Letterpress Printing: Jennifer Farrell, Starshaped Press, Thursday, April 5th, 4:00-6:00pm, Archives Seminar Room, Collins Library

Since 1999, Jennifer Farrell has operated Starshaped Press in Chicago, focusing on printing everything from business cards to posters, as well as custom commissions, wholesale ephemera and limited edition prints & books. All work in the studio is done with metal and wood type, making Starshaped one of the few presses in the country producing commercial work while preserving antique type and related print materials. Jennifer’s work has been repeatedly recognized both in print and design blogs, and has appeared in poster shows throughout the USA and Europe.

Work can be viewed at www.starshaped.com.

Posted in Events | Leave a comment

What does it mean to live forever…

EternalLifeRachel is a woman with a problem: immortal life. Her recent troubles―widowhood, a failing business, an unemployed middle-aged son―are only the latest of her problems. In the 2,000 years since she made a spiritual bargain to save the life of her first son back in Roman-occupied Jerusalem, she’s tried everything to free herself, and only one other person in the world understands: a man she once loved passionately, who has been stalking her through the centuries, convinced they belong together forever.

But as the twenty-first century begins and her children and grandchildren―consumed with immortality in their own ways, from the frontiers of digital currency to genetic engineering―develop new technologies that could change her fate and theirs, Rachel knows she must find a way out.

Posted in Popular Reading Collection | Leave a comment

From the Archives & Special Collections: Color Our Collections

archives_Feb7-picsThe only thing better than reading books is coloring them! This week, February 5 – 9, the Archives & Special Collections is participating in #ColorOurCollections, a week-long coloring fest sponsored by the New York Academy of Medicine. Participating institutions use materials from their collections to create coloring pages. Here is a link to the Archives & Special Collections coloring book for this year, featuring images from several 1920s Tamanawas yearbooks. Print them off, color them in, and post them on social media with the #ColorOurCollections hashtag. Tag us on Twitter or Instagram @psarchives so we can see your artwork!  Last year there were over one hundred libraries, archives, and other cultural institutions from all over the world that participated in this event. Institutions have contributed coloring pages based on children’s classics, natural history, anatomical atlases, yearbooks, and more.

If our four page coloring book isn’t enough to satisfy your artistic side, check out our coloring book from last year and explore other libraries collections at the #ColorOurCollections website. Happy coloring!

The Archives & Special Collections is open Monday through Thursday from 10:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. or by appointment.

By Sierra Scott

Posted in From the Archives | Leave a comment

From the Stacks – A few of our favorites – 1892: Gossip in a Library

Stacks_GossipInLibraryGossip in a Library!  Another title that we just could not resist, but don’t pick up this book expecting to find out some long forgotten secrets of scandalous library behavior. Edmund Gosse, the author,  was a prolific man of letters. He worked as a librarian, English translator, literary historian, author and critic.  His book is a collection of essays about the special books in his private collection. Gosse started his career out as a librarian at the British Museum and later became a lecturer at Cambridge University. His final position was as librarian for the House of Commons. He married an artist who was associated with the Pre-Raphaelites.  In an article that appeared in the New York Times on May 9th, 1892, the reviewer describes the publication as a happy volume that excites curiosity!*

Gosse’s intriguing essays on books are a must for any bibliophile!

A free audiobook is available, too, if you want to listen!

*New publications. (1892, May 09). New York Times (1857-1922), pp. 3-3. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.ups.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/95037856?accountid=1627

Posted in From the Stacks - A few favorites | Leave a comment

Research Tip #2: Seek out multiple news sources

SEEK OUT multiple news sources to get a variety of viewpoints and media frames.

Posted in Research Tips, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Take the Valentine Trivia Quiz!

CALLOUT_ValentineThis year’s trivia quiz is all about people and based on one of our most popular databases filled with facts.  Each clue has some connection with Valentine’s Day – it could be a profession, a color, a name or an event!   You can click on the link below to find the answers!

  1. Only in power for forty days, this Italian was beloved for goodness.
  2. This composer is known for Heartfelt  music.
  3. A comic with a sweet name.
  4. An actress and dancer with a wandering spirit.
  5. Sweet Home, Arkansas is where this writer hails from.
  6. A trumpeter with a sweet personality.
  7. Like Water, Like Chocolate.
  8. We know he loves wine but hates Merlot.
  9. She has a lot of cards to her name.
  10. A legacy of red was left by this nurse.

