Ethiopian-born children's librarian Yohannes Gebregeorgis, with an MLS from the University of Texas at Austin and a stint at the San Francisco Public Library (as SLJ reported), has gone home to establish children's libraries via the nonprofit Ethiopia Reads. He even wrote the first bilingual Amharic-English children's book, Silly Mammo. 

Now he's nominated as one of the Top 10 CNN Heroes for 2008. Librarians, I'm sure will be voting.

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After 19-year-old Shana Kay died unexpectedly in 2005, her family honored her last November by donating to the Commack Public Library, NY, a $5000 bronze statue of a young girl reading.

Though the 300-pound statue was bolted and cemented in the ground, it was stolen from the library’s front entrance in September, Newsday reported; police believe copper thieves are responsible and put the word out to scrap metal dealers. The library also seeks tips on the theft..

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See LJ's complete Sarah Palin and Libraries coverage.

For now, it seems, the Republicans and Democrats will be arguing past each other on the issue of Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin's relationship with the Wasilla Public Library when she was city mayor a dozen years ago.

Palin recently declared, "I certainly never advocated banning books," even though there's evidence that, as a City Council member, she expressed dismay about the presence of one book in the library and ...Read More

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Two closed branches of the Hartford Public Library, CT, have been resurrected, thanks to state funds, and in the publication Hartford Business, writer Laurence D. Cohen poses a provocative question:
"Left unanswered in the Hartford melodrama, for example, is how many branches of the public library does this city of 125,000 actually need?... Along with the central library downtown, the city seems to have about nine branches scattered hither and yon. Is it written in the Bible that nine is the right number?" 

Well, the city of New Haven has about the same popu...Read More

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A high mark in the popular, if flawed, Hennen's American Public Library Ratings (HAPLR), has become a staple promotional citation for certain libraries. However, the latest iteration of HAPLR, published in the October 2008 issue of American Libraries, has been retracted, because the figures used in compiling the statistics were the same (from 2004) as those used in 2006. “I apologize to everyone for this terrible mistake, especially the great staff at American Libraries,” Thomas J. Hennen Jr. said on his web site.

“I referred to the wrong datas...Read More

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The Great American Book Drive is being kicked off at my local Brooklyn Public Library this Saturday, with future fall events in Chicago, and Boston this fall. 

Basically, it's a newfangled way for libraries to solicit book donations; the donated materials are then sold by "Better World Books, a business with a mission," which shares the revenues with the libraries and with nonprofit organizations to support literacy efforts. BPL, a spokesperson tells me, will get about 30% of sales.

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See LJ's complete Sarah Palin and Libraries coverage.

The local Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman got an exclusive interview today with Alaska Governor and Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin, and got a chance to ask questions about Palin's posture, as Wasilla mayor 12 years ago, regarding the Wasilla Public Library.

Unfortunately, Palin's answers, via e-mail, aren't fully illuminating, since she isn't pressed to respond, for example, to a New York Times ...Read More

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See LJ's complete Sarah Palin and Libraries coverage.

Neither of the presidential candidates have said much on the stump about libraries, as far as I can tell, and Republican vice-presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska has special reason to avoid talking about libraries. 

But Illinois Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic candidate, did offer some supportive words about libraries in his 2005 address at the American Library Association annual conference in Chicago....Read More

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Taking note of library closings and reduced library hours in Florida, Arlen Bensen, a student at the University of South Florida Graduate School of Library and Information Science, observes in an Orlando Sentinel op-ed, "This is the worst possible moment for such action, as people in economic distress now need access to free information and services more than ever."

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See LJ's complete Sarah Palin and Libraries coverage.

The Detroit Free Press blog has a report--and photos--from the rally yesterday for the Democratic presidential ticket: "I'm not into crowd 'guesstimation' but suffice to say that Sunday's crowd at the Obama/Biden rally on Woodward in front of the Detroit Public Library was pretty darn big. Obama waited inside the library before his speech. Meaning that if Obama were to be elected, we would have a president that's actually visited a library."
 
That's a tad, uh, catty.

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On September 6, the San Francisco Public Library (SFPL) launched its fourth annual One City One Book effort with something different—a “book mob,” using blogs and local online arts calendars to alert people to form flash mobs. Some 60 people showed up; a clever anchor was the SFPL bookmobile, with the ile on the word bookmobile strategically covered with a One City One Book logo so that attendees could gather at an actual “bookmob.”

West of Kabul, East of New York: An Afghan American Story (Picador, 2003) by San Francisco writer Ta...Read More

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Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama and his running mate, Joe Biden, will hold a rally Sunday outside the Main Library of the Detroit Public Library in Michigan. 

The library is not the subject of the rally, of course, but it is (and offers) a central civic space in a sprawling metropolitan area and thus serves as a good gathering place.

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