Kathleen Benoun, long time Library Associate at the Western State Hospital Library in Lakewood, WA, is an amateur historian who spends a lot of personal time researching the history of the hospital, and the library itself.  Kathleen recently shared this interesting story about opening day of the library back in 1950.

Can you imagine opening day at a library without a book or librarian in sight?  That’s exactly what happened in 1950 on the grounds of Western State Hospital.  The Tacoma newspaper photograph you see below accompanied a story about the budget crisis of 1949 that diverted monies for the Staff Research and Patient Libraries to other building projects on campus.

Thankfully, the Legislature held a special session to fund both libraries and the Research Institute that occupied other floors of the building.

Washington State Hospital Library 1950 (from the Tacoma News Tribune??)

Since then and many budget crises later, the Patient Library has endured to provide leisure, educational, and therapeutic resources for both patients and staff.

Washington State Hospital Library 2014

The shelves are no longer empty.  Now the library houses 8574 books and 5610 CD/DVDs in the collection, as well as popular magazines and local newspapers

Beyond the physical resources the library provides, over the years, Kathleen visited every ward in the hospital to present Library programs.  Her goal was to both entertain and encourage the patients to borrow from the collection or use library services such as the listening center where patrons could enjoy radio or music or outreach programs for ward-bound patients and staff. The most popular ward programs were interactive–such as trivia contests and poetry readings.  Kathleen reports, “One month, I visited a ward with older men and women and challenged them to play the board game Chauvinist Pigs.  Its trivia questions were based on gender-specific common knowledge.   We had such a spirited time together, the staff came over to shush us.  First time that ever happened to me, but it wasn’t the last.”

Patients and staff often express their gratitude for the presence of an on-site library to provide a comforting environment within the state psychiatric hospital.  Over the years, both patients and staff have donated materials to supplement the meager library budget.  Patients have also donated poetry and original art.  One patient read so many novels, he told the Library staff he could write his own book, which he did and donated two copies to the Library collection.

The Western State Hospital Library is a unique library which serves a key purpose; a place that responds to the needs of its patrons and provides a welcoming, non-judgmental space to visit. But isn’t that the definition of all good libraries?

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The 12^th man is alive and excited at Washington State Library.  The 4^th floor windows on the Library’s south side urge the Seahawks to victory in Super Bowl 48!

Need something to read before the big game?  Here are a few books about the Seahawks:

Tales from the Seattle Seahawks sideline:  a collection of the greatest Seahawk stories ever told by Steve Raible.

Super Seahawks:  the story of the Seahawks magical run to the Super Bowl.

Notes from a 12 man:  a truly biased history of the Seattle Seahawks by Mark Tye Turner.

For these titles and other books about the Seahawks, check out your local public library.  Enjoy the game and Go Hawks!

[From the desk of Shirley Lewis. Photos by Sean Lanksbury and Steve Willis]

Less than a month into a whirlwind tour of over 40 libraries around the state and the Gadget Menagerie is officially a big hit in libraries. January kicked off the Gadget Menagerie with visits to Skagit and Lincoln Counties as well as the Ritzville Library and Mid-Columbia Libraries. Now, we are preparing for a super-busy February with visits to Gonzaga University, Richland Public Library, Timberland Regional Library, Washington State Library, Spokane County Library District, Sno-Isle Libraries and Everett Public Library. Wow, that’s exhausting just at a glance!

Sedro-Woolley staff show off devices at the Gadget Menagerie

The exciting thing about the Gadget Menagerie program is that it is not only for staff, but also for the public. Libraries wishing to offer a public program are partnering with Washington State Library staff to bring the Gadgets to the library for patrons as well. Working directly with library users has been a joy. It is so much fun to help people discover the world of eReaders and tablets. Everyone has different needs when it comes to using a tablet and our job is to help people understand how they are all similar, yet different. Is this a contradiction in terms? Perhaps, but it is very true.

By working with staff and encouraging them to approach devices in a “device agnostic” manner, we hope to get staff more comfortable helping patrons coming to the library on a daily basis with various devices. Each day of the Gadget Menagerie, we are learning more about devices and about our communities.
Devices in the current menagerie include: Kindle, Nook Touch, Kindle Fire HD, Nook HD, Galaxy Tab 10.1, iPad Mini, Microsoft Surface RT and a Chromebook.

