Archives

Milligan College History, Now Available Online

P.H. Welshimer Memorial Library and the Milligan College Archives are proud to announce the availability of a trove of Milligan documents online, through a mass-digitization project recently completed in collaboration with Appalachian College Association (ACA) and Lyrasis, with funding from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Milligan’s site is hosted on Internet Archive, and serves as a portal to a collection that includes Bulletins and Catalogs (1880-2008), Stampede newspapers (1940-2005), and a full run of Buffalo yearbooks (1915-2010). These are all freely available for viewing online or download in a variety of formats, and are fully searchable.

The landing page for Milligan Colleges Internet Archive collection

For example, say I wanted to see what Dr. Jeanes was up to during his college days. He graduated in 1968, so let’s look at the 1968 Buffalo. From our Internet Archive site, click on “B” in the “Browse by Author” field. This takes us to all the items with authors beginning with B (in this case, Buffalo Staff), arranged by date scanned. I then sort by date (they’ll be in reverse-chronological order.) Scroll down, and click on Buffalo 1968.

Click "Date" under "Sort results by"

The front page for each item looks very much like the main page, but includes information about this specific item, and links under “View the book” to various formats (including PDF, EPUB, and Kindle, available to download). The online viewing is gorgeous and easy to navigate. Click “Read Online.” Each book “opens” to the title page, in a two-page spread view.

First page displayed in 1968 Buffalo.

To “turn the page,” click anywhere within the right page to advance, or the left page to turn back. (Alternatively, click on the arrows at the bottom right corner, or by dragging the finger-shaped scroll button.) Clicking the “down” arrow in the lower right hides the toolbar, allowing full-page, full screen viewing. The other buttons in the bottom corner allow single-page, two-page, or all-page (tiled thumbnails) viewing, as well as zoom in or out.

Navigation buttons

The search box at the top will search all printed text (not graphics). To find Don Jeanes, type “Jeanes” into the box, and click “Go.”

Search box

Search results display as tear drop-shaped icons along the scroll bar at the bottom. Hovering the cursor over the “hit” displays a snippet of the searched word in context, and clicking on icon turns to the relevant page, with search term highlighted in blue.

"Jeanes," found.

This project has already been extremely helpful to me as Archivist. I have been able to answer inquiries with direct links to quality images of our books, rather than flipping through pages and pages by hand, and then scanning individual pages piecemeal. I hope the Milligan College community will find this equally useful, and will have fun exploring some of our history!

New “Life” for the Library News blog

Welcome to Milligan Library Life, the new name for the Milligan College Library blog. The name change is the result of a decision to differentiate the way we use various communication and social networking media in the Library.

In addition to a website, the Library maintains a Facebook page, a Twitter feed, targeted email, and this WordPress blog. Up to now, we have tended to view these various mediums as multiple ways of getting a single message out to our user community–namely, letting you know what’s happening in the Library. The more channels of communication we utilize, the greater our exposure. Right?

This is true to a point. But as we live with these online mediums we realize that maybe we have more than one message to share–or at least, we may have more than one way to share our message. Now that Facebook has become nearly ubiquitous in the Milligan College community (as it has practically everywhere else), we have decided to push most of the Library’s news and event-type posts in that direction. We have also found it convenient to utilize Twitter as a quick way to post schedule and informational alerts to Facebook and the Twitter widget on our website home page.

What do we do with the blog? The blog format is not really appropriate for short bursts of news information. We discovered that what looks perfectly appropriate on the Facebook wall appears as a cluttered mess in a blog. The blog format lends itself to longer form articles–and invites reading at a more engaged and leisurely pace.

Of course it takes more time to write in a form that invites reading at a leisurely pace. Do we have the time? Do we have anything worth saying using this format? Would anyone be interested in reading it?

These are legitimate questions. But rather than give up on the blog I encouraged the Library staff to experiment with me with this other form of communication in the way it works best. Enter Milligan Library Life. We are fairly competent and interesting folk who make it our business to stay informed about the rapidly evolving information environment impacting all our lives. I think it would be valuable to have us report and reflect periodically on such things as trends in library and information resource technologies, copyright and intellectual property issues, concerns about online freedom and privacy, etc. We could also tell you about developments in the Library or Archives, offer tutorials for using information resources more effectively, tell you about new books and media added to the Library, or review an interesting book we read or a movie we watched.

So here we go. We won’t have any set publication schedule, but we would hope to have at least one or two new posts per week. I will be functioning as the editor, with other Library staff participating as contributing editors, writing on items of interest from their particular areas of expertise. If you are inclined, we would also welcome your comments as a way of generating a conversation. I think it will be fun!

Gary F. Daught, Director of Library Services

Meet our newest librarian!

Please join us in welcoming Meredith Sommers, our new Information Resources Librarian/College Archvist, who began work with us on July 13th.

