “Big Data” and “Data Solutions: Your Questions Answered.” In addition, attendees can participate in two technical sessions on data analysis and data visualization with Python. During lunch, service providers will speak on how they support researchers and research data management.

For more information on UC DATA Day 2018, contact Tiffany Grant, interim assistant director for research and informatics, at (513) 558-9153 or tiffany.grant@uc.edu.

Job Posting: Metadata Librarian at the University of Cincinnati Libraries

Metadata Librarian, full time faculty position

The University of Cincinnati Libraries is seeking candidates for a tenure-track metadata librarian position responsible for providing leadership and guidance in the development and implementation of metadata and data management strategies that will support discovery, access, management and preservation of the libraries physical and digital collections.

The University of Cincinnati is a premier, public, urban research university with an enrollment of more than 44,000 students; and is ranked as one of America’s top 26 public research universities by the National Science Foundation. The University of Cincinnati Libraries are a charter member of the Association of Research Libraries, with research collections of more than 4.25 million total volumes, access to 96,000+ journals, a digital repository of over 500,000 local digital objects, and 1.5 million e-books. The University of Cincinnati embraces diversity and inclusion as core values that empower individuals to transform their lives and achieve their highest potential.

Review of applications will begin February 26, 2018. Please visit https://jobs.uc.edu/job/Cincinnati-Metadata-Librarian-OH-45201/451155600/ for full advertisement and to apply.

UC Libraries Closed Monday, Jan. 15 for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. from LIFE Magazine

UC Libraries will be closed Monday, Jan. 15 for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day with the exception of the Donald C. Harrison Health Sciences Library, which will be open 9am-5pm. The libraries will resume normal hours on Tuesday, Jan. 16.

This closing includes the 4th floor of Langsam Library, which will close at 11pm on Sunday, Jan 14 and re-open at 7:45am on Tues, Jan. 16.

Check out these library resources about Martin Luther King, Jr.