New devices are coming soon and will include more android-based tablets. Patrons and students may bring their own device or explore one from the Washington State Library.

Just a few of the available devices at the Gadget Menagerie.

At the public workshops, we assisted many people with their own devices and showcased the gadgets from our menagerie. An 83-year old woman wanted to compare tablets. After working with the various tablets in the Menagerie, she was able to narrow her interest down to 2 tablets. At another session, a 70-something farmer wanted to know when high speed internet would come to his county and town. He loves technology and has quite a few of his own gadgets already. He enjoyed showing us what he liked about the different tablets and was enthusiastic when telling us that when high-speed internet comes to his town, he’d be able to do so much more with all his high-tech toys. When the local librarian asked him “How did you get so tech savvy?,” he responded with, “My grandkids, and I have a lot of them!”

Our youngest patron at the Gadget Menagerie was 9 years old. She had a tablet and wanted to learn about YouTube. Unfortunately, since she has no access to internet at home, her tablet has limited functionality when items aren’t downloaded directly onto it. She loves coming to the library and now knows that she can bring her tablet in and use the library’s wi-fi to download what she needs and ask the friendly staff for help.

So, by now you are probably wondering, what exactly is this Gadget Menagerie?

The Washington State Library is partnering with local libraries across the state providing gadget training for library staff. Library patrons and students will be given similar training focused on the needs of the device user. Over 40 locations and 70 trainings are scheduled for the Gadget Menagerie through June 2014.

“We are very excited to be able to provide this training,” State Librarian Rand Simmons said. “We hope these skills will be beneficial to both library staff and those who rely on library resources.”

Staff at the Burlington Public Library study devices at the Menagerie.

Library staff will learn how various eReaders, tablets and other devices work. They will discover what these devices have in common, how they differ, and learn basic operating tips. Staff will learn basic troubleshooting and tips for helping patrons with their devices, including how to download books from the library.

The Gadget Menagerie will familiarize local library staff with the variety of gadgets available, allowing for staff to be more comfortable and skilled in helping library patrons.

Not all libraries are offering both types of training; some libraries are focusing only on staff training since they either already offer public workshops or don’t have the resources to offer trainings at this time.

These trainings are funded by the Washington State Library via the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) through the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA).

For this project, which is part of the Washington State Library Digital Literacy project, we are actively encouraging feedback and stories. So far, 100% of the public attendees say they have learned something valuable and would recommend the program to another. Comments from the public vary, but this one is very typical of the responses we have been receiving; “It was useful to have knowledgeable persons explain the equipment-what they will and will not do. Thank you for bringing the variety of devices.”

As one staff person said in a thank-you note, “We couldn’t have asked for better, more useful, hands-on training!”

Larry Tommer with Japanese glass float found near Ocean Shores, Washington, 1966.

From the desk of Evan Robb

A new digital collection from Ocean Shores, Washington documents the area’s rapid transformation from a sleepy, rural seaside locale to a developed resort community during the 1960s and 1970s. The Ocean Shores Heritage Collection includes material from the local history archives of the Ocean Shores Public Library, digitized in 2013. Digitization was made possible with assistance from the Washington State Library’s Washington Rural Heritage Initiative.

Standout material from the new collection includes:

• Photographs from Ocean Shores’ local newspaper The Ocean Observer. These include some great images of coastal recreation, including a topic near and dear to many throughout the Pacific Northwest: razor clam digging.
• A series of 1960s photos depicting Ocean Shores landmarks and a community in the early phases of development. These include a few good shots of the S.S. Catala, a retired Canadian passenger steamship that was brought to Ocean Shores in 1962 to serve as a floating motel, but capsized and sank close to shore on New Year’s Day, 1965.
• Several items documenting Ocean Shores’ incorporation (Ocean Shores is a relatively young city in Washington State, having incorporated in 1970).

Didi Anstett, 1968’s Miss USA, posing with the Ocean Shores Clam Prix oversized razor clam shovel.

Ocean Shores Public Library joins more than 90 cultural heritage organizations contributing to Washington Rural Heritage, a statewide collaborative digitization initiative coordinated by the Washington State Library.  Public libraries, tribal libraries, and partnering heritage institutions are eligible to participate in the project, which provides grant funding, training, digitization support, and digital collections hosting to its participants.

