On Wednesday, LSTA, the WI Library Services and Technology Act, will grant 5 libraries funding for projects. These libraries include the Kenosha Public Library, Indianhead Federated Library System, Hedberg Pubic Library, Eastern Shores Library System and New Glarus Public Library.  We want to say congratulations to these libraries!

In the past, we have worked with three of these libraries on digitizing their content. One collection that you may recognize is the Kenosha County History Collection. This collection contains texts that depict the early European-American settlement in Kenosha and a great image collection. The family albums in the collection are two of the most well-preserved documents created by L. M. Thiers. Handwritten photograph captions and detailed descriptions make them the most personal works featured in this collection. 


We have also worked with Indianhead Federated Library System on the Chippewa, Dunn, Eau Claire, Pepin, St. Croix, and Rusk Counties: Local History Collection. The Indianhead Federated Library System is comprised of 53 member public libraries in West-Central and Northwestern Wisconsin. The collection’s texts are comprised of community records, local history narratives, retrospectives, and high school yearbooks. The collection’s images include street scenes, historical buildings, notable people, and important events.


Lastly, we worked with Hedberg Public Library on our Janesville's Past Collection. This is an excellent image collection, which also includes city and County directories, providing researchers information for both the 19th and 20th centuries.


These are all great collections and are widely viewed and appreciated.  We are excited to see what new projects all of the grant winners will be working on this year. 

This week has been pretty stressful and to easy the tension I thought I would blog about something fun, crazy hats.  Hats are awesome, and at some point in your life you will either want to or have to wear a crazy hat. So let's have a little laugh this friday, and look at some crazy hat pictures.  


Now this image at the left does not really have a crazy hat in it, but come on, a dog in a hat is crazy. This picture just makes me less tense just looking at it.  



This hat on the right, is amazing.  If I could find a hat like that I would definitely wear it. Can you guess what this hat is a uniform for?


And then there is this picture of the crazy hat store! Oh wait, these are “Royce” brand women’s hats at the Henderson-Hoyt department store in Manitowoc, Wisconsin. The display includes more than a dozen hats! 


This woman on the right has the kind of crazy hats I want to wear. I wonder if she bought this hat at the store in the previous picture? 


All of these hats have made my day a little more fun.  Do you have any favorite images of crazy hats in our collection? Or maybe a fun story about your favorite crazy hat?


I hope everyone goes out and has a great weekend.

Yesterday we tweeted images from one of our new collections, the School of Library and Information Studies Teaching Slides Collection. This collection brings together unique and valuable teaching materials from University of Wisconsin staff and faculty. This collection hopes to aid in scholarship and study of these materials and disciplines.  

Our Twitter and Facebook fans enjoyed seeing parts of this collection and we learned some fun facts about the content.


Fun Fact #1: The image on the left is from the book Der Struwwelpeter, which also happens to be the book Dwight reads to the children in The Office episode, Take your Daughter to Work Day. 


Fun Fact #2: We also learned that one of our Facebook friends was given this book while they lived in Germany to learn the language!


This collection is very interesting and different then a lot of other materials we have throughout our collections.  Did you see anything yesterday or in the collection that you thought was particularly interesting or had a fun fact you want to share? 

Welcome back to all of the UW-Madison students who went away for spring break.  I hope you all got reenergized for this last push until summer.  But, while you were laying on the beach or laying on your couch at home, the women's hockey team was winning championships.

The Wisconsin women's hockey team won its fourth national championship in the past six years yesterday. They beat Boston University, 4-1, to win the title.  You can find more information about the game and the players in this article on the athletic website.

This article is from the 2000 Badger Yearbook.  It highlights the first time the women's hockey team took the ice at UW-Madison. There were nearly 4,000 fans in attendance at that game including the Govenor and Olympic Gold Medalists Cammie Granato and Karen Bye.


We also have the athletic media guide for this inaugural season.  Our UW-Madison Athletic Department Collection has media guides for almost all of the seasons.

We just wanted to say congratulations to the women's hockey team, and thanks for a great season and many seasons past.

And to all of the students out there, stay focused we're almost done!

This weekend will be filled with students commuting somewhere for spring break.  Campus will be quiet for a while, but I bet you can find students using all means of transportation to get to their final destination.

