Library Notes

Hololens   After some logistical delays, the Microsoft Hololens has been shipped and is expected to arrive at MSU this week.  The device will be housed, temporarily, in Room 205 on the Second Level of Duane G. Meyer Library, along with an Alienware Area 51 development computer.  The Hololens device is a mixed-reality, wearable computer.  It is designed to display interactive 3D images within a real environment.  Educational and business entities are adopting the technology for many uses.   Robotics…

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Friday, July 28, beginning at 7:00 p.m. in Duane G. Meyer Library: Rare Wine, Rare Books. This is the ninth year of this wonderful annual summer event. This year’s theme is “The Art of Wine; The Art of the Book.” A six-course dinner will be served to guests, including six flights of exquisite wines, with exhibitions and discussions of beautiful rare books, including some recent acquisitions. Our guest speaker will be Mitzi Kirkland-Ives (Associate Professor, Art and Design). David Dain…

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Steven Bell, the associate university librarian at Temple University, recently published an article in College & Research Libraries News about how many universities are implementing Textbook Affordability Projects (TAP), often tied to the general Open Educational Resources (OER) movement. While librarians often are assuming leadership roles in TAP initiatives, the question often is raised, “What about the campus bookstore?” Bell suggests that librarians need to develop a more current and dynamic sense of the relationships (real and desired) between the…

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This fall, when graduating seniors take their standardized exit exam, one question will be added to probe their satisfaction with their experiences in the MSU Libraries. We thank Grace Jackson-Brown for leading the effort to get this question added to the Senior Exit Exam. With input received from MSU library faculty and staff, and the MSU RStats Institute, listed below is the question that was devised for the Senior Exit Exam.     The MSU Libraries provide books, media, databases,…

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The final shipments of furniture for the new RIS Commons in the northeast area of the First Level should arrive and begin being assembled on Friday, August 4th. Installation should be complete by Tuesday, August 7th. Re-carpeting of the southwest area of the Second Level (“the Wedge”) should begin within the next two weeks, but the exact start date is not yet known. This project should take approximately one week to complete. Terry Rowland, who has served as coordinator on…

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The Labor Union Charters Collection (LA 29) in Special Collections and Archives contains forty-three charters and certificates of affiliation for various local labor unions, the oldest dating back to 1884.  The majority of the documents are from Springfield, but there are a few from other Missouri communities, like Joplin and Jefferson City, as well as Wichita and Parsons, Kansas.  The most decorative of the collection is suitably the 1932 charter for Springfield’s Brotherhood of Painters, Decorators, and Paperhangers of America….

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The new editorial and production team for OzarksWatch Magazine, a twice-yearly serial publication of the Ozarks Studies Institute (OSI), part of the MSU Libraries, is now in place.  In August Rachel Besara, our new Associate Dean of Library Services, will become the Editor of OzarksWatch, as well as Director of the OSI. Susan Croce Kelly will become the Managing Editor. She has been a newspaper reporter in Springfield and St. Louis, an award-winning columnist in Texas, public relations executive in St….

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The Chronicle of Higher Education recently ran an article by Shannon Najmabadi on what 21st century academic and research libraries are beginning to look like. Long-term print retention solutions are being implemented, and new services, such as Genius Squad counters (for tech support), Scholar’s Labs, and more are being implemented. New types of events are being held in libraries, such as job preparation nights. “Now, with information always a few taps away, libraries have had to carve out a new…

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Large rubbings from English Monumental Brasses make up the June Runk Brass Rubbings Collection (M 45).  MSU alum June Runk, who lived in Suffolk County, England, from 1972-1976 while her husband served in the U.S. Air Force, created the rubbings.  Along with other military wives, she would approach a church vicar and secure permission to make a rubbing of the brasses in a church, sometimes paying a small fee.  Mrs. Runk used velveteen paper and a silver or gold wax…

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What the 2020 Plan States: “Digitization Lab: Develop a full-scale, full-time Digitization Lab, in which library personnel digitize materials and objects on a daily basis, and also offer high-end digitization services to users and allied groups.” What’s Happening: The Digitization Lab is now fully in operation with two oversize scanners (one of which can also scan transparencies up to 12.2” x 16.5”), one full-size scanner that can also scan transparencies, a document scanner, a 360-degree photo capture unit, a station for audio…

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