To learn more about participation, as well as upcoming digitization grant opportunities, please contact Evan Robb at the Washington State Library, [email protected], 360 704-5228

Clallam Bay Library

The CBCC Branch Library was given a check this month in the amount of $1000.00 to spend on any and all kinds of books for the library. The check was donated by the CBIT (Clallam Bay Improvement Team) which is made up of offenders serving life without parole. The money comes from them holding fund raisers, such as pizza sales or baked goods made in the bakery by inmates and purchased by inmates through the whole institution. The bakery is run by Peninsula college and is a certified class. The purpose of the team is to improve life in the institution for all inmates. They are always craving new, up-to-date items that have to do with re-entry, medical, jobs and of course popular fiction authors. Due to the size of our budget at this time the library was grateful for the check and we thank them all.

Parachute play

Music powers the young brain and children’s musician, Nancy Stewart, brought that message to over 300 librarians across Washington State. Nancy launched a pilot program last year to connect families with free resources for early learning through community singing. Her project takes place in her own community of Mercer Island and has been expanded to last through at least summer 2014. The ideas shared at the trainings provided by Nancy around the state for library staff will be incorporated into her resources. Nancy’s free website for “Sing With Our Kids” is available at http://singwithourkids.com/.

Nancy’s free website includes songs, videos, book recommendations, community toolboxes, a grandparents corner, tips on using technology, advice from the experts, early learning and music information, your voice and ears and much more. All the information is available freely as long as credit is given and not profit is made.

Programs related to the project have included flash mobs, scavenger hunts, caroling, may pole celebration, storytimes,  campfire sing-alongs and early literacy talks for parents and care-givers. When Nancy demonstrated the may pole at the library workshops, excitement was so high that many libraries now have their own maypole for singing and dancing. In addition, one librarian in Everett came up with the idea of theming the may pole to reflect the current season and a new version about a spider was created. Check out Nancy’s flash mob video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnFA4DOIwdc&feature=share.

Martha Shinners and the May Pole

Making inter-generational connections and getting out into the community is what Nancy’s pilot project is all about (in addition to encouraging singing and the development of early literacy skills in young children.) Nancy has partnered with the local library, bookstore, parks, churches and even families she has never met while working on this project. Using social media (blog, facebook, twitter) helps Nancy reach a wider audience and connect with new people. For her community Christmas caroling, Nancy’s basic idea was to get families together and go caroling. She threw out the idea that someone could do this in their own neighborhood and even project the lyrics onto a big screen if available at someone’s home. Next thing she knew, Nancy was contacted by a family inviting her to lead caroling at their home with lyrics projected. Neighbors and family came together to sing making for quite the memorable event.

Early literacy skills are vital to helping children prepare for kindergarten. Nancy has great videos on the six early literacy skills and five practices of early literacy at http://singwithourkids.com/video.htm. She collaborated with Charlie the Noiseguy to make the videos both educational and fun.

Feedback from the workshops held in 13 locations around the state was extremely positive. Participants shared the following comments on the impact of the workshop:

Campfire Sing-Along

• I would say the project was great to learn about and Nancy was very motivating. It helped me feel encouraged to understand the importance of music in a child’s life and the need to incorporate it more into storytimes. I also enjoyed the live examples of how to use a parachute, maypole, etc. Great ideas!
• Being reminded about the power of music once again and how it can connect families together.
• It was just listening to Nancy talk about the power of song. It gave me a lot to think about and also a new way of talking to patrons about the importance of song. Also, her website looks incredible! I think this will be invaluable.
• Building the confidence and providing the outstanding free resources for integrating songs and singing into children’s programming in the community.
• The wealth of ideas and all the connections that were made. The reminder about the importance of music in my professional life and personal life!
• I really enjoyed the videos that Nancy shared of herself going out into the community. Breaking up in to small groups and brainstorming gave us a “hands-on” approach and I think that helps us retain the information better and we also learn from each other.

The final workshop takes place tomorrow in Spokane at the Moran Prairie branch of the Spokane County Library District. After the final workshop, Nancy will continue to share her project with libraries throughout Washington via her website, blog and other avenues. Interested in giving it a try yourself? Check out Nancy’s community toolbox at http://singwithourkids.com/toolbox.htm.