Maybe you are one of the lucky going somewhere warm for break.  Laying on the beach or and relaxing sounds great, but I hope you booked a larger airplane then this one.

Maybe you are a student participating in an alternative break.  Building houses and helping people sounds like a great way to spend your time.  How are you commuting, maybe a train like this one?

Or maybe you are a student like me, heading home to unwind from a long week of finals and papers. You might live far away and be taking a plane or a train like the ones pictured, but I will be taking a bus to good 'ol Kenosha.

Whatever your plans are I hope your transportation goes smoothy and you have a relaxing break.

See all of you back on campus soon.

Our University of Wisconsin Collection is still growing.  Today I thought I'd highlight the newest collection. The History of UW-La Crosse is a great image collection showing the evolution of this campus.  

You can search the collection for information or browse the images by subject: athletics, buildings, daily life, events, landscape, music, people and traditions. 

The image on the left is from the athletic section.  It shows cheerleaders on the UW-La Crosse campus circa 1980s. There are a ton of great sports images in this collection.  

The image on the right is from the traditions section.  The image shows the homecoming hanging of the lantern tradition. The "Hanging of the Lantern" tradition began over the south entrance to Graff Main Hall at the suggestion of English teacher Orris O. White who said, "We'll hang the lantern in the old college tower...You won't need to look for the key - the door will be open."

The images in this collection are great.  We highlighted a few on Facebook and Twitter on Tuesday, do you have any favorites? Let us know!

One of our Facebook Fans requested we highlight our Publishers' Bindings Online collection. This collection is a partnership between us and The University of Alabama, University Libraries. The collection contains decorative bindings, along with a comprehensive glossary and guide to the elements of these objects.  This collection hopes to bring greater awareness to the cultural and historical significance of books.

The collection brings together 5,000 decorative bindings from two collections in one place.  This project increases the awareness of the general public about the importance of publishers' bindings as reflections of historical events, art movements, and the evolution of commercial binderies.This resource will encourage people to look at their own books, and to gain an understanding of design movements and trends both within the United States as well as in Europe. 

The book shown on the left is The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The book dates back to 1899, and the binding is signed by Margaret Armstrong. The book is covered with white checkerboard grain cloth with gold, red, orange and green stamping on the front and spine. The endpapers are printed with brown goblet, pipe and pitcher pattern.  

The book on the right is a book of poems by Emily Dickinson. The book is bound with Half white leather with black and tan floral printed paper sides. It also has gold stamping on front and back. The endpapers are printed with black floral pattern. 

For those interested in books or material culture this is a great collection for you.  But for those who may find a book at grandma's house with beautiful binding, take a look at this collection, you may learn something about that book.

Desk and Bookcase, ca. 1750

On Monday, I asked our Facebook Fans what collections they would like to hear more about or share with other users.  We had a couple people mention our Decorative Arts collection, so today I will share with you more information about, in particular, our Chipstone Collection.  


The Chipstone Collection contains more then 1,250 digitized images of beautiful ceramics, furniture and prints dating from the 17th to early 19th century.  The objects belong to the Chipstone Foundation, which was created in 1965 in part to preserve and interpret the decorative arts collections of Stanley and Polly Stone of Fox Point, Wisconsin. 


This image on the left is a beautiful piece of furniture found in the collection.  This desk and bookcase dates back to the 1750s and is attributed to John Welch.  This piece is made of mahogany and is intricately carved with great detail. 


This piece on the right is part of the ceramics collection. This harvest jug also dates back to the 1750s and is attributed to John Hockin. The jug is pale red-brown earthenware and is extremely detailed.  The piece has a unicorn and a lion holding the Royal Arms with the initials GR for George II.  Also below the handle the rhyme:

Harvest Jug, 1748

now I am come for

to Supply your workmen when

in harvest dry when they do

Labour hard and Sweat good drink

is better fare then meat also

in winter when tis cold I like

wise then good drink can

hold both Seasons do the

Same require also most

men do good drink desire

John Hockin

1748 

This collection is great for furniture enthusiasts and just people who appreciate great craftsmanship.  The collection also has prints that show views of Boston and other U.S. cities during the 1700s. 

The Chipstone Collection is only one part of our Decorative Arts Collection.  Dig around a little and you never know what you could find. Let us know what you think!