WAML: News & Notes - October 2008

A wonderful time was had by all at the WAML meeting in October in San Diego. They really do have America's Finest Weather, as the Chamber of Commerce likes to say. Photos are on Flickr.

Nominate a cartographic resource for the 2009 Gale Cengage Learning Award for Excellence in Reference and Adult Library Services. The University of Nebraska is one of the previous winners. How about nominating an excellent online mapping site that's "an imaginative and unique resource" that appeals to the general public as well as academia? We could give map libraries some great publicity!

There's a new exhibit that looks wonderful: L.A. Unfolded: Maps from the Los Angeles Public Library. It runs through January 22.

There is now a web site for the Federal Agencies Digitization Guidelines Initiative. The initiative represents a collaborative effort to establish a common set of guidelines for digitizing historical materials.
The Still Image Working Group will focus its efforts on books, manuscripts, maps, and photographic prints and negatives. Its members include the Library of Congress, the National Agricultural Library, the National Archives and Records Administration, the National Gallery of Art, the National Library of Medicine, the National Technical Information Service, the National Transportation Library, the Smithsonian Institution, the U.S. Geological Survey, and the U.S. Government Printing Office.
One blogger's opinion: the "Off the Map" blog presented its list of the Top 25 Blogs in GIS, GeoWeb and Cartography.

What are you doing for GIS Day 2008 on Wednesday November 19th? Will your library have a program or a display? Email me a photo and we'll have an online display.

The Northwest Government Information Network (NGIN) will be having its one-day fall meeting on Friday, November 7, 2008 at Western Washington University (WWU) Libraries, Bellingham, WA.
The featured program will be To Catch a Map Thief: The WWU Story of Purloined Maps. Rob Lopresti and Julie Fitzgerald of WWU Libraries will be detailing the story of stolen maps from its collection and others by James L. Brubaker. The program will also detail securit improvements at the library.
PERSISTENCE OF MEMORY: Sustaining Digital Collections
December 9-10, 2008, InterContinental Chicago Hotel,
Chicago, Illinois
Presented by the Northeast Document Conservation Center; co-sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, the American Library Association, and Center for Research Libraries.
For complete conference info and online registration:
http://www.nedcc.org/education/conferences/pom2008/pombroc.php
For Web stories and sample comments from past participants of
Persistence of Memory: http://www.nedcc.org/about/archives.php

ALA Annual 2010 in Washington D.C

Want to be a presenter at the ESRI Education User Conference (EDUC) next July? The deadline for submissions has been extended to November 14, 2008. There are 2 session types:
- Moderated Paper Sessions, in which presenters have approx. 20 minutes for a lecture-style presentation
- Illustrated Paper Sessions, in which presenters give a 5-minute overview and then have 40 minutes for small-group discussions
Future WAML Meetings:
- Salt Lake City, April 29-May 2, 2009

New listserv discussion on genre/form headings: The ALCTS-CCS Subject Analysis Committee Subcommittee on Genre/Form Implementation invites interested parties to join a listserv discussion on issues relating to LC genre/form (155) headings and their implementation in library catalogs. The subcommittee will facilitate the discussion, posing a different question every week. The discussion will begin on October 27. If you are interested in participating, please go to http://lists.ala.org/sympa/info/form-genre and choose Subscribe.

Really really tired of hearing from McCain & Obama? Here's a nice site for maps of the Canadian election held in October.

View the Global Electoral College map at Economist.com to see how the world would vote.

Read Salim Mohammed's update on the Manoa MAGIS site that now has 7,000 images of Hawai'i, taken between 1950-2000, and now available for viewing and download.

You can get a nifty educational poster at the Water Education Foundation called the California Water Map. It's 24" x 36", it's beautiful, and it's on sale ($10.99, down from $15). Go to www.watereducation.org. Under the "Products" section, choose "Maps & Posters". Scroll down and you'll see other map-posters, including a Nevada Water Map (2004).

The Iowa Department of Transportation has put up its Historic Archives Digital Collections, "a compilation of transportation-related photos, maps and other documents gathered by DOT employees or donated to the department".

The Old Map Gallery, in Denver, was recently voted the Best Antique Store in that area. It's fun to browse their web site and dream of buying more of their wonderful rare maps.

It's always a happy day when the new Longitude newsletter comes out, full of news of travel books and the occasional new map. You can sign up for an emailed newsletter, which links to their web site. They often highlight mysteries set in foreign countries, and I know WAML has many mystery-lovers. They list excellent children's books about other countries, if you've got kids to buy gifts for.