Morris rediscovered

Occasionally reference questions here throw up research into and rediscovery of Morris County events and people. Latest is the Morris Turnpike Co., 1801-1851. Earlier gems were

Historic prices of Morris County, 1900+
"African School" at Parsippany (1817-1823)
Great Depression in Morris County 1929+
Original charter of the Morris & Essex Railroad (1835)

What do we call our growing collection of digitized county history? Suggestions?

Guitar concert Saturday

The only thing better than one classical guitarist is two. They've performed here separately, now we'll hear them together. Guitarras Españolas, Saturday, Nov. 14th, 2PM, Loren Fortna and Darren O'Neill

Letters about Literature

2009-2010 Letters about Literature competition, for students in grades 4-12, closes out December 12th. Download the rules and coupon or pick one up here at the library. Winners get a $500 Target gift card as a prize and also something for their school or public library. Tell an author what his/her book meant to you!

NJ Cares Coat Drive

We're a drop off point for the 14th Annual Jersey Cares Coat Drive. Your "lightly used" coats are needed now, more than ever! Bring to library lobby/circulation desk. Thanks very much. A coat for someone in need is a hug.

November exhibits

November exhibits include:
photos of Morris County veterans
naval paintings by Thomas Calvin Houtz
mixed media by four artists: Michal Barkai, Mike Fenton, Charles Miller and Doreen Valenza

House health care bill

Representative Frelinghuysen has given us a copy of HR 3962, the House health care bill introduced Friday. Ask for the summary, detailed summary or the whole 1,990 page bill at the Reference desk.

December movies

December films, Fridays at 2PM the 4th-18th, are: Bishop's Wife (Cary Grant, 1947), National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and Elf.

New York Times Historic

New York Times Historic (starts in 1851) is now available for your use, from home. Try, for example, these searches
McClellan between Sept 1877 and Jan 1878
(Woodrow Wilson) on Nov 6, 1912
Lakehurst in May 1937

Use parentheses to (phrase words together), connect words with AND. Try
Edison AND inventor for period 10/1/1931 to 10/31/1931
(The whole world held it's breath!) A lot of NJ news and people are in the Times "back in the day". Doing a history paper for school? This is your primary source material. Try, for example
Maine AND explosion, February 1898
railroad on May 11, 1869
Banting in 1922
Custer, June-July 1876 (took two weeks for the news to come east)

Questions? call or e-mail the Reference desk (973) 285-6969

Kappa Delta Pi

The women of the College of St Elizabeth's Education Honor Society will host a storycraft here on Nov. 14th. Children will hear How to make an apple pie and see the world, by Marjorie Price, and have a hands-on activity.
There is, at the same time, a duo classical guitar concert going on down the hall, in the public meeting room. Saturday, Nov. 14th, 2PM

Civil War

Civil War expert/re-enactor Garry Wetstein will be here Sat., Dec. 5th, 2PM to talk about the 15th NJ Volunteers. Bring the youngsters!

picture from a collection of NJ Volunteers in the State Archives

Books for Kids

MCL is a "Books for Kids" library. Between October 5th and December 5th we are accepting donations of new books, to be given to children for the holidays through local social service agencies. Drop your gifts off in the Children's room. Thanks.

Discounts on Broadway

In Music & Media, fall discount vouchers and two-fers for these shows: Lion King, Shrek, Desire, Altar Boyz, Rock of Ages, Stomp, Chicago, Mary Poppins, Hairspray and Bye-bye Birdie. Midtown direct train will get you there.

Genealogy guides

The Reference Dept offers genealogy research guides for NJ's top three ancestries: Italian (18.1% of state population), Irish (16%) and German (12.7%)

Generally, see MCL's bookmarks for genealogy or sign up for our November intro class.

New books

Latest titles on the reference shelves @MCL.
Circulating collection, titles on order.

Morris & Essex RR

Found a cache of interesting Morris & Essex railroad documents in local history files this afternoon: 1835 prospectus for the RR and a map--surveyed by Ephraim Beach and JS Green-- of the route, from Newark Bay to "Veal Town"?? (just above Basking Ridge) which we had to scan in six parts
southeast Newark Bay & Elizabethtown
middle east Vauxhall, Comptown and S Orange
northeast Hanover & Livingston
northwestDover, Littleton, Whippany
middle westVeal Town, Green Village, Millville, Springfield
southwest Scotch Plains & Westfield

And, 90 years later, the 1925 timetable for the Morristown & Erie Railroad, connecting Essex Fells and Morristown.

