Posts filed under ‘academic libraries’
Pac-Man teaches you about copyright
Pegasus Librarian Iris Jastram at Carlton College provides us with an excellent overview of copyright basics … with Pac-Man. Thanks, Marianne Aldrich!
Small plush squids say “RAWR”
Anybody know where this takes place? Or who made it? Or anything?
Thanks, Carol Dickerson!
Addendum May 3: Carol tells me it’s the Trinity University Library in San Antonio, Texas.
museum shenanigans of the 1920s
Okay, so this isn’t precisely a library shenanigan, but it’s close enough, I think — people tend to elide museums and libraries.
On May 10, 1922, Colorado College students removed taxidermied animals from the college museum in Palmer Hall and placed them all over campus. This shenanigan was apparently in protest of then-president of the college, Clyde Duniway, whose policies were unpopular with students: he limited the times when men could visit women’s dormitories; strictly enforced chapel attendance; and fired a football coach for using profanity on the field. 350 students (about half the total enrollment) signed a petition complaining about Duniway, to no avail. The animals prank was one of several that spring: students also released hydrogen sulfide in one classroom building and somehow got a live cow up to the second floor of another.
In January of 1929, CC students again placed the museum animals around campus, this time to protest the firing of the editor of the student newspaper.
Source: J. Juan Reid, Colorado College: The First Century (1979), chapter V, “Controversy and Student Unrest.”
Ripon College After Dark: Danger in the Library
Scary AND hilarious video and event at Lane Library, Ripon College, Ripon, Wisconsin. I wonder if we should do this at Tutt Library. Thanks, David Graham!
Flash mob at Tutt Library, Colorado College
Man, I wish I could have seen this. It took place on Tuesday, February 12, at 8:30 p.m., and lasted 3 minutes and 16 seconds, the duration of the song “The Harlem Shake” by Baauer (2013, more information here).
The UT-Austin library also took part in this meme:
Thanks, Steve Lawson and Joan Petit!
Keep the door closed due to bats
Mental Floss provides “9 Very Specific Rules From Real Libraries.” Thanks, Steven Kotok!
Oreo ad library shenanigan
Apparently, this ad aired during the Superbowl yesterday. I missed it, but several people let me know about it. I only wish people really did whisper whenever they were in the library. I confess I have shushed, and been shushed, both. Thanks, everybody!
libraries collecting/lending shenaniganish things
The Macaulay Library of the Ornithology Lab at Cornell University has digitized over 7000 hours of wildlife sounds, including the clarinet-like call of the indri lemur, which they describe as “the best candidate to appear on a John Coltrane record.” You can hear that sound and more in the NPR story, here. (You don’t have to listen to the whole story — the website has pulled out a few animal sounds for easy clicking.)
Speaking of unusual library collections, the Basalt Regional Library District in Colorado is lending seed packets. Patrons grow fruits and vegetables from the seeds they check out, and then harvest seeds from them and return those to the library.
Thanks, Rebecca Laroche!
Panda hat!
It seems no one is taking responsibility for this excellent shenanigan. I got it from Marianne Aldrich, who got it from someone else on Facebook, who got it from someone else on Facebook. A little detective work suggests the location may be the Arnold Bernhard Library at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. Thanks, Marianne!
Climbing the library!
At Portland State University in 1988, at least one student attempted to climb the library building as part of the Outdoor Program’s “Halloween Climb.”
Here at Colorado College, students have attempted to climb various campus buildings over the years, but not, as far as we know, the library.
Thanks, Joan Petit!
Library Shenanigans 