|
Collections |
Technology |
Interesting Questions |
| ||||
|
by Karen Aughinbaugh, Fresno County Free Library
The Fresno County Free Library (FCFL) has been a part of both federal and California depository library systems since 1920, making us one of the longest running (oldest) government depositories in California. For those who might not know the jargon, a depository library is one that, once officially designated, receives materials "on deposit" from either one or both of the federal or state governments. In lay terms, that basically means that FCFL does not "own" materials deposited here, but we manage them and provide access to them for the general public.
FCFL is a partial federal depository and currently selects 33% of the materials available. We are also an electronic depository, meaning that we provide entry points for public access to electronic or online depository material. Currently, the federal government has mandated that the depository library program moves as closely as possible to complete "electronic" access. After several years of changes, approximately 60% of federal documents are designated "electronic only." Technically, that can mean CD’s, DVD’s and online access, but more and more titles are online only. To facilitate patron access to online materials, Fresno County Library provides links on our reference page(www.fresnolibrary.org/reference.html) to GPO Access and to subject indices to both Federal and California documents. We now have a "government documents page" under the "libraries" section.
One of the goals for our depository libraries includes coordination of selection with other depository libraries in our immediate area so that unnecessary duplication is eliminated and broader coverage of materials is available locally to the public. Access to depository collections is required for the general public, even in private libraries or libraries not generally open to non-students or specific clientele. For the Fresno area, there are two federal depository libraries for the public: FCFL and CSU Fresno. In our combined selection policies we both get the basic collection either in paper or electronically, and FCFL concentrates on areas including agriculture, water, consumer oriented materials, and patent materials; although we are not an official patent depository.
FCFL is also a state depository library. We are one of a limited number of libraries in California that are "complete" depositories. In theory, that means that our library should receive "on deposit" one copy of any state agency material which is published in printed form, on CD-ROM, or in other formats. That really doesn’t occur, as the only materials that are formally tracked are those that are distributed by the state printing office: approximately 20% of items issued by state agencies. Complete depositories get the majority of documents by what is known as direct shipment from state agencies. There is no absolute method to ensure that any library gets everything available from agencies that publish their own materials. California’s Library Distribution Act directs state agencies to send copies of all documents except internal administrative materials to complete depositories. By the volume of mail FCFL receives, one might think that most agencies are in compliance with this act.
As a complete depository since 1920, FCFL has probably the largest state document collection between Bakersfield and Stockton. CSU Fresno became a partial state depository in 1945. They receive approximately 20% of published materials and can discard after 5 years retention. FCFL must keep nearly everything except superceded or ephemeral material basically forever: which probably explains the small number of libraries that choose to stay "complete" state depository libraries!
by Carol Doyle, California State University, Fresno
The Madden Library is a selective depository for United States federal and California state government publications. It was designated a California state depository in 1945, a federal depository in 1962, and a depository for US Geological Survey maps in 1967. We currently select approximately 55% of the items available to federal depository libraries. The mission of the Government Documents Department is to acquire, organize, and provide access to government information in support of the university's curriculum and research, as well as the government information needs of the residents of the 19th Congressional District and the San Joaquin Valley.
The collection consists of publications covering a broad spectrum of interests, such as water quality, education, AIDS, welfare, government finance, annual reports from agencies, legislative materials, crime, and health issues. The collection is particularly strong in statistical and congressional information, and material on subjects such as education, public policy, geology, and agriculture. We post a list of selected new items we have received each month on the web at http://www.lib.csufresno.edu/SubjectResources/GovernmentDocuments/New.html
The Government Documents Department is located on the first floor of the Madden Library. We provide free public access for government information received through the depository programs. Material is available in paper, microform, CD-ROM or via the web. Most government publications (with the exception of maps) are not yet in our online catalog. The Government Documents Department staff can assist you in the use of our resources, including specialized indexes, CD-ROMs, and web sources. Most of our material is shelved in closed stacks and will be retrieved for you by our staff. Our collection of depository maps is housed primarily in the Map Library on the second floor.
