MSEL Hours and Access Change

Due to low use of the building during early morning hours and the need to watch costs, the library administration has altered the 24/7 policy. The changes are listed below.

• Q and M levels of MSEL will continue to be open 24/7.

• The lower floors (A-D) will be open 7 am to 3 am. This includes Saturday and Sunday.

• The entire building will be open 24/7 for finals starting May 2 and ending May 14.

Signs at the doors into MSEL have the new hours posted. We’re working on our hours webpage now. Please continue to take advantage of the study space and computers available on M and Q levels.

AccuNet/AP Multimedia Archive: Find Images, Audio, and More

AccuNet/AP Multimedia Archive provides photographs, audio sound bites, graphics and text spanning over 160 years of history. From simple keyword searching to more complex searches such as concept, color, and category, enhance your research and presentations by accessing over one million photographs dating from 1826 to as current as a few moments ago, tens of thousands of graphics, more than 4,500 hours of audio files dating from the 1920s, and news stories dating from 1997. Explore this fascinating resource and incorporate media into your next academic project or presentation.

Exhibit Captures the Birth of the Blue Jay

Grauer’s Blue Jay: A Hopkins Tradition, an exhibit of Blue Jay memorabilia from journalist, author, and editorial cartoonist Neil A. Grauer, opens at the MSE Library on January 28 and runs through May 25, 2009.

Since the 1920s, the mascot of The Johns Hopkins University has been the feisty Blue Jay—sporting black-and-blue plumage to match Hopkins’ athletic colors.

For more than 40 years, the most popular portrayal of that mascot has been the cartoon Blue Jay created in 1966 by Grauer (A&S ’69), during his student years as a cartoonist for The Johns Hopkins News-Letter, the university’s student newspaper.

The exhibit is drawn from the Grauer Blue Jay Collection, a 1996 gift from Grauer to the Sheridan Libraries of more than 50 items. On display are his 1966 original sketch of the Blue Jay, drawn on the back of a 3×5 index card, numerous other original drawings, and lacrosse caps, T-shirts, posters, cups, an umbrella, and a travel bag, all printed with the Blue Jay logo.

Several items from Grauer’s personal collection are also exhibited, including a pair of Nike limited edition sneakers, created for members of the 2007 NCAA Division I Men’s Lacrosse championship team.

Grauer, now a senior writer in The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine’s Marketing Editorial Services department, has drawn the Blue Jay for numerous JHU athletic teams, the Alumni Association, and the Pep Band, and still draws the Blue Jay on request.

The exhibit is located on M-Level of the Eisenhower Library and may be viewed whenever the library is open.

Use Your JHED in the Library Catalog

You can now use your JHED username and password to view your library account. No longer must you use the 14-digit number on the bottom of your J-card to see your checked out books or to renew them. If you don’t have JHED credentials, the login screen tells you how to login. Many thanks to our Systems Office for the work they did on this.

Watch the Presidential Inauguration With Us

The Eisenhower Library will be showing live video coverage of the Presidential Inauguration on Tuesday, January 20, in the Electronic Resource Classroom on M-Level of the library. Coverage will begin at 10am.

Or, if you can’t join us in person, watch video coverage below from Hulu.

Featured: Aluka for African Sources and Plants

Aluka is a digital library of scholarly resources from and about Africa. It has three major content areas: African cultural heritage sites and landscapes, African plants, and struggles for freedom in South Africa. Each content area includes a wide variety of high-quality scholarly materials contributed by Aluka’s partners around the globe, ranging from archival documents, periodicals, books, reports, manuscripts, and reference works, to three-dimensional models, maps, oral histories, plant specimens, photographs, and slides. New materials are added to the collections on an ongoing basis. The rich textual and visual information in these collections provide excellent materials for research and teaching in African studies.

New Look and Functionality for Database Lists

It is definitely the start of a new year - this is our third post in a row with the word “new” in the title! Our database-by-subject list has a new look. Most of the old subjects are still there, like Art History, Political Science, and Engineering. We’ve added some new subjects, for example European Studies, Energy and Environmental Policy, and Public Health.

The really cool thing is that you have the ability to search across several databases at a time. Now when you look at a list of databases, say Philosophy, you’ll see a search box at the top of the list. The words you type into that box will be searched in the databases that are checked in the Core box below it.

You can change the group of databases being searched by clicking in any of the white boxes to select or deselect a particular database. If a database has a grayed-out box, that means it can’t be searched with other databases. To go to any one database, just click on the database title.

If you have any questions, you can stop at the Reference Consultation Office on M-Level or contact your librarian.

January: A New Administration, An Uncertain Economy

With a new administration this month and daily depressing news about the economy, it’s best to stay informed! We invite you to browse selected titles from our General Reference collection; they’re displayed on the two shelves to the left of the Reference Office. Want to learn more about the United States’ economic history, the various branches and members of the government, or the history of the Congress? Browse the display or ask a librarian about more titles.

New Library Guides: Start Your Research Here

We’re pleased to introduce new online guides that bring together the best resources with tips on writing, citing, and related topics. Bookmark them today and have a new dashboard to the best starting points for finding articles, books, video, and more in your areas of interest.

We currently have 52 guides published on an array of topics, including:

Or, search the guides: