[Web4lib] [request for assistance] : materials and anecdotes needed for awalk down library technology's memory lane...

[Roy Tennant]

Posted on behalf of Marc Truitt, <marc.truitt at ualberta.ca>.
Roy

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [request for assistance] : materials and anecdotes needed for a
walk down library technology's memory lane...
From: Truitt, Marc <marc.truitt at ualberta.ca>
Organization: University of Alberta Libraries
 
Cross-posted; please forgive the duplication...
 
Friends,
 
I have a somewhat unusual request.  I've been asked to give a presentation
to students in the introductory library/information science course at a
local library school.  The presentation is about how libraries have
redefined themselves, their services, and their work because of
technological change, and the time-frame is the last forty years.  Think of
it as a walk down memory lane.
 
I'm looking for anecdotes, reminiscences, and especially visuals that will
help to convey where we have been in the last forty years, and how we got
from there (mid-1960s) to here. I'm hardly the oldest timer around, but I
can spin a few entertaining yarns that would be illustrative and relevant
from the 1970s to the present.  I bet there are many of you who could add to
the fun with some tales of your own.
 
Would you be willing to share them for my use, either on- or off-list?
 
And about those visuals: I'm looking for images (digital photos, scans,
screenshots, whatever) of tools, stuff, devices of all sorts. The whole
range, from maybe a nice image of cards, card sorters, correction devices,
to ILS screenshots of different periods and varying functional modules, to
screenshots of OCLC, RLIN, (or your fave other utility), both graphical and
character-based.  Early library webpages would be great.  Anything and
everything.  Images of early dumb terminals (I fondly remember one of my
first, a 300-bps acoustic-coupled portable that we used for searching BRS
and Medline in 1979).
 
I'm also looking for some screenshots of early MARC displays... they must
exist somewhere!  I've had some very helpful folks at LC trying to locate
the "great-grand dad" of all MARC records, and you might be surprised to
find out that no one really seems to know what it is, or how to find it
(assuming it is findable).
 
Anyway, you get the picture. I'm looking for a fun and very visual stroll
through the last forty years. I'd be grateful for any help you can provide.
Please indicate in your response whether you prefer your contribution to be
attributed or anonymous... and whether you'd like to receive a copy of the
final resulting PowerPoint.
 
- mt
 
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Marc Truitt
Associate University Librarian,
Bibliographic and Information       Voice  : 780-492-4770
   Technology Services            e-mail : marc.truitt at ualberta.ca
University of Alberta Libraries     fax    : 780-492-9243
Cameron Library                    cell   : 780-217-0356
Edmonton, AB  T6G 2J8
 
"And so I quit the police department
And got myself a steady job
And though she tried her best to help me
She could steal but she could not rob."
                                   -- Lennon/McCartney (1969)
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