Meredith is a recent graduate of the School of Information Science at the University of Pittsburgh, where she also received her BA, in Classics (while she, like Librarian Assistant Jack Weinbender, counts the Greek language as one of her major loves, please don’t ask her to translate, as it’s been a few years . . .)  At Pitt, she worked as an undergrad in the Fine Arts Library, and as a grad student in the library’s preservation department, where she repaired some books and built protective boxes for others.  She is most proud of her work rebinding Audubon’s Ornithological Biography of America, a five volume set.  (See her work on Volume 2 here).

Meredith is very much looking forward to getting to know Milligan, and to exploring beautiful Northeast Tennessee with her husband, Jon, and two children, Nathaniel and Cora (22 months and 10 weeks, respectively.)

Meredith is taking over from Ginger Dillon, who resigned in May to get married and relocate to the Washington, DC area. “We were sorry to see Ginger leave us, but we are very excited to have Meredith joining our library staff,” says Director of the Library Gary Daught.  Meredith’s job responsibilities will retain much of the hybrid character as when Ginger occupied the position—dividing her time between the Library and the Milligan College Archives.

But there has been some tweaking. As Information Resources Librarian, Meredith will be responsible not only for acquisitions and processing of books and media, but she will also manage the Library’s print and electronic journal and magazine subscriptions.  Daught asserts that the nature of information resource handling in libraries continues to change, requiring new skills and new ways of working. “It’s important for staff to be adaptable, remain flexible, and not to allow position descriptions to become too hardened.  Still, points of personnel change provide the most natural time to rethink and reconfigure.  The departures of Ginger and Jan Ricker (earlier in February) gave us a chance to seriously reevaluate our staffing needs in this area.  It seemed to make sense to bring the management of our various information resource types together under one position.”

Initially, Meredith will spend roughly two-thirds of her time developing workflows with Library information resource management, and one-third of her time as College Archivist. However, it is hoped that she can gradually increase the time she dedicates to archival work.

Next time you’re in the library, be sure to say hello to Meredith, the newest member of our team.

What we did on your summer vacation, Part 1

“So, what do you, like, DO at the library all summer?” is one the most frequent questions students and faculty ask library staff as one school year ends and another begins.  I mean, it’s only reasonable to expect that library staff  play Scrabulous and Minesweeper in an empty library all summer while kindergartener-sized tumbleweeds roll past the periodicals racks.

Well, it may surprise you to learn that we do quite a bit!  Though we still have plenty of summer students, faculty and staff, and camp kids to keep us company, we still find time both to carry out our normal duties and to work on bigger projects and initiatives.  Here’s a taste of what we’ve done between graduation and today…

• Our biggest news first…we completed our library staff by hiring two new library staff members:  Jack Weinbender, our new Library Assistant whose first day with us was June 17, and Meredith Sommers, our new Information Resources Librarian/College Archivist, who will begin  July 13.  We’ll post profiles of both of them soon on this blog so you can get to know them better!
• Mary Jackson tagged dozens of new web resources for the library’s del.icio.us page
• Ordered, cataloged, processed, and shelved hundreds of new books, DVDs, and CDs
• Gary Daught, Mary Jackson, and Jeff Harbin attended BCLA Shared Catalog Committee meetings at Maryville College at the end of May
• Jeff cleaned up and shifted photography lending shelves
• Jeff shifted S-Z section of lending books
• Gary presented on the peer review process to two Scholarly Communication classes in Milligan’s M.Ed. program
• Jeff refreshed new book display with over 150 new books, not one of them published before 2008
• Jeff attended two online Interlibrary Loan tutorials and exponentially expanded pool of potential DVD and CD lenders
• Gary attended a webinar on WorldCat Local, and implemented Milligan’s “quick start” WorldCat Local environment
• Readied reserve shelves for next year, removing many outdated items and adding course-relevant materials, and moved out empty shelving unit to create more space in reserves area
• Gary closed out the fiscal year, reconstructed acquisitions fund code hierarchies, and reallocated funds in the library management system
• Gary initiated a review of current periodical/journal subscriptions with faculty
• Added extra shelving unit to provide more room for growing DVD collection, shifted current items and moved furniture to create more space in DVD room
• Jeff cleaned up and organized both the circulation desk and the Interlibrary Loans area
• Gary and Jeff wrote a grant proposal for the library’s “Librarians Bearing Gifts” faculty outreach project
• Worked with faculty to improve our lending collection of music books
• Gary and Jack organized receipt of and binding requests for M.Ed. theses
• Gary and Jack eliminated backlog of periodical check-ins
• Obtained ten additional circulating student-use laptops, bringing our total to twenty.

Whew!  And though the days of summer are quickly sifting through our fingers like so many grains of Myrtle Beach sand, the library staff has much more to accomplish in the 5 1/2 weeks (!) before the fall semester begins.  Be sure to check out Part 2 of this update as the new school year draws closer.