Trivia Answers

Portion of graphic designed by Freepik

Posted in Did You Know? | Leave a comment

Valentine Trivia Answers

  1. Only in power for forty days, this Italian was beloved for goodness:  Pope Valentine
  2. This composer is known for Heartfelt music:  Bruce Adolphe, The Tell Tale Heart Opera
  3. A comic with a sweet name:  John Candy
  4. An actress and dancer with a wandering spirit:  Gypsy Rose Lee
  5. Sweet Home, Arkansas is where this writer hails from:  Henry Dumas
  6. A trumpeter with a sweet personality:  Harry Sweets Edison
  7. Like Water, Like Chocolate: Alfonso Arau, Director of movie, Like Water for Chocolate
  8. We know he loves wine but hates Merlot:  Paul Edward Valentine Giamatti
  9. She has a lot of cards to her name:  Robin Wight (House of Cards)
  10. A legacy of red was left by this nurse:  Clara Barton
Posted in Did You Know? | Leave a comment

Distinguished Visitor at Collins Library

This week Collins Library was happy to host a very distinguished visitor: Flat Stanley. Stanley is a boy whose bulletin board flattens him one night in his bedroom. At first he is sad, but then he finds all sorts of things he is able to do when he is flat. He can fold himself up in an envelope and mail himself to visit friends in faraway places. Students in the Fulton Elementary School class of Mrs. Rosado, in the town of Ephrata, Pennsylvania (2, 700 miles away from Tacoma) sent Flat Stanley to the Collins Library for a visit. Flat Stanley is a book by Jeff Brown, first published in 1964. Since the publication, numerous adaptations of Flat Stanley have appeared and in 1995 the Flat Stanley Project was started by a teacher to foster communication and understanding amongst schoolchildren worldwide. Students send Flat Stanley to schools all around the world and Stanley then has a chance to learn about the community. Stanley is returned home in an envelope full of photos and stories about his visit. Stanley’s connection to Puget Sound: Jane Carlin’s grandniece, Madison Kauffman, is a student in Mrs. Rosado’s class at Fulton Elementary School. Check out some of these photos of Stanley at Puget Sound.

Posted in Did You Know? | Leave a comment

From the Archives & Special Collections: Fingerprints

Jan31_archivesLooking to learn a little bit about fingerprinting between your classes or errands? Ron Thom has got you covered! President Emeritus Ron Thomas donated a collection of his favorite books to the Archives & Special Collections upon his retirement, and one of the books is Practical Fingerprinting by B.C. Bridges. In this book you can discover a little more about the history of the fingerprint identification process. You can learn terms like “Radial Loop” or my personal favorite, the “Exceptional Arch” to describe attributes of fingerprints. President Emeritus Thomas was specifically interested in the history of criminology in the Victorian Era. At this time the modern police force was emerging, identification technology was becoming more advanced, and detective stories were booming. President Emeritus Thomas wrote in his essay, “Literature is Everything”,that these phenomena were all “forms of storytelling, too, about the very nature of individuals during a time of dramatic social change”. The book collection also contains many other criminology books such as Crime: It’s Causes and Remedies by Cesare Lombroso and Criminal Sociology by Enrico Ferri. Come to the Archives and Special Collections and explore a bit of the history of criminology!

The Archives & Special Collections is open on Monday – Thursday from 10:00-3:00 p.m. or by appointment.

By Laure Mounts

Posted in From the Archives | Leave a comment

A simple walk to school breaks a bond…

CALLOUT_bloodsistersAll starts off normal one morning when three little girls set off for school. Within an hour, one of them is dead. Fifteen years later, the surviving girls are going through their own struggles. Kitty can no longer speak and has no memory of the accident. She lives in an institution and is unlikely to ever leave. While Art teacher Alison seems fine on the surface, she struggles underneath her façade. She is having problems making ends meet and trying to forget her past. She takes a teaching job at a prison, despite her fears, and this is when she starts receiving alarming notes. In the shadows, someone is watching the two, someone who never   forgot what happened fifteen years ago. This is someone who wants revenge, a revenge that will only be complete by taking another life.

       Check in out in the Popular Reading Collection!

Posted in Popular Reading Collection | Leave a comment