I have created a series of guides to assist in the identification and location of government information resources. These include guides to finding government statistics, tracing California and Federal legislation, finding Presidential documents, and locating government websites. Most of our guides are available via the web, at http://www.lib.csufresno.edu/SubjectResources/GovernmentDocuments/. Please feel free to link to these guides. "Generic" versions of some of these guides are available at http://zimmer.csufresno.edu/~caroldo/aboutguides.html. These generic guides focus primarily on major California and U.S. depository resources and have no institution-specific information such as call numbers or links to a library’s main webpage or subscription databases. They were created to be easily adaptable: feel free to either link to the generic guides, or to copy the html and adapt it to make your own local version of a guide.
Please contact me if you would like to arrange an orientation to the collection or specific
resources, or if I can assist you with government information questions. Carol Doyle, Head,
Government Documents Dept. & Map Library; carol_doyle@csufresno.edu
by David Kosakowski, California State University, Bakersfield
The Walter W. Stiern Library at California State University, Bakersfield became a federal depository library in 1974. The Library is a partial federal depository, currently receiving 34% of materials available for selection. All federal documents held by the Library are listed in the library's catalog.
The Stiern Library also provides electronic access to federal documents. Some records in the library catalog contain links which connect to the electronic version of the document. The Library also has several web pages that provide links to Congress, executive branch agencies, reference sources and search engines for government publications. The main Government Information page - http://www.lib.csubak.edu/gov/index.html - provides links to these pages.
Support of the university curriculum is the main criteria for the selection of federal documents. Collection strengths include demographic and economic data, education, geology, health care and criminal justice.
The Walter W. Stiern Library is also a partial state depository library. That is, the library receives a selection of documents published by the State of California. Currently, the library has about 4,500 California documents in its collection.
All California documents are listed in the Library's catalog. There also are links to electronic versions of State of California documents via the Government Information Page.
One of the best ways to show someone how to accomplish a task with a computer is to provide actual screens that demonstrate that task. Providing these pictures in e-mail messages is also a good way to communicate problems to your local computer technician. Here is one way you can do this: if you need to show the entire screen as in example 1, all you have to do is hit the "Print Screen" key (usually just above the Insert Key on your keyboard), then open the document you want to put the screen in (a new Outlook message, a new Word file, etc.). With your mouse, select where you want to insert the screen. Right click your mouse and select paste. You should have your entire screen in your document.
If you would like your screen to include only the active box (example 2), then you would follow the same steps as above, except when you want to copy to the clipboard you will hold down the "alt key" then the "Print Screen" button. Continue with the other steps.
by Kathleen Smith, San Joaquin Valley Information Service "I found this coin at the junk yard. Can you tell me if it’s worth anything?" This question was recently submitted by a patron at the Kern County Public Library. Tiffany Nagle did a fine job of identifying the coin as a silver strike casino chip, but was still looking for a value. She provided me with some very helpful background information she located on the Internet along with a photocopy of the coin-front and back.
A silver strike is a limited-edition silver token won from a special slot machine. They first appeared in 1992. The tokens have redeemable values of $7 - $200 and vary in size depending on the value. Each silver strike notes the city and/or casino of origin on one side and a theme picture on the reverse. This patron’s token was from an unspecified casino in Blackhawk, Colorado.
Using the information Tiffany sent as a starting place, I did some general searching using Google.com with the general terms "chip* token* casino*". This yielded quite a number of web sites dedicated to casino chip enthusiasts including one specifically for Colorado casino chips. Most of these sites are produced by amateur collectors themselves along with auction sites and clubs.
