Archive for the ‘flash-mob cataloging’ Category

Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010

March Legacy Mob: U.S.S. California

After the success of cataloging the 1963 White House Library, we’ve made it into a monthly thing.

This month, starting at 12:00 noon EST Wednesday, March 3, and continuing for 24 hours, we’re going to be cataloging the on-board library of the U.S.S. California, as it was in 1905.

This California‘s library catalog were written up and published by the Government Printing Office, and has been scanned by the Internet Archive. Designed to serve the California‘s 830-odd officers and men—the libraries were separate—it offers a unique view of the navy of the time, and of the country. The ship, then rechristened the San Diego, and its library, went to the bottom of the ocean in 1918, the victim of a German U-boat. Six sailors died.

The “Legacy Mob” is an amalgam of two LibraryThing inventions:

Labels: flash-mob cataloging, legacy libraries, legacy mob

Monday, October 26th, 2009

Simultaneous flash-mob cataloging

On the weekend of October 3-4, we had two simultaneous, two-day, flash-mob cataloging events. Here’s the wrap-up:

Central Park School for Children – a small public charter elementary school in Durham, NC
(centralparkschoolforchildren.org, centralparkschool on LT, blog post announcing event)

1,391 books cataloged, barcoded, assigned Dewey numbers, physically labeled the volumes for shelving, uploaded cover images, and shelved. All this was done by 22 catalogers on Saturday and 10 on Sunday.

It’s easy to underestimate how many books are in a library, and children’s books are particularly notorious (skinny little volumes that they can be), so this flash-mob is heading back to finish up the collection. They don’t have a date set (they’re thinking early November), so if you live in the area and you’d like to help, you can email erin_stalberg@ncsu.edu for details.


Erin and Laura Abraham presented “Cataloging: Who Knew it was a Community Service?” at the North Carolina Library Association conference this past week. You can download the PowerPoint here.

The Canton Museum of Art in Ohio
(CantonArt.org, CantonArt on LT, blog post announcing event)

Over two days, catalogers managed to add 1,090 books in a total of about 7.5 hours. They had seven catalogers on Saturday, four on Sunday, and a dedicated book lugger (also the father of the flash-mob organizer) for both days.

See more photos here.

Labels: canton, Durham, flash-mob cataloging, nc, NCSU, oh

Friday, February 20th, 2009

Flash-mob cataloging tomorrow in Rhode Island

Join us tomorrow for the second Flash-Mob Cataloging Party, at the Audubon Society of Rhode Island in Smithfield, RI.

See the main post.

I’ll be driving some people from Boston tomorrow morning. If you want a ride—no guarantees—drop me an email (tim@librarything). I check it all the time.

Labels: flash-mob cataloging