From the desk of Rand Simmons

Washington State is listed as one of 10 success stories by the Institute of Museum and Library Services in their 2013 report on early learning, Growing Young Minds: How Museums and Libraries Create Lifelong Learners.

“By proactively responding to new initiatives and policy actions, libraries across Washington have secured their position as key players in statewide early learning efforts,” the report states. It cites several activities in which the Washington State Library has been instrumental: the Washington Early Learning Initiative (2000-2003), the establishment of the Early Learning Public Library Partnership (ELPLP), and a partnership between the University of Washington Information School, the ELPLP, the Foundation for Early Learning and the State Library focusing on research-based evidence of the effectiveness of public library programming on early learning and early literacy.

The report is available online in PDF format.

Limited print copies of the report and the executive summary are available from Leanna Hammond, Washington State Library, [email protected], 360-704-7133.

To learn more about the State Library’s involvement in early learning contact Martha Shinners, [email protected], 360-570-5567.

Volunteers working at WTBBL

September 18, 2013

Today we recognize the many volunteers in the Olympia area who work in the Washington State Library and Washington State Archives. There will be a celebration this afternoon in the Governor’s Mansion to simply say, “thanks.”

Washington State Library volunteers are not a luxury. They are a necessity. State Librarian Rand Simmons noted, “They help us to better meet our customers’ needs by providing services we wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford.”

Without volunteers we would not be able to offer such robust services in our Central Library, located in Tumwater, or in our Seattle Washington Talking Book & Braille Library (WTBBL).

Steve Willis, Manager of the Central Library says, “We treat them in the same way we hire staff. We talk with them about their interests and skills and look for a good fit with the opportunities available.”

We have an amazing crew of volunteers at the Talking Book & Braille Library — more than 400 who donate over 30,000 hours each year. The WTBBL volunteers work in areas such as book recording, braille transcription, and other library services. Our WTBBL customers are located throughout the state and materials are sent and returned through the US Mail system by our shipping and circulation volunteers.

In our Digital and Historical Collections program we have three projects involving volunteers. The main project is the indexing of historical newspapers. Volunteers view each page of the newspaper and enter keywords into a database so that researchers can find the articles they need. This labor intensive work makes our online newspapers more searchable.

The newest project is the conversion of some of the historical digital collection to braille. Volunteers are converting selected titles to text files and correcting the text misread by the Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. Once this is done, the files will be sent to the Washington Talking Book & Braille Library to be converted to braille. This project is bringing our online material to a wider audience.

Judy Pitchford comments that “Both projects require a lot of reading of historical material, which is what these volunteers appear to love the most.”

Our National Digital Newspaper Program has a goal to upload 300,000 pages of historic Washington newspapers to the Library of Congress’ Chronicling America website by mid-year 2014. Our volunteers are often history and newspaper enthusiasts willing to help correct key terms misread by Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software and improve the search results.

Project manager Shawn Schollmeyer says, “The editing they do helps us meet and improve on standards set by the Library of Congress and contributes to online resources used by genealogists and historians everywhere.” We are currently seeking volunteers for this project. Volunteer Rhonda Fabert encourages others to volunteer for the project, “If you are someone who enjoys incredibly interesting work that will benefit generations to come, I highly recommend that you call Shawn Schollmeyer to arrange your own volunteer opportunity with this very prestigious project.”

Gordon Russ is helping to create a database of the library’s historic ephemera files. In doing so, Gordon is improving future subject and keyword access to this extremely useful collection for researchers of Washington State history.

The State Library receives many requests from family genealogists for newspaper obituaries. While we have lost our capacity to fill requests from out-of-state individuals because of staff reductions, the contribution of volunteers enables us to continue to fill in-state requests.

The historic Northwest card file, housed in 180 card catalog drawers, is being converted to an online format by volunteer David Lane. The resulting online database will be available to genealogists, researchers, and historians. The work is slow because each card, an estimated 172,000 of them, must be entered into an Access database which is then made available online.

Rhonda Fabert also created a database of microfilm vendors which allows library staff to more efficiently identify sources of given microfilm titles.

“It is a win-win situation when the library benefits from the volunteers’ work and the volunteers’ experience enriches their lives,” notes Volunteer Coordinator, Marilyn Lindholm.