One such club is The Casino Chips and Gaming Tokens Collectors Club. They have a good library of materials available for loan to members and associate members as well as several online issues of Casino Chip and Token News magazine. I contacted their club librarian to check several books in their collection related to Colorado gaming tokens, but none of them included silver strikes. I also had librarians at the Los Angeles and Denver Public Libraries check the following sources for relevant information: Collecting Casino Chips by Donald D. Spencer (2000) and The Official U.S. Casino Chip Price Guide by James Campiglia and Steve Wells. (2000). Neither book listed silver strike values, although Spencer’s book had a very complete bibliography of resources for collecting casino chips.
I posted a message on The Strike Point bulletin board for silver strike enthusiasts. I received a number of responses from collectors who estimated the value of this silver strike at $10 - $15. None of them knew of any resource for silver strike values other than an out-of-print 15-page pamphlet by the late Ben Kreigh. I chose not to follow up on this publication due to its age. I did find a very similar chip selling on eBay.com for $9.99. In the meantime, I contacted Allen Banick, the author of the Complete Colorado Chip and Token Price Guide to see if his latest edition included silver strikes. It did not. However, he also offered an estimate of $10 - $15.
The most interesting part of this question for me was the discovery of several areas of collecting related to gambling chips. Numismatics is the study or collection of money, coins, and often medals. A related field is called exonumia, which relates to tokens or medals that resemble money but are not intended to circulate as money. Both of these more obscure terms might be helpful for any future research involving coins, money, tokens, medals or gambling chips.
American Numismatic Association
The American Numismatic Association is a nonprofit, educational organization that promotes the study and collection of money, including coins, tokens, medals and paper currency, for research, interpretation and preservation of history and culture from ancient times to the present. To further advance the knowledge of numismatics along educational, historical and scientific lines, as well as enhance interest in the hobby, the organization offers numerous services and programs, including a monthly journal, The Numismatist.
Token and Medal Society
The Token and Medal Society, Inc. is an educational and non-profit organization devoted to furthering the exonumia field consisting of all forms of tokens, medals, badges and other items of a related nature. They publish a bimonthly magazine called TAMS Journal. (SJVIS currently subscribes to this publication and holds at least ten years of back issues.)
Although I was not able to locate a published list of silver strike values, I felt confident providing the patron with the estimate of $10-$15. He also received all of the above information just in case he is interested in pursuing this area of interest further.
by Mike Drake, SJVIS
I found the following question interesting for two reasons: 1) It has provided me with the opportunity to discover some reference resources that were unfamiliar to me, and 2) there is the potential opportunity to correct an error found in many standard print sources and web sites.
The patron has information that claims that the plant genus Boswellia was named in honor of John Boswell (1710-1780) who was a "fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh" beginning in 1748. The patron came to the library looking for more information about John Boswell. The librarian who was assisting him apparently came across a claim that Boswellia was named after James Boswell (1740-1795), "friend and biographer of Dr. Samuel Johnson" (Smith, see below for citation). The question was referred to SJVIS for clarification on the origin of the name and for further information about John Boswell. Was he, in fact, the intended recipient of this honor?
Rather than present a narrative of the process of my search, I will simply list by type the resources that I found useful and describe the relevant information found there, if any. Some of these sources are found at the Fresno County Public Library. Most are found at the Madden Library at CSU Fresno.
The World Wide Web:
I was able to find conflicting information on the web regarding the origin of the name, which helped to confirm that there is a discrepancy among the sources. Using Google and AltaVista to search the web I had discovered several web sites that claimed James Boswell as the origin. But one web site was found (in German) that claimed something different:
"Die dortige Stammpflanze, Boswellia sacra, ist nach dem Botaniker Johann Boswell aus Edinburgh benannt." http://www.dccv.de/nachrichten/1999-1/990106b-weihrauch-literatur.htm
This is translated into English as:
"The there master plant, Boswellia sacra, is designated after the Botaniker Johann Boswell from Edinburgh." (using Babel Fish to translate, http://babel.altavista.com):
It is not yet certain if the "Botaniker Johann Boswell" is the same as the patron's John Boswell.
