Rome Field of Mars  (Campus Martius) a floodplain of the Tiber River, the site of the altar of Mars and the temple of Apollo in the 5th century bc.  Originally used primarily as a military exercise ground, it was later drained and, by the 1st century bc, became covered with large public buildings—baths, amphitheatre, theatres, gymnasium, crematorium, and many more temples.  The Pantheon is the most notable structure extant.  The historian Livy (1st century bc) called the area campus ignifer because of the volcanic smoke often seen there.  https://www.britannica.com/place/Campus-Martius

Paris Field of Mars (Champ  de Mars)  Located in the 7th arrondissement, the area that is now Champ de Mars was, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, a garden area where vegetables and grapes grew.  By the eighteenth century, however, it had become a training ground for the adjacent École Militaire, a military academy where cadet officers of poor aristocrat families were trained in the art of war.  A young Napoleon was a student here between 1784 and 1785.  The park was now closed off by a fence and soon became known as Champ de Mars because of the war training maneuvers that took place there, featuring as many as 10,000 men at a time.  The Champ de Mars originally measured 42 hectares (about 103 acres), but for the 1890 World Exposition, architect Jean-Camille Fromigé redesigned the park and reduced its size.  It was redesigned yet again in the early twentieth century to its current size, about 24.5 hectares (approximately 60 acres).  http://www.aviewoncities.com/paris/champdemars.htm

St. Petersburg Field of Mars (Marsovo Pole)  One of the most famous squares and green spaces in the city center, the Field of Mars is home to an eternal flame that burns in the center of the square commemorating the victims of the Russian revolutions of 1917.  At the beginning of the 18th century, the area was mostly a marshy swamp out of which flowed two small rivers, the Mya River and Krivusha River (later the Moyka River and Griboedov Canal respectively).  Peter I had the area drained due to its close proximity to his Summer Palace.  The drained area was called the Grand Meadow.  Later, military parades and folk festivals were organized here, and the space became known as the Amusements Meadow.  Residences of the nobility gradually filled up the surrounding area, and during the reigns of Anna Ioannovna and Catherine I, the meadow turned into a formal garden and was renamed Tsarina's Meadow.  After the flood of 1777 destroyed the garden, the meadow was once again used as a training ground for the Russian army.  The Field of Mars gained its present-day name after a monument to the military leader Alexander Suvorov, cast as the ancient god of war, was erected in the square.  The name was also an obvious reference to the Fields of Mars in Rome and Paris; a bold indication that Petersburg should be recognized as one of the great European capitals.  http://www.saint-petersburg.com/squares/field-of-mars/

Capital and capitol are homonyms.  Capital can be used in a financial sense to describe money, equipment, or property that is used in a business.  It can sometimes be used figuratively to describe a valuable resource such as “human capital.”  It can also refer to a type of letter, a capital or lowercase letter.  Capital refers to the most important city or town in a region, state, country, etc., and it generally refers to the seat of a government or administration center.  A capitol is a building or set of buildings where legislators meet and have session.  You can keep track of capitol vs. capital by visualizing the “O” in capitol as the top of a dome.  http://writingexplained.org/capital-vs-capitol

Chronicling America is a Website providing access to information about historic newspapers and select digitized newspaper pages, and is produced by the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP).  NDNP, a partnership between the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Library of Congress (LC), is a long-term effort to develop an Internet-based, searchable database of U.S. newspapers with descriptive information and select digitization of historic pages.  http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/about/

At least 15 public libraries in Iowa have been targeted by a toner pirate scam in 2016.  That’s according to the Iowa Attorney General’s Office, which filed a consumer fraud lawsuit against three Orange County, California-based businesses  September 1, 2016.  The supposed scam came to light thanks to Cate St. Clair, an attorney by training and library director by trade.  When Robey Memorial Library in Waukon received a mysterious bill for about $400 for toner, St. Clair called the number printed on the invoice.  “They were very surly on the phone,” says St. Clair.  “They were like, ‘Just disregard it.  Just disregard it.’  So I was like, ‘Well, this is super sketchy.’”  St. Clair then shared her story with a librarian listserv.  Turns out at least 14 other Iowa libraries have received similar bills this year.  "A couple of them were really freaking out," she says.  "At lot of small rural libraries, the yearly budget is small, so getting a $400 invoice for something you don't remember getting or ordering . . . it's a ton of money."  St. Clair also told her father, Steve, who specializes in consumer fraud at the Iowa Attorney General's Office.  The elder St. Clair is the assistant AG for the lawsuit, which names Central Supply Solutions, Central Supply Center, and Elite Supplies.  None responded to requests for comment.  Sarah Boden  http://iowapublicradio.org/post/alleged-toner-pirate-scam-targets-iowa-libraries#stream/0

Crossover words   Terrible and terrific are both formed off the same root:  terror.  Both started out a few hundred years ago with the meaning of terror-inducing.  But terrific took a strange turn at the beginning of the 20th century and ended up meaning really great, not terrible or terror-inducing at all.  This happened through a slow reshaping of the connections and connotations of terrific.  First it acquired the sense, not just of terror-inducing but of general intensity. You could talk about a “terrific clamor,” meaning a whole lot of clamor.  This was a bit of hyperbole—“so much noise it was terror-inducing!”—that eventually got reduced to a general sense of “more intense than usual.”  Once a word like that gets established as a general intensifier, it may also be applied to positive experiences—terrific beauty, terrific joy—and from there the jump to a fully positive “terrific!” isn’t so unexpected.  The same thing happened to the word tremendous (“causing one to tremble in fear”).  It happened to formidable (fear-inducing) too, but only in French, where it means “really great!”  It hasn’t quite reached that stage in English, but it has acquired positive intensifier status (“a formidable talent”).  The path from fear to happy enthusiasm isn’t an inevitable one.  Awful also started as a fear word—“awe” used to have much stronger connotations of quaking with fear before powerful forces—and came to be a general intensifier (“that pie was awful good!”), but it hasn’t crossed over to the happy side.  On the other hand, its close relative, “awesome,” did make the jump.  The fully positive “awesome,” a child of the '80s, is a relatively recent innovation.  It began as slang, with a dash of irony or sarcasm to it.  That seems to be the crucial ingredient in these crossover words.  The positive “terrific” dates to the slang-heavy flapper era, where “killer” also became a playful positive.  “Egregious,” a word that made the opposite crossing from positive to negative (it used to mean notable, excellent), also appears to have arisen from an ironic use.  http://mentalfloss.com/article/56865/why-does-terrible-mean-bad-and-terrific-mean-good

