Donate to Coats for Kids and View Ashley Horner's Fashion Designs

The main campus library is a collection point for Channel 9's annual Coats for Kids project. Look around your home and gather all the gently used children's coats that could go to a child who needs a warm coat. There must be one or two that would qualify! Bring them to the library and deposit them in the cardboard box that is just inside the entrance.

While you're here, take a look at the amazing fashion illustrations on exhibit by Baylor student Ashley Horner. Ashley has allowed us to display her fashion sketches for a few weeks. She has designs for coats, women's menswear, dresses, and casual outfits. We will one day say that "we knew her when."

Native American Heritage Month Book Display

A few days ago, I went through some of the books in the Augusta R. Kolwyck Library and selected some for display. The display ties in with Native American Heritage Month. The theme this year is "A Native Prescription: Balancing, Mind, Body and Spirit." I found several books that related to this year's theme. See more about this year's theme at the Library of Congress web site: http://www.loc.gov/topics/nativeamericans/

One book I particularly enjoyed browsing was titled "Black Seminoles." The story of John Horse who had to balance leadership and survival as a descendant of fugitive slaves and as a descendant of Florida Seminoles provided a lot of interest. A good website about John Horse is Rebellion: John Horse and the Black Seminoles at http://johnhorse.com/

Check out the Kolwyck library's research guide on Native Americans with selected reference books, websites, and library databases: http://library.chattanoogastate.edu/research/rgdes/native.htm

Also browse the call numbers of E 76 - E 99 for more books on native Americans.

Posted by Dwight Hunter

Don't Eat Too Much Turkey!

"Don't Eat Too Much Turkey!" is the title of a popular children's book by Miriam Cohen. But turkey is a very nutritious food, according to the Minnesota Turkey Grower's Association, which proudly boasts that Minnesota is the top producer of turkeys in the U.S., "bringing more than $600 million in income for producers, processors, and other related industries."

So, enjoy a nutritious, guilt-free turkey day by gobbling up the lean protein provided by this celebrated bird. Actually, the admonition might be revised to say, "Don't eat too much stuffing!"

Have an enjoyable Thanksgiving holiday. The library will close on Wednesday, Nov. 21 at 4:30 and re-open Monday, November 26 at 7:30 AM.

Photography of Valerie Fleming

Valerie Fleming is a self-taught photographer. After 15 years as a law firm librarian, she began to pursue photography full time. Her photography can be found in the collections of the Tennessee State Museum, Savannah College of Art and Design, and several corporate collections. Her website is http://www.valeriefleming.com/

See some of her photography at the Kolwyck Library during the month of November.

Rise Up Reading!

"Rise up Reading!" is the theme for this year's Children's Book Week, November 12-18. The celebration of reading by, for, and with children has been happening since 1919 when the American Booksellers' Association and the American Library Association collaborated to "promote higher standards in children's books."

Schools, libraries, and bookstores will be celebrating children and books all week with special events and promotions. Our library will offer puppet shows and readings to preschool age children on Thursday, Nov. 15 beginning at 10:00 AM. We will have a special visit from Gertrude, a furry, friendly, four-footed life-like puppet whose owner is Betsy Fronk, one of our reference librarians.

The goal of Children's Book Week is as important today as it was nearly 100 years ago: "Book Week brings us together to talk about books and reading and, out of our knowledge and love of books, to put the cause of children's reading squarely before the whole community and, community by community, across the whole nation. For a great nation is a reading nation."

Celebrate by reading to a child this week. You may find yourself re-living a little bit of your own childhood.

We invite you to comment on this blog and tell us what your favorite childhood books were. Does anyone remember Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel or The Secret Garden?

Blog and Business

Two books about business blogging are currently in the library's new book section. "blogging for Business" and "BLOG Rules: A Business Guide to Managing Policy, Public Relations, and Legal Issues" provide a lot of information for how blogs help promote businesses in the blogosphere.

Why should a business or organization develop a blog?

1. Publish content and ideas
2. Promote thought leadership
3. Build a community
   
4. Deliver information quickly to customers
5. Receive feedback from customers
   (From the book BLOG Rules)
   

Check out these two books to find out why businesses and other organizations need to consider a blog as public relations, or as customer service, or as idea promotion.

Less is More

If you have ever wished you could search for a book and limit your search to books that you actually have time to read, say maybe those that are less than 200 pages, then you are in luck. LazyLibrary.com does just that. If the book is not more than 200 pages long, you won't even see it in your results list.

As the website says, "Fortunately, there are authors that would rather have a concise and effective book than a lengthy and diluted tome, and that's where we come in."

Links to popular searches let you see what others are looking for, too.

Because the titles are derived from Amazon's database, "buy this book" links are provided that take you directly to Amazon where you may puchase new or used copies. Or, better yet, check to see if the library has the book and save your hard-earned cash. So, now you have no excuse to avoid reading. Find a book that fits your time constraints by using LazyLibrary.com.