Name: Tourist. Destination: Home.

My New Year’s Resolution is to explore the great city of St. Louis in 2014. There couldn’t be a better year than the 250^th anniversary of St. Louis’s birth to see what sights are in store. When I arrived home after living away for some years, I came back to a city in transition. The Grove sprang up overnight. Washington Avenue and downtown living was a reality. Food trucks took over Tower Grove Park. The Peabody Opera House was resurrected.

It’s impossible to go a weekend without finding something interesting to do in this town. Check out your local St. Louis County Library for free events and classes or take a guidebook home. Browse our collection of links to all things St. Louis under the topics: Art, Entertainment, and St. Louis. Some of my favorites include - 

• St. Louis Art - Links to galleries, artists, events and groups in St. Louis. This site does a great job breaking down art by medium, with links to artist websites, venders of fine art, and events throughout the year.
• Explore St. Louis - The official website of the St. Louis Convention and Visitor's Commission, this website features complete travel information for St. Louis visitors and resources and planning assistance for group tour planners and meeting planners.
• St. Louis Zoo - One of my favorite places to visit, this site has all the events and showtimes for the world famous St. Louis Zoo, complete with links to educational resources.

Join us in celebrating St. Louis this year by traveling your hometown! Meet me in St. Louis! For more information about STL250 events, visit the official site.

--Anna H., Jamestown Bluffs

ProQuest Digital Microfilm

Did you know that ProQuest Digital Microfilm provides instant, online access to digitized images of actual microfilm from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and New York Times? It is available through the Research link on the library homepage and the News, Sports and Weather subject guide or the Databases A-Z link 24/7. ProQuest Digital Microfilm provides cover-to-cover page images from both newspapers including all graphics, advertisements and other features of the print edition, but does not provide searching capability. You must select a newspaper (click on select at the top left of the page), then choose a year, month and day. When these are selected, the viewer automatically opens to page 1 of the issue selected. It is perfect to look up a story when you can recall the specific date. It’s like looking at the actual newspaper! It can also be used in conjunction with ProQuest Newsstand which indexes both the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and New York Times to obtain the citation information needed to view specific page images. Pages can be viewed, image readability adjusted, downloaded in PDF or printed. You can view images from the newspapers from 2008 to present, with an approximate three to four month delay.

If you have any questions about ProQuest Digital Microfilm or any of the St. Louis County Library electronic resources, please contact the Reference Department at extension 2050.

--Maria D., Reference

Reference Quick Tip: American National Biography

--Tiffany D., Reference

Pulitzer, Carnegie and Caldecott - Oh My!

There are a number of literary awards given each year, so how do you stay on top of this  information? With the NoveList database, you can easily find award winning and notable books by award name or genre.

To get started, first go to Research from the library’s homepage. Then, choose Literature and scroll down to find NoveList Plus. On the right side of the NoveList home page, you will find a list of resources.  Award Winners is the first choice listed under Professional Resources. The most common awards are listed first; organized by materials for adults, teens and children.  You can view all award winning and notable book lists by clicking the link at the bottom of this page.  Lists are sortable by award name or by genre.

Since I am an avid horror reader, I wanted to locate great books in that genre. After navigating to the awards page, I selected “horror” from the genre list on the right side of the screen. Fortunately for me, there are 18 lists of award winning horror titles.  Not only was I able to read about each award, but I found several titles to sufficiently scare me the rest of the year!

--Stacey L., Reference

ReferenceUSA Winter Webcast Schedule

Are you interested in learning more about ReferenceUSA? The following webcasts, offered by ReferenceUSA, are designed to help you get a deeper understanding of how to be effective and efficient when using the resource. To register for any session date, follow the link, select your time zone and complete the form. You will then receive meeting coordinates and confirmation by email. Attendees will need an internet connection to participate in the webcast.

We recommend starting with Search Essentials to lay down a good foundation before proceeding to the other offerings that again will either enhance the search experience (Big Data –Mapping & Data Visualization) or specific to an area of interest (Start, Manage & Grow Your Business,Uncover the Hidden Jobs Market). 

ReferenceUSA Search Essentials [Click to register]
Date: Fridays (January, February, March)
Time: 11:00 AM (1 hour)

Designed for anyone new to using the database, this hour-long session will cover all the basics of getting started with ReferenceUSA. This is also a great opportunity for current users to learn some new tips, tricks and techniques.

Uncovering the Hidden Job Market [Click to register]
Date: Wednesdays (January, February, March)
Time: 2:00 PM (1 hour)

Attendees will learn how to use ReferenceUSA as part of their Career Searching Strategy. Included will be information on the importance of having accurate information for applications and resumes, creating engaging cover letters, assembling a network of references and referrers, finding key persons at a business to act as mentors, building datasets of potential employers based on skill set, work history and preferences as well as how to prepare for interviews and interactions through thorough research.

Start, Manage & Grow! Your Business [Click to register]
Date: Mondays (January, February, March)
Time: 2:00 PM (1 hour)

Entrepreneurs and business owners will learn how to use ReferenceUSA to find the mission critical information necessary to start, manage and grow a business. 

Topics include: 
• name Search for Business
• locate hard to find vendors, both locally and nationally
• locate subject manager experts and professional services
• find investors, venture capitalists and angels
• network with other businesses in your area or in your industry
• develop relationships with related business for co-branding opportunities
• understand community demographics
• survey locations for expansion
• conduct competitive analysis
• plan delivery routes and service areas
• source new employees

ReferenceUSA Big Data [Click to register]
Date: select Tuesdays (January, February, March)
Time: 2:00 PM (1 hour)

Data Visualization is the next BIG thing in data. Going beyond static lists of information, 
ReferenceUSA can help you ‘visualize’ data elements on a map. Great for understanding how locations relate to each other or seeing densities within a specific area, the ReferenceUSA mapping tools give you a new and powerful way to better understand the landscape. Learn how to build a map to display results and how to manipulate the mapping tools to your advantage.

Reference Quick Tip: Gale Legal Forms

--Tiffany D., Reference

The Splendor of Columbia Granger's World of Poetry

What do the movies Shakespeare in Love (1998), Bright Star (2009), and Howl (2010) have in common?  They are all based on poems and poetry.  The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry database is an accessible and informative resource for poets and their works.

The quick search feature at the bottom of the home page allows users to search for poets and poems by name.  There are tabs across the top for searches by subject, biography, commentaries, history and criticism, poetry sources (ex. Afghan poetry), and a glossary.  There is a nice feature that allows users to hear a poem read aloud by clicking on the "audio" link for a poem.

For students, there is a feature that allows the user to compare poems.  There is poetry trivia on the home page and  a featured poem.  There is also a free smartphone app for the featured poem and trivia.  The only drawback to the this excellent database is that some poems, presumably due to copyright restrictions, are not reproduced in full.  The biographical information and list of poems for each poet are extensive and there are references for further research.

Finally, under the final tab on the home page, the last link is for the top 500 most anthologized poems, a treat.  The number one poem? "Kubla Khan: or, A Vision in a Dream" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge.  Well worth reading.

--Harry C., Reference