Difference between mammoths and mastodons   Although they  might resemble their distant, mammoth cousins, mastodons came into existence even earlier, about 27 million to 30 million years ago.  They lived primarily in North and Central America and, like mammoths, began to disappear between 12,000 and 10,000 years ago.  While similar in size and stature, fossil evidence shows that mastodons were slightly smaller than mammoths, with shorter legs and lower, flatter heads.  Both species stood between 7 and 14 feet (2 meters to 4 meters) tall, and were covered in long, shaggy hair that protected them from the harsh conditions of their respective environments.  But mammoths also possessed fatty humps on their backs that provided them with the additional nutrients necessary in their more northerly, ice-covered habitats.  The most important difference between these two species, according to Smithsonian.com, lies in how they ate their food.   Both animals were herbivores, but mastodons had cone-shaped cusps on their molars designed to crush leaves, twigs and branches.  Mammoths, however, had ridged molars that allowed them to cut through vegetation and graze like modern-day elephants.  Both species had long, curved trunks that the animals may have used to scrape snow and ice off vegetation.  Elizabeth Palermo  http://www.livescience.com/34446-mammoth-or-mastodon.html  See also http://mentalfloss.com/article/54120/whats-difference-between-mammoth-and-mastodon

September 23, 2016  Thousands of years before cats took up residence in 37 percent of American households, and managed to outnumber dogs by roughly 75 million across the globe, they were hopping continents with farmers, ancient mariners, and even Vikings, scientists have found.  The first large-scale study of ancient feline DNA has finally been completed, and the results reveal how our inscrutable friends were domesticated in the Near East and Egypt some 15,000 years ago, before spreading across the globe and into our hearts.  The study was presented at the International Symposium on Biomolecular Archaeology in Oxford, UK last week, and sequenced DNA from 209 cats that lived between 15,000 and 3,700 years ago--so from just before the advent of agriculture right up to the 18th century.  Found in more than 30 archaeological sites in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, these ancient feline specimens are helping researchers to finally piece together the beginnings of an animal that we share our beds with, but know surprisingly little about.  "We don’t know the history of ancient cats.  We do not know their origin, we don't know how their dispersal occurred," one of the team, Eva-Maria Geigl, an evolutionary geneticist from the Institut Jacques Monod in France, told Ewen Callaway at Nature.  Analysing the DNA of cats found in ancient Egyptian tombs, burial sites in Cyprus, and an old Viking settlement in Germany, the team found that cats likely experienced not one, but two, waves of expansion during their early history.  The first wave is a story you’re probably familiar with.  When the team looked the mitochondrial DNA--genetic information that’s passed on from the mother only--they found that wild cats from the Middle East and the fertile eastern Mediterranean shared a similar mitochondrial lineage.  This suggests that small wild cats spread through early agricultural communities, because they were attracted to the mice that were attracted to the grains.  Then, thousands of years after this, the research points to a separate mitochondrial connection between cats descended from those in Egypt to ones in Eurasia and Africa.  "A mitochondrial lineage common in Egyptian cat mummies from the end of the 4th century BC to the 4th century AD was also carried by cats in Bulgaria, Turkey and sub-Saharan Africa from around the same time," Callaway reports.  This second wave of expansion has been attributed to ancient sea-faring people--farmers, sailors, and Vikings--because the cats were likely encouraged to stay on board to keep their rodent problem in check.  http://www.sciencealert.com/cats-sailed-with-vikings-to-conquer-the-world-genetic-study-reveals

September 24 was National Punctuation Day.  Find graphics with words like "Let's eat grandma.  Let's eat, grandma.  PUNCTUATION SAVES LIVES" at http://www.ibtimes.com/national-punctuation-day-2016-facts-common-mistakes-avoid-how-spot-errors-2421137  See How to Celebrate National Punctuation Day^® by Jeff Rubin at http://www.nationalpunctuationday.com/celebrate.html

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1531  September 25, 2016  On this date in 1789, the United States Congress passed twelve amendments to the United States Constitution:  The Congressional Apportionment Amendment (which was never ratified), the Congressional Compensation Amendment, and the ten that are known as the Bill of Rights.  On this date in 1930, Shel Silverstein, American author, poet, illustrator, and songwriter, was born.  Word of the Day  booklegging noun  The illicit publication and distribution of banned books.  Banned Books Week, organized by the American Library Association to celebrate the freedom to read and to draw attention to banned and challenged books, is held in 2016 from September 25 to October 1.

St Kilda is an isolated archipelago 64 kilometres (40 mi) west-northwest of North Uist in the North Atlantic Ocean.  It contains the westernmost islands of the Outer Hebrides of Scotland.  The largest island is Hirta, whose sea cliffs are the highest in the United Kingdom; three other islands (Dùn, Soay and Boreray) were also used for grazing and seabird hunting.  The islands' human heritage includes numerous unique architectural features from the historic and prehistoric periods, although the earliest written records of island life date from the Late Middle Ages.  The medieval village on Hirta was rebuilt in the 19th century, but illnesses brought by increased external contacts through tourism, and the upheaval of the First World War contributed to the island's evacuation in 1930.  The story of St Kilda has attracted artistic interpretations, including Michael Powell's film The Edge of the World and an opera.  Currently, the only year-round residents are military personnel; a variety of conservation workers, volunteers and scientists spend time there in the summer months.  The entire archipelago is owned by the National Trust for Scotland.  It became one of Scotland's six World Heritage Sites in 1986 and is one of the few in the world to hold joint status for its natural and cultural qualities.  Parties of volunteers work on the islands in the summer to restore the many ruined buildings that the native St Kildans left behind.  They share the island with a small military base established in 1957.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Kilda,_Scotland

