In the little things mean a lot department: Nancy Mosley, cataloger extraordinaire, and currently making considerable leeway into the bulk of uncataloged material at MMCD, has also made a significant contribution to the Library of Congress. Yes, that is correct: the Library of Congress.
Recently, she wrote them an email.
"I am a cataloger at The Mint Museums in Charlotte, North Carolina,and we have a large concentration in decorative arts and crafts. This includes glass. In cataloging books on this topic, I have found an inconsistency in the use of the terms "Art glass" and "Glass art" in the literature, and unfortunately in the LC Catalog. I have not found any scope notes on these two topics, either. In the Classification Web, the LC Class number associated with "Art glass" implies that it is a specific type of glass, and for "Glass art" it is a large range of numbers. I am using these implied definitions in choosing which subject heading to use, but would appreciate some more official guidance. Can you help?Sincerely,Nancy Mosley"
To which they responded:
We will add scope notes to these headings to clarify usage. The definition proposed for Art glass is: works on varieties of decorative colored glass produced in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The definition proposed for Glass art is: works on art that is created using glass. Milicent Wewerka, Cataloging Policy and Support Office, Library of Congress
As Nancy noted in her email to me telling me of this, "It pays to be a pest. The Library of Congress should have done this ages ago." But they didn't and YOU Nancy are the one that got them to do it. For those of you unfamiliar with the responsiveness of bureaucracy, this is HUGE!!
Congratulations Nancy!!
Back in the grant trenches department: The retrospective conversion is officially done. This means all the card catalog and notebook records have been converted to digital form and can go into the library software. Hopefully, that will take place over the next couple of days. We are looking to show you all the catalog - staff only! - after the first of the year. Can you believe it? I'm not quite sure I do.
In with the new department: Welcome Joe! He's made the rounds and I think everyone has had a chance to meet Joe Eshleman, the new library assistant. If we've missed anyone, please come by and say hi! He is here on Tues., Wed., and Thurs. Although he is kind of new to the library field, he is an old hand at the museum/non-profit world having worked at Discovery Place for 12 years. Welcome Joe!
This is not goodbye department: Shawn's last day is Friday, November 2 BUT she will be back - she promised! - on a volunteer basis to help with barcoding all these dang books! She is already (and has been) working full-time at Heroes, so the last month she has been doing double-duty big time. Thanks for everything Shawn! And see you soon!
Road trip department: SOFA chicago opens today and a little piece of MMCD is there too courtesy of the Founder's Circle along with intrepid staff. Wouldn't it be cool if one of them could blog and share impressions, images of the show, reactions to our exhibit booth? Next best thing, SOFA's blog: http://sofaexpo.com/loop/
And of course the last but not least department: Since it is always fun to see how others see us, let's look! Here's a search on Flickr - the photo sharing site - about US! Enjoy :)
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=mint+museum+-toys+-champoy+-sakura&m=text
