First Post-

This is my fourth week on the job now as music librarian intern at Musselman Library, and I've learned a lot so far. I've been given quite a bit of reading (I had forgotten that librarians were into that), including the funny title So You Want to Be a Librarian but it's all been very informative and helpful.

At this point, I have done research within Muscat and Worldcat, as well as Choice Reviews and MTNA.org to put together bibliographies on music wellness/injury prevention books we have here in the library, and books we should add to our collection since NASM (National Association of Schools of Music) is interested in our collection on this topic. I have also done a bibliography on music chronologies our library has, in addition to chronologies of 20th century, and chronologies of contextual topics such as art in order to help out my music history class with our research paper that is supposed to connect a composition from 1912-1913 to a historical event or any new developments in non-music fields at that time. Unfortunately for both these bibliographies, RefWorks wasn't working for me so I put them in MLA form myself, but I don't mind since that's how I've always done bibliographies.

In addition to making the bibliography, I did a Information Literacy Session with my class on Thursday on how to conduct research for the paper (keywords, subject headings, the different databases), but also how to try to come up with a thesis. So I prepared a concept map connecting my two topics, Picasso's cubist newspaper clipping collages of 1912 to Schoernberg's atonal vocal work Pierrot Lunaire and how both were very radical and avant-garde for their time. I had been at such an info session for my first year seminar and didn't think concept maps were that useful, but after this assignment, I realized that they really do organize your ideas and connections in a visual way and give you better keyword searches. Also in the session, I showed the class how to find primary resources such as original manuscripts and interviews with the composer (which I had only learned how to find myself the day before). Tim helped me a lot already in the research for this paper, and it gave me a headstart on my paper which I'm not used to since I'm usually a take-it-one-day-at-a-time kind of student (I have to be when taking six courses!). I feel like I learned more from this project than just what to teach my class; it helped my research skills as well. Teaching the class also gave me public speaking experience, of which I always need improvement.

A week or two ago, after giving me a lot of reading on the subject, Lina taught me how to do music cataloging. Or she tried to at least. It is a very confusing system with a lot of codes and rules with exceptions. It made me appreciate librarians who catalog so much more. It also made me realize that Muscat isn't an entity on its own; cataloging librarians must enter all the information seen there. I hope I won't have to catalog anytime soon, but if I have to, I at least know the basics and I have good resources to turn to as well. This weekend I was in New York City on a music career immersion trip and we visited the New York Public Library of the Performing Arts, which has a seemingly endless collection but only a small fraction of it can be found in an online catalog. I kept thinking, "they should get on that." I find catalogs really helpful for the public, so I'm appreciative that all our library sources are available through the online databases.

That's all for now. Thanks for reading!
-Bridget

And so it begins!

In the reference office, right above the computer station where I sit, is a painting of the Peterborough Town Library--“The Oldest Free Library in the World Supported by Taxation.” It caught my eye the first day I came in to do work, and I thought how serendipitous it was that it hung there as I began my library internship. You see, this summer I had interned in New Hampshire, specifically in the very tiny town of Peterborough!! While I was there I even went to this library to do work. It’s a promising start to the semester!

I am so excited to be interning with the reference department. It's been about three weeks and I've already learned a whole lot and am working on many exciting new things!

I am finished with Reference desk orientation and am now officially open for questions! My first student question involved finding books through MUSCAT—that, I thought, is something I can handle! Later, the phone rang, and I, at first, chickened out and let Meghan answer it. But the person calling seemed to have phone issues because she hung up, and called again. This time, I bolstered up my courage and took the call. After stumbling through my greeting (who knew that Musselman was such a hard name to pronounce!) I listened to her question, took her name and number and got to work. She was calling long distance from Colorado inquiring whether we had the Philadelphia Public Ledger in our library (good news, we do!). Although those were the only two questions I got, it was really nice to be able to successfully answer them—I hope that in the future I only get better in answering people’s questions!

I am working on a couple of projects off of my reference desk shifts as well. First, I am creating a short video with Jess and the help of Clint to show to future first-year students. The goal of the video is to allow current first-years to share what they wish they had known about Musselman library when they first came to Gettysburg. Filming is to occur in the near future—so more on that later! Second, I am working with Meggan on re-evaluating our children’s literature collection. This involves working with the education department to see which materials are most useful and researching the different children’s book prizes. It’s really exciting for me to be working on this project because I am really interested in going into children’s librarianship!

Conclusions

After being gone for about a week due to Easter break and a particularly unpleasant sinus/ear infection, I have returned to the Reference Department! I'm definitely glad to be back amongst the piles of books that need sorting and the pesky printer that seems to always need more paper.

