A little after 10PM on May 21, 1927, a 25-year-old pilot sets his single engine plane down gently in a landing field in France. Sleep-deprived, numb and cold, he makes history by becoming the first person to fly alone over the Atlantic Ocean and becomes the world’s first media superstar. He is Charles “Lucky Lindy” Lindbergh. Flying in The Spirit of St Louis which had an average cruising speed (108 mph) approximating many of today’s vehicles as they hurtle down the Turnpike, Lindbergh was at the controls for over 33 hours, navigating with little more than a compass and pre-plotted sailing charts. Awarded the Medal of Honor and the first recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross, jumped from captain in the US Army Air Corps Reserve to bird colonel, Lindbergh is feted wherever he goes. Tiring of the attention, he and his wife, along with their young son, Charles, Jr, retreat to High Fields, their recently built estate in Hopewell, NJ. On the night of March 1, 1932, Charles, Jr is kidnapped from the house and though ransom money is paid, the child is never returned. A body is found months later in the nearby woods, identified as Charles, Jr, and quickly buried. This “Crime of the Century” is followed by the “Trial of the Century.” Lindbergh alienates many with his views on Nazi Germany and the Jewish people and further distances himself with his isolationist views. Public reaction is typified by this editorial in the Borger(Texas) Daily Record of April 25, 1941: “It seems that Charles A Lindbergh never loses an opportunity to take a slap at Great Britain. On the other hand, there seems to be no record of [him]…belittling or criticizing Hitler….”(Hundreds of similar articles and letters will be found in his FBI files.) Having resigned his commission before the entry of the United States into World War II, he is rebuffed by President Roosevelt as he seeks re-instatement. Lindbergh turns to the private sector as a civilian consultant and actually makes combat runs in both fighters and bombers, recording the downing of a Japanese aircraft. His innovative tips help American flyers during the war and allow them to keep their planes in the air longer. After the war, he continues his reclusive life, publishing a memoir entitled The Spirit of St. Louis which goes on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1954, the same year he is recommissioned as a brigadier general in the US Air Force. In later years  he becomes an ardent conservationist and establishes a foundation to further his work. As his Pulitzer-winning biographer, A. Scott Berg, remarked in an interview: “I think he was a very flawed human being, who, at the same time, lived an utterly unique, fascinating life. I don’t know a soul who packed more living into 72 years than Charles Lindbergh did.” For additional information, please consult these two PBS sites: Chasing the Sun and the American Experience - Lindbergh. Also, check out this extensive New York Times section(free registration required) on Lindbergh as well as charleslindbergh.com and Lindbergh Trial(from NJ.com).

Guarini Library will have the following hours for the summer:

Summer I(May 19-June 23) & Summer II(July 7-August 7)

Sunday 11-5; Monday - Thursday 7:30-9

Intersession hours:

Monday-Thursday 8-5; with the exception of June 30-July 3 when we will be open from 8:30-4:30.

Tomorrow, May 14, over 1500 students will graduate from NJCU at the Izod Center in the Meadowlands. All pertinent information on the graduation will be found here. To find out who is giving commencement speeches elsewhere, try this site. Commencement speeches can have great import; for example, the Marshall Plan for rebuilding Europe was announced by George Marshall in his 1947 speech at Harvard. This short speech, only 1200 words, was practically ignored by reporters present but those in Europe who heard excerpts from the speech via the BBC immeditaely recognized the implications of the address for what it really was - America’s intention to bring Europe back from the devastating horrors of World War II. (Read about “The Ultimate Commencement Address” here.)  Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s “A World Split Apart” address at the 1978 Harvard commencement revealed his disappointment with Western culture. And let us not forget that US presidents are sought-after commencement day speakers as can be seen at this site which features speakers back to Woodrow Wilson.

“In preparation for today, I read a number of other commencement addresses. There seems to be an obligatory reference to Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. And also to give the perception that you are intelligent, you don’t actually have to BE intelligent, but just create the perception. This can usually be accomplished by a reference to Kafka-even if you have never read any of his…or her works.”  -Bob Newhart, Commencement Address, Catholic University, May 17, 1997.

 Founded in 1896, the National Fire Protection Association is the world’s largest organization devoted to fire safety. Comprised of over 81,000 individuals and 80 trade/industrial groups, the NFPA’s 300 codes “influence every building, process, service, design and installation in the United States”(from NFPA site). Its codes are the de facto fire codes for many municipalities and jurisdictions in this country; they are essentially the national fire codes. Guarini Library is proud to announce that we have online access to all the NFPA codes, and are one of but a handful of academic libraries that have this resource electronically. Just go our database by title section on the homepage, scroll down the alphabetical list until you reach the NFPA Codes Online, and you are good to go. You may search by code, by the master index, or by full text. And as long as you have your Gothic ID number, you may access this resource remotely. Invaluable for the fire sciences, public safety officials, or for anyone who proudly carries the appellation of “first responder.” While you are using this tool, please use it in conjunction with our fire science online resources subject guide. Read a chapter excerpt from Dennis Smith’s Report from Engine Co. 82, a bestseller in its day, and one of the most gripping reads ever. “Fire is a major national problem….Appallingly, the richest and most technologically advanced nation in the world leads all industrialized countries in per capita deaths and property loss from fire.” - from America Burning: The Report of The National Commission on Fire Prevention and Control(1973)

 What do Thomas Edison(this site allows you to search over 100,000 digital documents relating to him), Harriet Tubman(find her autobiography here), Albert Einstein(access to some of his papers is here), Buzz Aldrin(read his “Roadmap to Mars” here), Clara Barton(read some of her works here and here, and Vince Lombardi(read some of his quotes) all have in common. They, along with nine other worthies, are the first inductees into the New Jersey Hall of Fame. Although the Hall is only virtual, there are plans to build a physical structure as well. Congratulations to all the inductees! And do not forget to visit the NJCU Athletic Hall of Fame.