Library staff member promoted to administrative faculty

It is our pleasure to announce the promotion of Ginger Dillon to full-time professional status on the staff of the Milligan College Library, effective January 1, 2009. Ginger will carry the title of Archives and Technical Services Librarian, with the rank of administrative faculty. Ginger is a Milligan College alumnus (Bachelor of Arts in Humanities, 2002). She received a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies, Archives Concentration from East Tennessee State University in 2005.

Ginger worked in the Library and the Milligan College Archives both as a student and casual part-time employee from 1998 to 2005. She was formally hired as archivist of the Milligan College Archives (half-time) in December 2005. In August 2007, Ginger was hired for an additional 20 hours per week as a paraprofessional in our Technical Services Department, ordering new materials and assisting with cataloging. Ginger has worked hard to enhance the professionalism and visibility of the Archives, and she brings a modern attitude, keen thinking, and technical savvy to her work in Technical Services.

The expectations and information seeking behaviors of library users are changing, facilitated by the rapid evolution of the World Wide Web, new electronic resource access models, and remarkable developments in mobile communication technology. The Library and its staff is committed to responding to these changes with creativity and innovation, resulting in superior service to the Milligan College learning community. Ginger’s promotion, and the flexibility it provides, is a further reflection of this commitment. Please join us in extending congratulations.

Founders’ papers now open for research!

Josephus and Sarah Eleanor Hopwood in 1886

The Milligan Archives has just completed processing work on the Josephus and Sarah Eleanor La Rue Hopwood Collection and is excited to announce that it is open for research!

The Hopwood Collection contains financial paperwork, correspondence, student assignments, and artifacts spanning from 1865 to 1935 – the majority of the Hopwood’s lifetimes and the entirety of their marriage, ministries, and careers as Christian educators.

When Josephus and Sarah Eleanor came to the Buffalo Male and Female institute in 1875 the campus consisted of a single building on an acre of land. The Hopwoods worked tirelessly to build the little Institute into a place where young men and women could be educated in the arts and sciences, could develop good habits and useful skills, and gain a strong knowledge of the Bible. Six years later the school received its state charter and became Milligan College. This collection provides a glance into the everyday work undertaken by the Hopwoods, their supporters, friends, and students on behalf of not only Milligan College, but also of Virginia Christian College (now called Lynchburg College), Lamar College, and Mountain Mission School. We hope that the Josephus and Sarah Eleanor La Rue Hopwood Collection, as well as the Hopwood Correspondence Collection, will provide a unique and valuable resource to researchers interested in the Hopwoods, the history of Christian education and the Stone-Campbell Movement in Northeast Tennessee, and Milligan College. Contact us for more information!

Living history: Navy V-12 alumni share their stories

Tuesday afternoon I joined members of the Phi Alpha Theta history honors society for a luncheon with local alumni of Milligan’s Navy V-12 program. These men came to Milligan between summer 1943 and summer 1945 as part of the Navy’s WWII officer training program. During those two years, the Milligan student body was composed entirely of Navy trainees and the campus was considered a naval base. Jane Anne Thomas organized the luncheon as part of Project Profile, which aims “to bring people in the Milligan community together with students, staff, and faculty they would not otherwise know.”

While we ate, the students, Theresa Garbe, Dr. and Jane Anne Thomas, and I talked to the V-12 alumni and their wives about classes and military training at Milligan. We took notes, were shown photographs of the men as uniformed students, and heard stories about what Milligan was like in the wartime 1940s. Back then, Stan Johnson told me, Milligan only had four buildings – the Administration Building (Derthick), Hardin Hall (then a dorm), Pardee Hall, and Cheek Gymnasium. Trainees woke up at 6am, reported for drill on Anglin Field for an hour, and went to “chow” at 7. Classes were taught by Milligan’s civilian faculty, including Sam Jack Hyder and Ivor Jones. A typical class load was between 17 and 20 hours with strong emphasis on math, engineering, and naval history. Basketball, baseball, wrestling, and football teams were formed and competed against other schools. In addition, an obstacle course was set up in the athletic field and a running course wound around campus and up Pardee Hill (now Sutton Hill). Lights went out at 10pm after a long day of classes and physical training.

Many, but not all, of the young men who went through the V-12 program were deployed. After the war, some stayed in the Navy while others returned to civilian life. In 1945 Milligan was decommissioned as a naval base and launched a vigorous student recruitment campaign to help make the transition back into civilian use. In 1980 the first reunion of the Milligan V-12 alumni was held, and since then further reunions have been organized every couple of years. In talking with these alums, we could feel that they had good memories of their time on campus, were impressed with how far the college has come, and were delighted to share their stories about the V-12 and beyond with us.

If you would like to learn more about the Navy V-12 at Milligan, come by the Archives. We have lots of pictures and other materials to see!