Rhonda wrote about her volunteer experience, “I’ve experienced an incredible amount of personal and professional growth through interactions with the dedicated staff of WSL over the past year. The project entrusted to me was to design a database which will make access to serials microfilm vendor information quicker and easier. I am delighted to have had the experience of working with Technical Services Supervisor, Shirley Lewis, and look forward to the project’s completion.”

A retired State Library employee and former federal depository specialist, Carol Estep, assists our staff who work with federal publications by doing a wide variety of duties. Her faithfulness helps us bridge the gap left by staff reductions.

Motivation to volunteer varies with each individual. Michele Weaver wrote, “I want to thank the Washington State Library for giving me the opportunity to ‘give back’ as a genealogy research volunteer finding obituaries for patrons. Having done genealogy research for many years on my own family, I know how frustrating it is to hit the proverbial ‘brick wall’, and get stalled with your research. Through the years I have had some kind people do research for me, and I love the thought that I am ‘paying it forward’ by finding obituaries for State Library patrons, and filling in holes in some family trees.”

How do people come to volunteer? The paths are many. Gordon Russ has volunteered for the State Library for about 10 years. He got his start by sending an email to the State Librarian after reading a newsletter article that featured the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company, a subject of particular interest to him as he collects railroad-themed books. The article mentioned that some of the documents would be digitized so he thought he might help with that process.

One thing led to another and he began volunteering for what is now the Digital and Historical Collections Program. Then, one night while reading in bed, he dropped a book he was reading and the spine broke.

Knowing that the State Library had a preservation program, he asked its program manager, Diane Hutchins, how he might repair the book. She pointed him to the “Conservation Kitchen,” a YouTube tutorial developed by State Library staff. That led him to a stint helping the State Library preserve rare materials including some of Governor Isaac Stevens’ books along with maps, photographs, and other rare items dating as far back as the 15^th century.

Gordon loves history and that love is evident as he tells colorful stories about Washington. We appreciate his dedication to helping the State Library preserve the history of the state of Washington.

Want to explore volunteer opportunities at the Washington State Library? Please contact Marilyn Lindholm at [email protected] or 360.704.5249.

How do volunteers benefit those of us who work in the State Library? Marilyn Lindholm said it best, “Our volunteers bring creative ideas and a fresh perspective to how we do business.”

Thank you, Kendall Brookhart, Kathie Dexter, Carol Estep, Rhonda Fabert, Karen Fieldman, David Lane, Barb Monti, Brynn Pitchford, Anissa Rajala, Gordon Russ, Kelly Sjoblom, Amelia Turnbull, Michele Weaver, and Mary Webster. Your skills, expertise and service are invaluable in helping us meet the needs of our customers.

Our family vacation this summer was in Maui where we vacationed several years ago as well. I noticed a few things that changed in the past 3 or 4 years. The kids are now teens and pre-teens and were amazingly well behaved and involved in living the Aloha life that Maui offers. I also noted that my in-laws who are in their 70s were enjoying their Nooks and iPads for reading books. Likewise, the parents, aunts, and uncles were all enjoying various e-Readers and tablets for reading, watching videos, and playing games.

The kids were actually less inclined to read an e-book on the beach because they were too busy playing in the surf. However, when they took a break from exploring and swimming, they were gaming on their various gadgets or reading actual paper books.

As libraries struggle to find a new path in this age of gadget abundance, I look at my family vacation and realize that we have successfully reached all generations with technology. And it is not just the youth who are embracing it. In fact, some youth are now starting to disengage from the overload of technology to try to have more balanced lives.

While I did have my “smart-phone” and e-reader tablet in Maui, I turned off my work email and limited my monitoring of social media and email. My only internet access was through my phone, as the condo did not provide free internet. This was very much appreciated by my husband and the rest of the family as it allowed us the opportunity to connect with each other without the constant disruption of gadgets.

Whereas a few years ago, the kids would have been playing with their handheld game consoles and everyone (kids and adults) would have been reading paper books, now we all have our gadgets. And yes, some even took those e-Readers to the beach!

While reading in our family is never going away, the way we read is changing. None of us wanted to bring a dozen books in our suitcases with the extra fees airlines charge for luggage so having a dozen (or more) books downloaded on our various devices helped us keep the luggage fees in check and assure us that we wouldn’t run out of reading material.

Oh, and where do you think many of those e-books came from? You guessed it, the library. Some things never change.