Mary Couts Burnett Library is currently accepting nominations for its 12th annual TCU Library Staff Excellence Recognition Award, sponsored annually by the Friends of the TCU Library. The honoree will receive a certificate of merit and a monetary award at a holiday gathering in January.

Please return the nominating form (Staff Award Nomination Form) to John Araujo, Chair of the Award Committee, TCU Box 298400, by Friday, December 11, 2009.

2009 Library Staff Recognition Award Committee
John Araujo, Chair
Dr. June Koelker (Dean)
Dr. Karen Steele, Chair Faculty Library Committee

Ebrary has created a publicly available research center featuring a highly interactive, searchable database of documents pertaining to the H1N1 influenza pandemic.

Available today at http://h1n1.ebrary.com, the new site contains a growing selection of reports, papers, newsletters, posters, and other important materials from government agencies and other trusted sources.

The Friends of the TCU Library presents it’s Fall FacultySpeak event, “Iran After the Disputed Presidential Election of 2009,” Monday, November 16th at 5 pm in the Library Conference Room. Light refreshments will be served.

Dr. Manochehr Dorraj of the Political Science is a frequent commentator on global and Middle Eastern affairs. He earned his PhD from UT Austin and has been on the TCU faculty since 1990. He has earned many teaching awards while at TCU including:

• “The Most Inspiring Professor Award”, Pan-Hellenic Council, TCU, 2004
• “Faculty Appreciation Award in recognition of Distinguished Teaching and service”, TCU, 2000, 2002
• “Professor of the Year Award”, TCU Student House of Representatives, 1998
• “The Mortar Board Preferred Professor Award”, 1992, 1993, 1998, 2000, 2002, 2004
  and
• Finalist,” “Wassenich Award for Mentoring” 1999

The Friends of the TCU Library host FacultySpeak once each semester. The event is designed to offer the TCU campus and others an opportunity to learn about faculty research.

American History in Video has added 1,623 new titles which is approximately 238 new hours of streaming video.  In total, American History in Video now comprises 3,149 titles – 766 hours of streaming video.

Highlights:

New Partner: Pennebaker-Hegedus Films
Six films including the iconic films Monterey Pop and Jimi Plays Monterey; Town Bloody Hall, where Norman Mailer, Germaine Greer, and others debate women’s rights and politics; You’re Nobody ‘Til Somebody Loves You, the film of Timothy Leary’s wedding; and Chiefs, the film of the 1968 police chief convention where the police talk candidly about civil rights, riots, race relations, and more, all coming out of the demonstrations and protests of that year.

PBS
Many new titles including the balance of the Ken Burns Jazz series and The Nuremberg Trials.

Universal Newsreel
Added dozens of years starting in 1929. The series is almost complete!

Visit American History in Video’s “What’s New” section to see all of the new content.

The TCU Library now subscribes to OnePetro, a full-text database of over 80,000 documents relating to the oil and gas exploration and production industries. Ten professional organizations have included their technical literature in this important database:

• American Petroleum Institute (API)
• American Rock Mechanics Association (ARMA)
• American Society of Safety Engineers (ASSE)
• Offshore Technology Conference (OTC)
• NACE International (corrosion engineers)
• Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE)
• Society of Petrophysicists and Well Log Analysts (SPWLA)
• The Society of Underwater Technology (SUT)
• World Petroleum Council (WPC)

Celebrate Archives Month with us! Dr. David B. Gracy II, the Governor Bill Daniel Professor in Archival Enterprise at UT-Austin will speak about the importance of archives and the historical record from 4-5pm on Thursday, October 22, in the library conference room. To gain a greater appreciation of archives, please join us for this talk by a prominent educator and past State Archivist of Texas.

In addition, Special Collections will be exhibiting selections from some of its archival collections on October 22.  The exhibit will be in the Special Collections Department on the second floor of the library and will be open from 8:00-5:30.  For more information, contact Mike Strom at x7595 or m.strom@tcu.edu.

TCU Press is proud to announce the September publication of Calvin Littlejohn: Portrait of a Community in Black and White. Littlejohn was for many years the only photographer for the black schools, churches, and businesses in Fort Worth, and he documented a vibrant community during the Jim Crow era. Bob Ray Sanders, Associate Editor/Senior Columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, wrote the introduction and section essays. The images are housed in the Littlejohn Archive at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas at Austin. The Fort Worth Public Library and TCU Press are cosponsoring a book launch at the Ella Mae Shamblee Branch Library, 1062 Evans Avenue, on Thursday, October 22, 2009, from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. Contact Susan R. Petty, 817.257.5074 for more information.

Amon G. Carter was a big booster of TCU football as well as publisher and founder of the Fort Worth-Star Telegram. He started life poor, but with wit and drive, he became a person of renown and influence, meanwhile amassing a great fortune. He spearheaded the building of the Amon G. Carter Stadium at TCU, and threw his money and personality into the football team.

In 1938, a great brouhaha went up and rumors flew when TCU accepted an invitation to play in the Sugar Bowl at New Orleans, rather than in the Cotton Bowl at Dallas. Columnists opined on hidden motives and shady schemes, with Amon Carter in the middle.

Reproductions from The Amon Carter Papers and photos from Special Collections tell the stories in an exhibit in the Library lobby.

The library will host a Graduate Student Orientation on September 10^th from noon-1pm in the Library Conference Room (B29). Come learn about special library services for graduate students, meet your subject liaison librarian, munch on light snacks, and tour the library building.