I have really enjoyed working at Musselman Library. Just yesterday I arrived for my afternoon desk shift panicking about my mountains of homework and the financial burden of purchasing enough caffeine to get me through it all. However, upon my arrival in the Reference Office I discovered the latest McNaughton Books rental catalog for the Browsing Room. While at the desk I gave a couple students a few helpful answers, but I spent most of my time reading through the McNaughton catalog, selecting books for the Browsing Room, and imagining which ones I would like to read if I ever was able to find free time to read for fun. At 3:00 I left the Reference desk much more calm and focused than I was when I arrived. I think that picking out books for the Browsing Room was one of my favorite parts of my Internship. It was something that was helpful, would have visible results, and somehow just imagining that one day I might have free time in which I could read for fun always seems to make me feel a little better.

However, while picking out books for the Browsing Room, it occured to me that these books will not show up until July and I will definitely not be here then. This served as another reminder of how quickly my remaining hours at Gettysburg College and Musselman Library are disappearing. As far as my Library Intern Experience goes, after today I have a short desk shift on Thursday, another on Monday, and then I need to find time for an exit interview with my supervisor, and that's it. And then in a little more than a couple short weeks, Gettysburg College will release me into the real world so I can find some real-life, and hopefully at least somewhat lucrative applications for my liberal arts degree. One such possible application is indeed graduate school for Library Science. While graduate school is not on my plate for next year, it is something that I would like to pursue in the near future. Even if I end up pursuing graduate studies in a field other than Library Science, I know that my Internship experience, especially the research skills and critical skills I have gained, will continue to inform whatever work I choose to pursue.

I can't say enough wonderful things about libraries, and especially about Musselman Library. Even before being given the Fortenbaugh Internship, the library was really like my second home on campus. (When I knew I was to be studying here very late, I frequently went as far as to bring a pair of PJ pants with me. If that doesn't make something a second home, I don't know what does.) Now, it is a place that I can hardly imagine not spending time in every day. Although I am very close to being academically prepared to leave Gettysburg College, I am definitely not ready to go. While it is true that someday I will (hopefully) finish paying off my student loans, I will always be indebted to Gettysburg College and Musselman Library for the the experiences they have given me.

The Next Level of Understanding CONTENTdm

Hello everyone and Happy Wednesday once again! As promised from my last blog entry, I come to you with new knowledge about CONTENTdm! If you remember from my previous post, I had learned how to input the metadata in the correct fields and organize the folders to be harvested by CONTENTdm. I could upload these digitized Tipton photos and their accompanying metadata for approval (this is the "digitized pergatory" I mentioned last time). But one final step that I did not know how to do was "take down" or delete the old digitized Tipton photos and "put up" the new digitized Tipton photos with the fronts and backs. This changed this past week when Catherine took the time to demonstrate for me how to complete this process.

Catherine began by showing me where the newly digitized photos and their metadata appeared on the CONTENTdm administration website. During the uploading process CONTENTdm checks for any new important changes that deviate from the other digitized photos already in the GettDigital college photograph collection. One deviation my modified metadata files had concerned the name I placed in the Creator field. This means that in the column where I am supposed to put the photographer's name as printed on the photo, I put a new name that no other photos in the GettDigital college photograph collection had. This was a great sign because my primary responsibility in this project is to go through these photographs taken by William Tipton and modify the creator name according to the way it appears on the photograph itself.

As you can see in the photos above, over the years William Tipton modified the way in which he marked his photos. From the mid 1870s to 1880, Tipton stamped his photos with "W. H. Tipton & Co." During the early 1880s, Tipton began stamping his photographs with simply "Tipton." From the mid-1880s on, Tipton adjusted his stamp once more to read "W. H. Tipton."

But back to CONTENTdm. After I informed CONTENTdm that these new creator names were acceptable, I could then select all of the uploaded Tipton photos I had modified and approve them. At this point, Catherine informed me that I needed to delete the old object files of the digitized photos I wanted to replace. After individually deleting each of these, I indexed the collection in order to add my new object files and delete the old ones. All in all, thanks to Catherine's great help, things went smoothly and I was able to complete the process from start to finish twice today without a problem!

As I learn more and more about digital collections, I am becoming all the more excited about starting graduate school in the fall. I will be attending the University of Pittsburgh in order to receive my Master's in Library and Information Science, with a specialization in Archives, Preservation, and records Management. I know that my experiences here in Special Collections will greatly aid me in understanding the concepts I will learn beginning in the fall. It is so awesome that, even as a novice without a master's degree, I have this opportunity to learn about the behind-the-scenes archival work that makes digital collections possible. I really can't wait to build upon this knowledge in the fall and to enrich my passion for archival studies! :)

The Known and the Unknown

Hello everyone and happy Wednesday! I've just emerged from another week in the world of CONTENTdm and I feel like I'm understanding more and more what it likes and what it doesn't like. Thus far, I've added a digitized image of the reverse side of close to 30 Tipton photographs!

During the process of adding metadata and digitized images to extant Tipton photographs in the GettDigital Collection, I have become more familiar with the steps needed to create folders that are compatible with the CONTENTdm system. In fact, I hardly cringe anymore when CONTENTdm is extracting the information I have placed within various file folders in order to create a cohesive entry for each photograph. :) For me, the most helpful step in the learning process was understanding more fully how CONTENTdm took the disparate metadata in excel spreadsheets and jpeg images and transformed it into a keyword searchable digitized photograph entry. Although I will not claim to know the tecnical intricacies of how CONTENTdm operates, I can see how the information I put in the different rows and columns (aka fields) of an excel spreadsheet are transferred into the metadata that appears under a digitized photograph in the GettDigital Collection.

Now that I have demonstrated how I am "in the know" about certain facets of CONTENTdm, I feel the need to also share one the aspects of the system that I'm not familiar with yet. After I have gone through the process of modifying and adding metadata and photographs, I upload the information in CONTENTdm and prepare it for publishing on the GettDigital Collection. My adjusted Tipton photo entries are in a certain digitzed pergatory of sorts until Catherine Perry, Special Collections' Archival Assistant, publishes them in the GettDigital Collection. In addition to adding the new entries, Catherine also has to take down the old, unmodified entries. Although I have yet to understand this process, Catherine has promised to show me how to do this next week! In this way, the unknown will be known before too long!

Musselman Library Reference Desk, this is Audrey, how may I help you?

I never thought I would feel this comfortable at the desk. At the end of last week a lot of librarians weren't in the building so I picked up one of their shifts. In January I never would have thought I could just volunteer for that. The idea of being at the desk alone was pretty scary, so the thought of being at the desk when there were very few librarians even in the building would have been flat out terrifying. But it was fine! There weren't too many questions because it was the lunch shift on Friday so for the most part students were either having lunch or had already checked out for the weekend, but I was still kept moderately busy answering people's questions.

I don't even get that nervous when the phone rings anymore! About half an hour ago someone doing genealogical research called the Reference Desk with questions about which library services are open to the public, and also asking about The Journals of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg. I told the man on the phone that our library is open for public use and that I would look into his questions and send him an e-mail. Several minutes ago I sent what I think was a very helpful e-mail about how to set up a library account for Adams County residents and about our two copies of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg's journals (one is in Special Collections).

I really enjoy being helpful and I like that my Internship allows me to do that. The flip side of that is that I feel bad when I am unhelpful, but at this point I think those moments are becoming few and far between. On that note, I think it's about time for me to help some students by refilling the printer paper.

Beginnings and Endings

Before I dedicate the rest of my blog entries to my work with CONTENTdm, I have one more exciting piece of news regarding the manuscript collection I processed... the finding aid for MS-118 Wikoff has been digitized and is now available on the Special Collections website! Here's the link! The photo to the right serves as the cover page to my completed finding aid. The three images in the center of my finding aid are photocopies of the three articles Mr. Wikoff published in the Gettysburg magazine based on the alumni letters that comprise the manuscript collection.

Now back to my current work at Special Collections! As I mentioned in my last post, I am in the midst of working with a collection of William H. Tipton's photographs that appear in the GettDigital collections. In addition to modifying the creator name and date of each photo, I am also adding a digitized image of the backs of many photos. As it stands now, only the fronts of the photos taken by Tipton are viewable online via the GettDigital Collection. Although I only want to add another view to a photograph already a part of the GettDigital collection, I cannot simply upload an image of the reverse side of the photo and be done. Rather, I have to copy already-existing information that describes the photograph (aka metadata) from an old excel spreadsheet into a new one. I then have to make other changes to the new spreadsheet, photocopy the reverse side of the photo, and save a copy of this image and the image of the front of the photo in a special folder.

The most fascinating facet of this project thus far has been to learn more about the work that goes into digitizing a photograph. All too often we take for granted the ability to keyword search a digitized collection without reflecting on the preparations that make the search possible. It's been really awesome to learn more about CONTENTdm and how it transforms excel spreadsheets and jpeg images into a digitized collection. As I hope can be seen in this entry, I have learned so much about the digitization process over this past week! However, as I am also sure is evident in this entry, I still have so much more to learn about the digitization process! In light of this, I am so thankful for the knowledgeable people that surround me and their kind willingness to answer all of my questions! :)