Today marks the 15th anniversary of the day the Web went public and our lives were forever changed. For more information read this interview with the web’s creator, Tim Berners Lee. For more information on the history of the Web and the Internet, take a look at this great list of sites put together by the Internet Society.

For more in depth reading, see the following books, all available at Guarini Library:

How the Internet works
Preston Gralla 
TK5105.875 .I57 G72423 2007               

Imagining the internet : personalities, predictions, perspectives
Janna Quitney Anderson
HM851 .A63 2005                           

The information revolution : the not-for-dummies guide to the history, technology, and use of the World Wide Web
J.R. Okin
TK5105.875 .I57 O39 2005                   
 

As the dread days of finals loom up, causing even the most stout-hearted a momentary pang of remorse, nay panic, the Library will be open until 11PM from Monday, May 5 through Thursday, May 8.

Contrary to what many people believe/hope, most transactions on the Internet are not private. From ISPs supplying information to dataminers to hackers to employers, individuals’ personal records are open to scrutiny. Therefore, the recent New Jersey Sureme Court decision in State of New Jersey v. Shirley Reid should come as welcome relief. Essentially, the NJ Supreme ruled that the need for a subpoena to access personal records also exists in the virtual world as it does in the material one. And, in more than one instance(p.14 for example), the NJ Supreme Court declares that Article 1, Paragraph 7 of the New Jersey Constitution provides better protection for individual’s internet rights than federal law. We proudly point to the fact that the New Jersey Library Association is listed as an amicus curiae. For additional information on this landmark ruling, you can read the following articles: one from the Associated Press and the other from Law.com. For additional information look at State Laws Relating to Internet Privacy. For an overview at the federal level, read this CRS report; and for a good FAQ on the topic, go to Privacy and the Internet: Traveling in Cyberspace Safely.

 Keeping Mark Twain’s observation in mind(it may found in his Chapters from my Autobiography: Chapter 20), the 2007 edition of the invaluable County and City Data Book has just been published. Being a statistical compilation of demographic and socio-economic statistics gleaned mainly from Census Bureau publications, this work provides insights into the ever-shifting landscape that defines the American populace. It concentrates on counties and cities with populations of 25,000 or more. But fear not, other statistical works are readily available with one click of your mouse: the Statistical Abstract of the United States, a staple of every library’s ready reference collection, published since 1878; the landmark Historical Statistics of the United States from Colonial Times to 1970; and the State and Metropolitan Area Data Book which, as its names implies, focuses on state and metro area statistics.  For a really interactive experience, please use the American Factfinder and find out how far you can drill down into the vast statistical universe that is the Census Bureau. Find out, for example, what languages are spoken in your community, what is the ethnic background of your town, etc. Other sources many be found both in the reference department of the Library as well as on the Library’s homepage under “selected web sites by subject-reference- statistics.” Let the enumerations begin!

“Libraries drew visits by more than half of Americans (53%) in the past year for all kinds of purposes … And it was the young adults in tech-loving Generation Y(age 18-30) who led the pack.” Such is one of the conclusions from the 2007 Pew report:  Information Searches That Solve Problems. Visit your libraries and enjoy them. Use the resources of the Guarini Library where you have access to over 250,000 books, more than 25,000 journals containing millions of articles, thousands of videos, group study rooms, viewing rooms, and over 150 public access computers. In addition to these riches, consult with your librarians, the true heart of any library, whose expertise ranges from art history through science fiction.

In honor of this special week, we have located additional web sites which feature books from various disciplines. Dime novels captivated the reading public in the second half of the nineteenth century. Their lurid covers and action-packed yarns were instant successes with the reading public, many of whom believed the often-fanciful adventures depicted within. Kit Carson who was unknowingly profiled in these novels, expressed surprise when he saw one: “We found a book in the camp, the first of the kind I had ever seen, in which I was represented as a great hero, slaying Indians by the hundred.” (Kit Carson’s Autobiography. Edited by Milo M Quaife. Chicago: Lakeside Press, 1935, p.135)  As he was illiterate (but spoke English, Spanish, and many Indian tongues) he had one of his companions read the story to him. You can look at some examples of this literature at Dime Novels and Penny Dreadfuls.

While some work has been done on the reading habits on the frontier (Jedediah Smith, the greatest of the mountain men, carried with him a much-read Bible while Jim Bridger thoroughly enjoyed having Shakespeare read to him as he, too, was illiterate) more work has been done with the colonists because more information is extant for many reasons. Look at the American Colonists’ Library to see what the well-educated read. Read eyewitness accounts of early exploration in North America in American Journeys from the Saga of Eric the Red through the journals of Lewis and Clark. Many monographs on the southern United States can be found at Documenting the American South and Online Library of the Southern Campaigns of the Revolutionary War. These are a few of the new web sites that have been added to the Library’s “Selected Web Sites by Subject” section. By using the sites found in the various subject categories, you have access to over 1,000,000 books online. So if you cannot get to the Library or a bookstore, there is still no excuse not to read.

“Reading gives us a place to go when we have to stay where we are.” - Mason Cooley