"Libraries are hazardous workspaces."  This is what my boss at the seminary library told me some years ago as she handed me a surgical mask and a pair of white cotton gloves.  For a few days one summer my job was to reorganize some of the older collections in the school archives--torn and well-handled family Bibles from the 18th century, rare hymnbooks from the time of the Protestant Reformation, random artifacts with no special value but their poor condition.  All of these items had two things in common; they were all old and they were all saturated with mold.  This latter detail is what makes libraries hazardous workspaces, at least according to the U.S. Department of Labor (which bestows this official designation).  If you have ever paid the price for cleaning out a long-neglected garage with days of constant sneezes, mysterious rashes and watery red eyes, you know what I mean.  Will Scott  http://www.daltondailycitizen.com/news/local_news/libraries-and-churches/article_997725fb-0fbc-51ca-971e-54d95b4273c7.html

In the old days, pants were two pieces of clothing, one cylinder for each leg.  And that was good enough.  A pair is a pair is a pair.  No need for fitting rooms.  A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg   See also Pair of pants at  http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-pai1.htm and 11 Nouns That Only Have a Plural Form at http://mentalfloss.com/article/52672/11-nouns-only-have-plural-form

Meet the 2016 MacArthur Fellows  “While our communities, our nation, and our world face both historic and emerging challenges, these 23 extraordinary individuals give us ample reason for hope.  They are breaking new ground in areas of public concern, in the arts, and in the sciences, often in unexpected ways. Their creativity, dedication, and impact inspire us all.” — MacArthur President Julia Stasch  See pictures and biographies at https://www.macfound.org/fellows/class/class-2016/

A Quaker gun is a deception tactic that was commonly used in warfare during the 18th and 19th centuries.  Although resembling an actual cannon, the Quaker gun was simply a wooden log, usually painted black, used to deceive an enemy.  Misleading the enemy as to the strength of an emplacement was an effective delaying tactic.  The name derives from the Religious Society of Friends or "Quakers", who have traditionally held a religious opposition to war and violence in the Peace Testimony.   A similar idea was employed during the Doolittle Raid, which occurred in the early stages of the Pacific War of World War II, where Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle led a squadron of B-25 Mitchells to bomb Tokyo.  The early model B-25B had no guns installed in the tail section to help protect the planes from tail-end attacks.  While modifying the bombers for the mission at Eglin Field, Florida, Doolittle had fake machine guns consisting of a pair of broomsticks painted black mounted at the tail end of the fuselage to simulate tail guns.  See pictures at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaker_gun

Basque (Euskara) is a language with no known linguistic relatives spoken by about 660,000 people mainly in the Basque country (Euskal Herria) in the north of Spain and the south west of France.  An ancestral form of Basque known as Aquitanian appears in Roman inscriptions in Aquitaine, in the southwest of France.  The inscriptions consist of the names of people and gods plus a few other words and were inscribed during the 1st and 2nd centuries AD.  Basque first appeared in writing in Latin religious texts, the Glosas Emilianenses, dating from the 11th century.  The first published book in Basque was a collection of poems entitled Linguae Vasconum Primitiae, published by Bernard Detchepare in 1545.  Link to Basque dictionaries and a video of a person speaking Basque at http://www.omniglot.com/writing/basque.htm 

Basqueland begins at the Adour River with its mouth at Bayonne-the river that separates the Basques from the French pine forest swampland of Landes-and ends at the Ebro River, whose rich valley separates the dry red Spanish earth of Rioja from Basqueland.  The entire area is only 8,218 square miles, which is slightly smaller than New Hampshire.  Within this small space are seven Basque provinces.  Four provinces are in Spain and have Basque and Spanish names: Nafaroa or Navarra, Gipuzkoa or Guipuzcoa, Bizkaia or Vizcaya, and Araba or Alava.  Three are in France and have Basque and French names:  Lapurdi or Labourd, Benafaroa or Basse Navarre, and Zuberoa or Soule.  An old form of Basque nationalist graffiti is "4 + 3 = 1."  http://rciasia.tripod.com/euskara.html

Basque Country is known for many things, among them meat and fish, but also cherries.  That makes sense in that it’s a mountainous region located right at the far-Western edge of where France and Spain meet, where the Pyrénée mountains hit the Bay of Biscay.  Basque black cherries thrive all around the area in the cool high-altitude climate, however the most famous come from a town called Itxassou.  Itxassou cherries come in three varieties:  peloa, xapata and the rarest of the rare, the beltxa.  http://joepastry.com/2012/on-basque-cherries/

Gâteau Basque recipe  http://gourmetpedia.net/recipes/gateau-basque-arrambide/

The National Book Festival, an annual event held in Washington, DC, is a celebration of the joy of books and reading that is sponsored by the Library of Congress and gives attendees the opportunity to visit with more than 175 award-winning authors, illustrators and poets who will talk about and sign their books.  In addition to author talks, book-signings and children’s activities, the 2016 event will include an evening panel discussion with experts and film-industry figures, followed by a screening of a classic movie that was made from a classic book.  The festival is free and open to the public.  Saturday, September 24, 2016, 9 a.m. to 10 p.m., Washington Convention Center, 801 Mount Vernon Place, NW Washington, DC  The event features a wealth of authors, poets and illustrators for readers of all ages.  Stephen King will open the Main Stage of the 2016 Library of Congress National Book Festival with a presentation and recognition by the Library of his lifelong work promoting literacy.  Tickets will be required for the King presentation.  Tickets will be free and will be issued electronically beginning Sept. 14.  Seating will be first-come, first-served.  There is a limit of two tickets per person.  Representatives from across the United States and its territories will celebrate their unique literary offerings in the Pavilion of the States.  Guests are invited to collect state stickers and stamps and "Discover Great Places Through Reading."  The Let’s Read America area will offer reading activities that are fun for the whole family.  The Washington Post will host a bookmark-creation station and a festival-themed photo backdrop.  The Poetry & Prose pavilion will feature performances by award-winning students in Poetry Out Loud, an NEA and Poetry Foundation program that encourages high-school students to memorize and perform great poems.  The Library of Congress Pavilion will showcase treasures in the Library’s vast online collections and offer information about Library programs.  Special exhibits will be on view and Library representatives will discuss their work to collect, share and preserve the creative and intellectual heritage of the nation at the world’s largest library.  Rachel Cooper  Find a list of 2016 National Book Festival authors at http://dc.about.com/od/specialevents/a/NationalBookFes.htm

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1530  September 23, 2016  On this date in 1845, the Knickerbockers Baseball Club, the first baseball team to play under the modern rules, was founded in New York.  On this date in 1909, The Phantom of the Opera (original title: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra), a novel by French writer Gaston Leroux, was first published as a serialization in Le Gaulois.