Thank you, EBSCO

Online vendor/publisher EBSCO offered free access to their Career Library earlier this year, for 2009. Now they are also offering free access to a wealth of flu information for medical professionals and for patients.

Mini-videos

A new bit of software, screenjelly.com, allowed us to make these two mini-videos on

How to ?
use databases from home
&
sign up for MCL classes, events and programs

Scanner & printer

We've set up a scanner for your use, on the second floor (Reference). Bring (or buy from us) a floppy or flash drive to save your scan. Same desk now also sports a printer, for those of you using laptops--just plug in the USB cable. Printing is five cents per page, thanks.

Audiobooks in catalog

Thanks to the six staffers in Technical Services who came in today, Saturday, to upload audiobook records into the library catalog. Now you can click on Electronic resource: A downloadable audiobook accessible through the ListenNJnw Project; click for detailsin any catalog record to go right through to the downloadable title.

Social service agencies

Third/latest revision of our Guide to Social Service Agencies for Morris County Residents has been posted--or pick up a copy in the library.

MCL wins book collection

We're pleased to learn today that MCL is one of five libraries receiving this year's NJ Council for the Humanities 2009 Book Collection Award. Twenty nine (29) titles were nominated for the NJCH book prize, by publishers. All 29 are being presented to the library. This year's winning book was The Hemingses of Monticello: an American family, by Annette Gordon-Reed. Five other titles were named "Honor Books".

Morris County Library, according to the Council, "will be among the organizations and individuals recognized at NJCH's annual October Awards Event," at the Montclair Art Museum, Oct. 21st.

New marketing research tool

SRDS Market Audience Analyst is now available inside the library (no remote access). Based on Nielsen Claritas demographics and PRIZM data, the service offers market profile, lifestyle analysis, demographics and target group reports. Second floor: ask one of the reference librarians to log you in.

Open Mic Night excerpts

Doesn't begin to do our performers..singers and poets, 12-60+ years old!...justice, but enjoy a few minutes of Wednesday's Open Mic Night. A special salute to the brave souls making their first ever public appearances! (Someday we'll say "we knew them when" ??)

Scrolling through the 1930s

Our local history librarian is pulling together stories from the Daily Record of how it went around here, 1929-1938. You can read along as we scan news stories on the Depression in Morris County.

Now 1,588

1,588 households have signed up for Events@MCL, our electronic mailing list of advance notice about programs, classes, concerts, speakers, etc. You can join the list by dropping us a note or call the Reference desk at (973) 285-6969. We keep the list sends to a minimum (everyone has enough stuff in their mailboxes!), one or two short notices a month. You can see past samples in the list archives.

Books on order

What's your favorite reading? Did you know you can review the books now on order, soon to hit the library shelves. Look at the whole list, list by author or title or search/click on the topic that most interests you (career? travel? test prep? parenting? ..) You can even subscribe to new titles if you wanted a notice when more orders go out. Click on a subject below to see what's new or upcoming.

Orchestra Musician's ...

Our music department now has the Orchestra Musician's CD-ROM Library, which the publisher describes as
Complete sets of original orchestral parts from the great symphonic repertoire – over 600 masterworks from the Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and Modern periods – are readily available on individual CD-ROMs by instrument.

Use it in our listening room, play the parts over on the digital piano ..and be sure and ask our music librarians. We have circulating scores for nearly everything in this collection. Want more info? Contact the Music desk, (973) 286-6979.

1,200 maps

You can now search the library's map collection online. One of our reference librarians recently completed a full, descriptive inventory of the collection which, thanks to a grant from the Library Foundation, we can now offer via the web.

Economies

The library is a "good deal." You can borrow, not buy, nearly 2 million books, movies, music and books on CD, download audiobooks, etc. Don't want to waste gas trundling around? Books from any of the libraries around the county can be picked up at and returned to your hometown ...or nearest ..Morris library. We offer remote reference and resources and can fax up to 10 pages of material a week to county residents. There is no charge for:
classes (software and the Internet)
career seminars
movies and concerts
speakers program
meeting and study rooms

Morris County Library: your tax dollars at work.
Run your savings estimate through the library value calculator.

Homeschooling?

Is your family homeschooling? The library offers resources and support.

Morris area newsfeed

We've pulled together a Morris area news aggregator If you want to subscribe, use http://www.mclib.info/morrisnews.xml