Bibliographies:
Guide to information sources in the botanical sciences, 2nd ed. Davis, Elisabeth B., 1932- Englewood, Colo. : Libraries Unlimited, 1996.
This excellent guide was indispensable for my becoming oriented in the resources of botanical nomenclature. The entries are annotated. Shorter bibliographies can be found in some of the sources listed below (see Stearn and Shosteck).
Dictionaries of plant names:
These are dictionaries that contain information about the origin or meaning of a plant name.
A gardener's dictionary of plant names; a handbook on the origin and meaning of some plant names (revised ed.) Smith, Archibald William, 1897-1962. New York, St. Martin's Press [1972]
This book includes an entry for Boswellia claiming that it was named "in honor of James Boswell (1740-1795), friend and biographer of Dr. Samuel Johnson."
Stearn's dictionary of plant names for gardeners : a handbook on the origin and meaning of the botanical names of some cultivated plants Stearn, William T. (William Thomas), 1911- London : New York, NY : Cassell ; Distributed in the U.S. by Sterling Pub. Co., 1996.
Apparently a later edition of the book by A.W. Smith listed above. It contains the same entry for Boswellia. This edition differs from the Smith edition in that it has a good bibliography.
Flowers and plants; an international lexicon with biographical notes. Shosteck, Robert, 1910- [New York] Quadrangle/New York Times Book Co. [1974]
Boswellia was not listed here. There is a useful bibliography in this book.
A manual of plant names, Plowden, C. Chicheley. London, Allen & Unwin, 1968.
This book has a listing for Boswellia attributing its origin as "Dr. Boswell, of Edinburgh." It is not certain at this point which of the Boswells this refers to. Clearly it can refer to John Boswell the physician. A closer examination of James Boswell's biography will clarify whether this could also refer to him.
A source-book of biological names and terms. 3d ed. Jaeger, Edmund Carroll, 1887- Springfield, Ill., Thomas [1955]
Boswellia is not listed in this book. It does have biographical information for other people in whose honor plants have been named.
Indexes:
Index nominum genericorum (plantarum) Publisher Utrecht : The Hague : Bohn, Scheltema & Holkema ; Junk, 1979.
"Intended as an aid in stabilizing nomenclature, the index consists of an alphabetical list of validly published scientific names of all plant genera. Entries include citations to the authors to whom the names are attributed; citations to the first valid publication of names; a record of existing homonymy; an indication of taxonomic placement." (annotation from A Guide to Reference Books, Bailey 1996)The entry for Boswellia in this source includes the following: "Roxburgh ex Colebrooke, Asiat. Res. 9: 379, 1807". "Roxburgh" refers to William Roxburgh (1751-1815) and "Colebrooke" refers to Henry Thomas Colebrooke (1765-1837). See below for more on who these men were and how this relates to Boswellia. The citation refers to the first "valid publication" of the name Boswellia.
Biographical sources:
Dictionary of national biography. Edited by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee. v.1-21, and Supplement, v.22. London, Oxford Univ. Pr., 1917-
This is the standard source for British biography. It contains good entries for both William Roxburgh and Henry Thomas Colebrooke. Roxburgh was a botanist educated in Edinburgh who studied the flora of India, and Colebrooke was an official of the East India company and a prolific researcher and writer in Indian studies. For more about these men, consult this source. It seems to me that as the botanist, Roxburgh was probably the first to identify the plant, and perhaps the person that named it. The entry for Colebrooke contains a complete list of his works which includes the article referenced in Index nominum genericorum (plantarum). The complete citation is "On Olibanum or Frankincense" Asiatic Researches, 1807.
I have requested a copy of the Asiatic Researches article through interlibrary loan. My hope is that this article will clarify the matter as to who that plant was named for: John Boswell or James Boswell. I have postponed any further work on this question until we receive this article. I will relate any further discoveries about the origin of the name Boswellia in the next issue of News & Clues.