Roald Dahl is remembered for his solitary, kind-hearted child heroes—Charlie, who visited a chocolate factory, and Sophie, who befriended a floppy-eared giant, among them—and their triumphs over bullying adults.  But the beloved British children’s book author was also known for the distinctive language he used to create the vivid, often dark, worlds in which the characters lived.  To honor the centenary of his birth, the Oxford English Dictionary has updated its latest edition September 12, 2016 with six new words connected to Dahl’s writing, and revisions to four other phrases popularized by Dahl’s evocative stories.  In May, the Oxford University Press also published a Roald Dahl Dictionary complete with 8,000 words coined or popularized by the author.  There was linguistic method to Dahl’s mad use of language.  “He was using very linguistic principles,” says Vineeta Gupta, head of children’s dictionaries at Oxford University Press.  Dahl invented words based on old words, rhymes, malapropisms, and spoonerisms (swapping the first letters of words around, such as “catasterous disastrophe” from The BFG).  Dahl also played with sound (“sizzle-pan” to refer to a frying pan in The BFG, for example).  Marta Cooper  Find the new Dahlisms added to the OED, and the revised phrases, with notes on their origins at http://qz.com/779365/six-of-roald-dahls-made-up-words-have-been-added-to-the-oxford-english-dictionary-to-celebrate-his-centenary/

NEW YORK, September 15, 2016—The Museum of Modern Art announces the release of an extensive digital archive accessible to historians, students, artists, and anyone concerned with modern and contemporary art:  a comprehensive account of the Museum's exhibitions from its founding, in 1929, to today.  This new digital archive, which will continue to grow as materials become available, is now accessible on MoMA's website, at moma.org/history.  The exhibition history project was initiated and overseen by Michelle Elligott, Chief of Archives, and Fiona Romeo, Director of Digital Content and Strategy, The Museum of Modern Art.  Over the course of the last two-and-a-half years, three MoMA archivists integrated over 22,000 folders of exhibition records dating from 1929 to 1989 from its registrar and curatorial departments, performed preservation measures, vetted the contents, and created detailed descriptions of the records for each exhibition.  The digital archive can be freely searched, or browsed in a more structured way by time period or exhibition type.  Each entry includes a list of all known artists featured in the exhibition.  Artist pages likewise list all of the exhibitions that have included that artist, along with any of their works in MoMA's collection online.  https://www.finebooksmagazine.com/press/2016/09/moma-launches-online-exhibition-history-beginning-with-its-founding-in-1929.phtml

LEBANON is named for its landmark white, snow-capped mountains.  ALBANIA is similarly mountainous, while ALBION (the oldest name for Briton) might come from Continental  immigrants seeing the white cliffs of Dover.  The ALPS are snowy white, but the Noon/N has melted away.  The ALBINO is thought to have come from the theoretical   Indo-European “root” albho(white) .  Welsh bal (white spot) gives us BALD.  Some whitish foods might actually be tasty, but Bulgarian blanav (tasteless) and BLAND reveals a prejudice against BLANCHED-looking food.   BLANKET is from whiteness, as is CARTE BLANCHE (from French).  http://www.edenics.net/english-word-origins.aspx?word=ALBINO

On January 24, 1791, President George Washington announced the Congressionally-designated permanent location of the national capital, a diamond-shaped ten-mile tract at the confluence of the Potomac and Eastern Branch Rivers.  A survey of the area was undertaken by Andrew Ellicott and Benjamin Banneker.  Forty boundary stones, laid at one-mile intervals, established the boundaries based on celestial calculations by Banneker, a self-taught astronomer of African descent and one of the few free blacks living in the vicinity.  Within this 100 square mile diamond, which would become the District of Columbia, a smaller area was laid out as the city of Washington.  (In 1846, one-third of the District was retroceded by Congressional action to Virginia, thus removing that portion of the original district which lay west of the Potomac River.)  In March 1791,the surveyors' roles were complemented by the employment of Major Pierre Charles L'Enfant to prepare the plan.  Major L'Enfant (1755-1825), a French artist and engineer who had formed a friendship with George Washington while serving in the Revolutionary War, requested the honor of designing a plan for the national capital.  The fact that the area was largely undeveloped gave the city's founders the unique opportunity to create an entirely new capital city.  After surveying the site, L'Enfant developed a Baroque plan that features ceremonial spaces and grand radial avenues, while respecting natural contours of the land.  The result was a system of intersecting diagonal avenues superimposed over a grid system.  The avenues radiated from the two most significant building sites that were to be occupied by houses for Congress and the President.  L'Enfant specified in notes accompanying the plan that these avenues were to be wide, grand, lined with trees, and situated in a manner that would visually connect ideal topographical sites throughout the city, where important structures, monuments, and fountains were to be erected.  On paper, L'Enfant shaded and numbered 15 large open spaces at the intersections of these avenues and indicated that they would be divided among the states.  He specified that each reservation would feature statues and memorials to honor worthy citizens.  The open spaces were as integral to the capital as the buildings to be erected around them.  L'Enfant opposed selling land prematurely, refused to furnish his map to the city commissioners in time for the sale, and was reluctantly relieved of his duties by George Washington.  Ellicott was then engaged to produce a map and reproduced L'Enfant's plan from his memory.  https://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/wash/lenfant.htm

Mount Rushmore, located just north of Custer State Park in South Dakota’s Black Hills National Forest, was named for the New York lawyer Charles E. Rushmore, who traveled to the Black Hills in 1884 to inspect mining claims in the region.  When Rushmore asked a local man the name of a nearby mountain, he reportedly replied that it never had a name before, but from now on would be known as Rushmore Peak (later Rushmore Mountain or Mount Rushmore).  Seeking to attract tourism to the Black Hills in the early 1920s, South Dakota’s state historian Doane Robinson came up with the idea to sculpt “the Needles” (several giant natural granite pillars) into the shape of historic heroes of the West.  He suggested Red Cloud, a Sioux chief, as a potential subject.  In August 1924, Robinson contacted Gutzon Borglum, an American sculptor of Danish descent who was then working on carving an image of the Confederate General Robert E. Lee into the face of Georgia’s Stone Mountain.  Luckily for Robinson, the headstrong Borglum was on the outs with the group that had commissioned the Lee sculpture, and would soon abandon the project.  Borglum suggested that the subjects of the South Dakota work be George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, as that would attract more national interest.  He would later add Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt to the list, in recognition of their contributions to the birth of democracy and the growth of the United States.  http://www.history.com/topics/us-presidents/mount-rushmore

Mount Rushmore in South Dakota is one of the most recognisable landmarks in the United States, featuring in numerous Hollywood films such as Team America:  World Police, National Treasure:  Book of Secrets and North By Northwest.  But it turns out that the sculpture is even more of a mystery than the adventure movies portray it as--behind the chiseled granite showing Abraham Lincoln's head is a hidden room.  When he planned the monument, sculptor Gutzon Borglum had wanted to create a much larger image that included several important moments in America history as well as the images of presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln.  Unfortunately his plan was too intricate to be completed and Gutzon had to settle for the four presidents, but he was also allowed to start work on a Hall of Records--a hidden room that would tell the story of the US to future generations, including the country's charter documents.  The government approved the idea but asked the sculptor to focus on finishing the presidents' heads before starting work on the Hall of Records.  When Gutzon died before the project was finished, the Hall work ground to a halt for several decades.  Eventually, in the late 1990s the project was revived to an extent and the chamber room was completed.  Caroline McGuire  See pictures at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-3639293/It-s-like-real-life-Indiana-Jones-film-secret-room-Abraham-Lincoln-s-face-Mount-Rushmore-revealed.html

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1529  September 21, 2016  On this date in 1897, the "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" editorial, witten by Francis Pharcellus Church, was published in the New York Sun.  On this date in 1937, J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit was published.  Quote of the Day  Good books don't give up all their secrets at once. - Stephen King, novelist (b. 21 Sep 1947)

August 26, 2016  Inspired by the success of Pokemon Go, a Belgian primary school headmaster has developed an online game for people to search for books instead of cartoon monsters, attracting tens of thousands of players in weeks.  While with Pokemon Go, players use a mobile device's GPS and camera to track virtual creatures around town, Aveline Gregoire's version is played through a Facebook group called "Chasseurs de livres" ("Book hunters").  Players post pictures and hints about where they have hidden a book and others go to hunt them down.  Once someone has finished reading a book, they "release" it back into the wild.  "While I was arranging my library, I realized I didn't have enough space for all my books.  Having played Pokemon Go with my kids, I had the idea of releasing the books into nature," Gregoire told Reuters.  Though it was only set up a few weeks ago, more than 40,000 people are already signed up to Gregoire's Facebook group.  The hidden tomes range from books for toddlers through to Stephen King horrors, placed around Belgian towns and countryside, often wrapped in clear plastic to keep off the rain.  Maria Haase Coehlo  http://www.reuters.com/article/us-belgium-books-pokemon-idUSKCN1110RG

Scoria is a dark-colored igneous rock with abundant round bubble-like cavities known as vesicles.  It ranges in color from black or dark gray to deep reddish brown.  Scoria forms when magma containing abundant dissolved gas flows from a volcano or is blown out during an eruption.  As the molten rock emerges from the Earth, the pressure upon it is reduced and the dissolved gas starts to escape in the form of bubbles.  If the molten rock solidifies before the gas has escaped, the bubbles become small rounded or elongated cavities in the rock.  This dark-colored igneous rock with the trapped bubbles is known as scoria.  One of the main uses of scoria is in the production of lightweight aggregate.  The scoria is crushed to desired sizes and sold for a variety of uses.  Concrete made with scoria typically weighs about 100 pounds per cubic foot.  This is a weight savings compared to concrete made with typical sand and gravel that weighs about 150 pounds per cubic foot.  This savings in weight allows buildings to be constructed with less structural steel.  The air trapped in the scoria makes the lightweight concrete a better insulator.  See beautiful graphics at http://geology.com/rocks/scoria.shtml

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg:  antonyms

estivate/aestivate  (ES-tuh-vayt)  verb  To pass the summer in a dormant state.

diurnal   (DY-uhr-nuhl)  adjective  1.  Of or pertaining to the daytime.  2.  Occurring every day.  noun   Dairy, journal, newspaper

ultimogeniture  (uhl-tuh-mo-JEN-i-chuhr)  noun  A system of inheritance in which the youngest child inherits a title, estate, etc.

distributary   (di-STRIB-yuh-ter-ee, -yoo-)  noun  A branch of a river flowing away from the main stream and does not rejoin it, as in a delta.

dissensus  (di-SEN-suhs)  noun  Widespread disagreement.

Most Americans view public libraries as important parts of their communities, with a majority reporting that libraries have the resources they need and play at least some role in helping them decide what information they can trust.  Public libraries, many Americans say, should offer programs to teach people digital skills (80% think libraries should definitely do this) and help patrons learn how to use new creative technologies like 3-D printers (50%).  At the same time, 57% of Americans say libraries should definitely offer more comfortable places for reading, working and relaxing.  Yet, Americans are also divided on a fundamental question about how books should be treated at libraries:  24% support the idea of moving books and stacks in order to make way for more community- and tech-oriented spaces, while 31% say libraries should not move the books to create such spaces.  About four in ten think libraries should maybe consider doing so.  Read extensive article by John B. Horrigan at http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/09/09/libraries-2016/

W.P. (Bill) Kinsella, author of the novel that was adapted for the movie “Field of Dreams,” died September 16, 2016 at age 81, according to a press release from his literary agency.  Kinsella was a Canadian-born author who started writing “Shoeless Joe” while enrolled at the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop in Iowa City.  Iowa would become the setting for the 1982 novel.  It was Kinsella’s passion for baseball that influenced the plot of the beloved tale, in which the ghost of “Shoeless” Joe Jackson, the Chicago White Sox outfielder who was banned from baseball for his part in the 1919 World Series betting scandal, tells a farmer to build a baseball field.  “Field of Dreams” filmmaker Phil Alden Robinson was fascinated by Kinsella’s rural ballfield fantasy and brought the work to life with a ball diamond built into a corn field and boisterous characters.  Much of the movie was shot in Dyersville, where the diamond still sits.  "That's a real thrill," Kinsella said in 1995 about the field.  "I get up there every year. It doesn't matter when you go there; there's always 40 or 50 people from all over the world playing catch and you can stand there and watch."  The movie, which was released in 1989, starred Kevin Costner and James Earl Jones.  In a 1994 Iowa Poll conducted by The Des Moines Register, 30 percent of Iowans polled said "Field of Dreams" was Iowa's greatest contribution to the nation's arts, literature and music.  Other popular cultural exports in the poll were "The Music Man," "American Gothic," "The Bridges of Madison County," "State Fair" and "A Thousand Acres."  Kinsella published nearly 30 books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction.  It was the last two lines of his 1974 poem "The Bugs of Johnson County"—"Is this Heaven?  No, just count the bugs.  It's Iowa!"—that he reportedly adapted for "Shoeless Joe," before becoming one of the movie's greatest exchanges.  Molly Longman  http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/entertainment/movies/2016/09/16/kinsella-author-field-dreams-novel-dies/90533874/

The 2016 Harvest Moon on September 16 delighted observers who stepped outside to get a peek of the event.  The Harvest Moon is the full moon that is seen nearest to the time of the Autumnal Equinox.  The Autumnal Equinox falls on September 22 this year.  This year's Harvest Moon took place in conjunction with a penumbral lunar eclipse, which was only able to be seen by skywatchers in Asia, Europe, Africa and Australia.  Kevin Byrne  See beautiful photos at http://www.accuweather.com/en/features/trend/photos_harvest_moon_illuminate/60163672

Immunologist LAURA HAYNES:  The best time for most people to get the flu vaccine would be in October.  If you're a little bit older and over 65, I would say between Halloween and Thanksgiving.  Dr. Haynes acknowledges that a flu shot will not always keep you from getting the flu.  She says it's about 60 to 90 percent effective for children and adults--somewhat less for the elderly.  But she believes they're still worthwhile.  http://www.npr.org/2016/09/17/494360180/older-people-should-consider-waiting-a-bit-longer-to-get-flu-shot

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1528  September 19, 2016  On this date in 1778, the Continental Congress passed the first United States federal budget.  On this date in 1796, George Washington's Farewell Address was printed across America as an open letter to the public.  Word of the Day  arr interj  (Britain, West Country, West Midlands)  Yes.  Used stereotypically in imitation of pirates.  Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day, a parodic holiday invented in 1995 by John Baur (‘Ol’ Chumbucket’) and Mark Summers (‘Cap’n Slappy’), of Albany, Oregon, USA.  Quote of the Day  We all have our time machines. Some take us back, they're called memories. Some take us forward, they're called dreams. - Jeremy Irons, actor (b. 19 Sep 1948)

Digitizing Orphan Works:  Legal Strategies to Reduce Risks for Open Access to Copyrighted Orphan Works by Davud Hansen.  Kyle K. Courtney and Peter Suber, eds., Harvard Library  An orphan work has two properties:  It is under copyright, and diligent effort cannot identify the copyright holder.  Read 112-page article including an appendix listing examples of digital collections containing orphan works at

https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/27840430/OrphanWorksReportFINAL.pdf?sequence=3

Homonyms are words that are spelled and pronounced the same but have different meanings.  Homographs are words that are spelled the same but differ in meaning, derivation, or pronunciation.  Heteronyms are words that are spelled identically but have different meanings when pronounced differently, usually through accenting different parts of the same word.  Homophones are words that are pronounced the same but differ in meaning, derivation, or spelling. Homophones are classified as words with two spellings and two meanings, but only one pronunciation.  Lee Masterson  See examples at http://www.fictionfactor.com/articles/hhhh.html

In recreational mathematics, a magic square is an arrangement of distinct numbers (i.e., each number is used once), usually integers, in a square grid, where the numbers in each row, and in each column, and the numbers in the main and secondary diagonals, all add up to the same number, called the "magic constant."  A magic square has the same number of rows as it has columns, and in conventional math notation, "n" stands for the number of rows (and columns) it has.  Thus, a magic square always contains n² numbers, and its size (the number of rows [and columns] it has) is described as being "of order n."  A magic square that contains the integers from 1 to n² is called a normal magic square.  (The term "magic square" is also sometimes used to refer to any of various types ofword squares.)  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_square  See also http://mathworld.wolfram.com/MagicSquare.html

"Pretend journalists" are not objective.  The term has been used at least since 1997, although instance of "mock" news shows with an agenda have been around longer. 

pollinivore noun  An animal that feeds on pollen; a palynivore.  Wiktionary

The Tuareg inhabit the Saharan regions of North Africa--Niger, Mali, Libya, Algeria and Burkina Faso.  Tuareg is an Arabic term meaning abandoned by God.  They call themselves Imohag, translated as free men.  No one knows the true origin of the Tuareg, where they came from or when they arrived in the Sahara.  Reputedly of Berber descent, the language of the Tuareg is Tamachek, with their own script known as Tifinagh, thought to have ancient Libyan roots.  Their numbers are unclear, but estimates run between 300,000 and 1 million.  The Tuareg were recorded by the Greek historian Herodotus in the 5th Century BC.  The most striking attribute of the Tuareg is the indigo veil, worn by the men but not the women, giving rise to the popular name the Blue Men of the Sahara, orMen of the Veil.  Men begin wearing a veil at the age 25.  One of the traditional dances of the nomadic Tuareg is the 'Tam Tam' where the men on camel circle the women while they play drums and chant.  The huts of the Tuareg nomad are easily constructed, and comprised of weaved matting and tradition fabrics on a timber frame.  Although most Tuareg now practice some degree of Islam--the Maliki sect of Islam, resulting from the teachings of the great prophet El Maghili from the early 16th century--they are not considered Arabic.  They have preserved many pre-Islamic traditions and do not strictly follow many Islamic rituals.  Among the Tuareg the women have a great freedom and participate in family and tribal decisions.  Descent and inheritance are both through the maternal line.  Read more and see pictures at http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/tuareg/

If you would be pungent, be brief; for it is with words as with sunbeams--the more they are condensed, the deeper they burn.  Robert Southey  English poet (1774-1843) http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/2408.html  also attributed to John Dryden, England's first Poet Laureate (1631-1700)  See also Unpacking Metaphors at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1N3ptCj1Fte25J7CgD3ZKHMEjez1N6AgCNz9YXDZpk8I/edit and Fire 'i the Blood:  a Handbook of Figurative Language at  http://www.bookpump.com/upb/pdf-b/1128347b.pdf

This free full-text search engine from the American Bar Association searches over 400 online law reviews and law journals, as well as document repositories hosting academic papers and related publications such as Congressional Research Service reports.  Several of the law reviews and legal journals (such as the Stanford Technology Law Review), working papers, and reports are available online only.  Coverage may vary; for more complete coverage visit your local law library and fee-based online legal research services.  Also see list of reviews/journals/document repositories which have free full-text available online, but which must be searched/browsed manually.  Viewing tip:  for PDF files, click on the "View as HTML" or "Quick View" links for quick viewing.  http://www.americanbar.org/groups/departments_offices/legal_technology_resources/resources/free_journal_search.html

A phrase is a group of words acting as a single part of speech and not containing both a subject and a verb.  It is a part of a sentence, and does not express a complete thought.  The first sentence contains five phrases:  "of words," "acting as a single part of speech," "as a single part," "of speech," and "not containing both a subject and a verb."  Except for the phrase beginning with as, all the phrases are acting as adjectives.  The phrase beginning with as is adverbial.  http://englishplus.com/grammar/00000014.htm

Cannellini beans are white Italian kidney beans, available in both dried and canned forms.  Dried cannellini beans require soaking overnight before you cook them.  Use the beans in salads, soups and stews or puree them for use in dips.  Boiled cannellini beans have about 225 calories per one cup serving with 11 grams of fiber, 15 grams of protein and 40 grams of carbohydrates.  They also contain iron, magnesium and folate.  http://www.livestrong.com/article/533050-can-you-substitute-kidney-bean-for-cannellini-bean/

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1527  September 16, 2016  On this date in 1963, Malaysia was formed from the Federation of Malaya, Singapore, North Borneo (Sabah) and Sarawak.  Soon, Singapore left this new country.  On this date in 1966, the Metropolitan Opera House opened at Lincoln Center in New York City with the world premiere of Samuel Barber's opera Antony and Cleopatra.

In the Hellenistic Era—that's 323 BC to 31 BC, for all you numbers fans—the Library of Alexandria, Egypt was a research hub of high prestige.  But while certainly the largest of its time and the most famous, the Library of Alexandria wasn’t the only institution of its kind.  Libraries throughout the ancient world competed to be the best Greek library, in rivalries that proved as dangerous and unscrupulous as actual wars.  Perhaps the most vicious rivalry of all was between the libraries of Alexandria and Pergamum in the city of Pergamon—present-day Bergama, Turkey.  In this conflict, the ego-driven kings of both cities enforced various sneaky maneuvers to stunt the growth of the opposing collections. “The library was a means [for the kings] to show off their wealth, their power, and mostly to show that they were the rightful heirs of Alexander the Great,” says Gaëlle Coqueugniot, an ancient history research associate at the University of Exeter.  In the third and second centuries BC, there was a boom in the number of institutions that kept books.  The Library of Alexandria, which ultimately consisted of approximately 500,000 scrolls and boasted early texts by Euripides, Sophocles, and Homer, was first conceptualized by King Ptolemy I.  The Ptolemaic dynasty was able to spend big on the institution thanks to the riches of Egypt’s fertile land and resources from the Nile, including papyrus, the ancient world’s main writing material.  As a result, the library had an edge in development over others.  The Ptolemaic kings were determined to collect any and all books that existed—from the epics, tragedies, to cookbooks.  One of the Ptolemies’ most drastic schemes to strike down the Library of Pergamum was the sudden cut of its trade of papyrus with the city of Pergamon.  The Ptolemies hoped that if the main component of books was limited and hard to obtain, it would prevent the Library of Pergamum’s collection from growing.  However, Pergamon came up with an alternative.  Roman writer and scholar Marcus Terrentius Varro documented the event:  “the rivalry about libraries between king Ptolemy and king Eumenes, Ptolemy stopped the export of papyrus … and so the Pergamenes invented parchment.”  While it’s not possible for Pergamon to have invented parchment since scriptures on stretched leather have been found earlier in the east, the lack of papyrus may have pushed the king to expand the use and development of leather as a writing material, Coqueugniot says.  The word for parchment in Latin, “pergamīnum” literally translates to “the sheets of Pergamum,” she says.  Lauren Young  Read more and see pictures at http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-fierce-forgotten-library-wars-of-the-ancient-world

Most people are familiar with the word racism.  It means, in a nutshell, the belief that one race is superior or inferior to another.  You’ll find more elaborate definitions, but that’s always the core.  Most people are NOT familiar with the word racialist, and I’ll wager that when most people hear it they either think the speaker made a mistake by adding the extra syllable, or they assume it’s just a fancy word for racist.  But it is a separate word, and it’s meant—according to many—to embrace a separate concept.  While racism posits that racial distinctions place races into a hierarchy of superiority and inferiority, racialism claims to simply be a recognition that racial differences exist.  It purports to take the high ground, remaining neutral and non-judgemental: racial differences are real, but they don’t indicate superiority or inferiority, only difference.  It might be important, in a technical sense, to show that these two words have different meanings, but it’s increasingly clear that in practice they are equivalent.  At least one major dictionary (the Oxford English Dictionary) has reached this conclusion and collapsed the definitions:  racism and racialism are the same word for them, with racialism simply being older (although they’ve retained separate entries and citations for each).   American Heritage differs from the OED by giving racism and racialism separate entries, and citing the racism/racialism equivalence as “Chiefly British.” Merriam-Webster gives the words separate entries, too, but tellingly cross-references racialism  back to racism.  Many readers might be surprised to learn that all of these terms are relatively new.  Racialism  is slightly older (first citation: 1901), and in those citations there’s an impression of trying to be more academic or intellectual in the way the word is used.  By the way:  if you’ve looked up this word in other online sources, you might have encountered the much-repeated assertion (even in Wikipedia’s entry for racialism) that W.E.B. Du Bois used racialism  in his 1903 work, The Souls of Black Folk.  I’ve done a full text search through it, however, and while he may have described the idea, he didn’t use the specific term.  For that matter, he also didn’t use the word racist in that volume.  We have a living language, and actual use can overtake documented meaning.  If racialism ever deserved a clear distinction from racism, that’s no longer true:  in practice the words are the same.  But even if you disagree with that conclusion, you should take note of another concept that I’ve mentioned frequently here:  the skunked term.  Skunking is the practice of avoiding a word because its meaning is in flux—some readers will think it means one thing, while others will think it means another.  The user of such a word invites confusion.  Christopher Daly  Read more at https://thebettereditor.wordpress.com/2016/08/29/racialism-its-not-the-same-as-racism-or-is-it/

NISO Work Item:  Flexible API Framework for E-Content in Libraries  Submitted by:  Kelvin Watson, Chief Innovation and Technology Officer (kelvin.watson@queenslibrary.org) and Christopher Carvey, Director of Interactive Customer Experience (christopher.carvey@queenslibrary.org), Queens Library Proposal last modified:  June 21, 2016  Approved by NISO Discovery to Delivery Topic Committee:  July 18, 2016   Library patrons struggle with hard to use, old technology when interacting with library resources; they are used to very modern tools and technologies, especially the adoption of mobile technologies, in almost every other area of their lives.  For public service and back office operations, libraries use varied technologies to accomplish all the tasks associated with providing services to users.  By establishing standards on RESTful2 Web services APIs3 as well as standard Mobile Application Intent calls4 , the library industry will leave archaic, difficult-to-use tool sets behind, and level the playing field for libraries,allowing more flexibility in meeting patrons’ needs with customized solutions unique to their communities.  This initiative will deliver a foundational framework to communicate an understanding on how libraries expect to provide and receive data, as outlined in the first proposed draft(s) of the Queens Library API 2 Requirements.  Find 3-page paper and links to draft documents at http://www.niso.org/apps/group_public/download.php/16796/Library%20Services%20API-for%20VM%20Approval.pdf

NISO, the National Information Standards Organization, a non-profit association accredited by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), identifies, develops, maintains, and publishes technical standards to manage information in today's continually changing digital environment.  NISO standards apply to both traditional and new technologies and to information across it's whole lifecycle, from creation through documentation, use, repurposing, storage, metadata, and preservation.  Founded in 1939, incorporated as a not-for-profit education association in 1983, and assuming its current name the following year, NISO draws its support from the communities it serves.  The leaders of over 70 organizations in the fields of publishing, libraries, IT, and media serve as its voting members.   http://www.niso.org/about/

Borscht is a tart soup popular in several Eastern European cuisines, including Ukrainian, Russian, Polish, Belarusian, Lithuanian, Romanian, and Ashkenazi Jewish cuisines.  The variety most commonly associated with the name in English is of Ukrainian origin and includes beetroots as one of the main ingredients, which gives the dish a distinctive red color.  It shares the name, however, with a wide selection of sour-tasting soups without beetroots, such as sorrel-based green borscht, rye-based white borscht and cabbage borscht.  Borscht derives from an ancient soup originally cooked from pickled stems, leaves and umbels of common hogweed, a herbaceous plant growing in damp meadows, which lent the dish its Slavic name.  With time, it evolved into a diverse array of tart soups, among which the beet-based red borscht has become the most popular.  It is typically made by combining meat or bone stock with sautéed vegetables, which--as well as beetroots--usually include cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes and tomatoes.  Depending on the recipe, borscht may include meat or fish, or be purely vegetarian; it may be served either hot or cold; and it may range from a hearty one-pot meal to a clear broth or a smooth drink.  It is often served with smetana or sour cream, hard-boiled eggs or potatoes, but there exists an ample choice of more involved garnishes and side dishes, such as uszka or pampushky, that can be served with the soup.  Read much more and see beautiful pictures at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borscht

Q:  When is Chocolate Day Celebrated?  A:  One site declares that July 7th is Chocolate Day, but another asserts that one day isn’t sufficient and that February is National Chocolate Lovers’ Month (it makes sense to me that chocolate would need more than one day to be celebrated and that the celebration period occur during winter).  A third site insists that International Chocolate Day is September 13th, and another insists that National Chocolate Day is October 28th!  As if all of that wasn’t enough, particular chocolate goodies have their own days.  For instance, National Bittersweet Chocolate Day is on January 10th, while Chocolate Soufflé Day is February 28th.  May 2nd is National Chocolate Mousse Day; National Chocolate Chip Day is almost two weeks later on May 15th.  June 22nd is National Chocolate Eclair Day.  If you can’t get enough chocolate cupcakes, their National Day is October 18th.  And the list goes on and on . . .  James Ford  http://www.amanochocolate.com/faqs/when-is-chocolate-day-celebrated/  Read more and link to Lucy and Ethel wrap chocolates! video (3:03) at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/monkeymind/2016/09/eat-your-chocolate-proudly-a-smallest-meditation-on-international-chocolate-day.html

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1526  September 14, 2016  On this date in 1741, George Frideric Handel completed his oratorio Messiah.  On this date in 1752, the British Empire adopted the Gregorian calendar, skipping eleven days (the previous day was September 2).  On this date in 1814, the poem Defence of Fort McHenry was written by Francis Scott Key. The poem was later used as the lyrics of The Star-Spangled Banner.