About Falvey: Newsletter: Blueprints, April '99

 Contents: April 1999

• "Flashlight" on Historical Resources: Databases, Websites, New Books!

• Success of "Faculty Book Talk" Leads to Enlarged Scope of Series

• Reconstructing a Life: Russia's Countess Sophia Panina

• Falvey Surveys Student Satisfaction

• Quest Featured as Poster Session at National LOEX Meeting

• New Faces in Falvey Library

• Cool, Clear Water
  
   

  ---

From Falvey's homepage (http:// www.library.villanova.edu), select E-Resources by Subject/History.

Here you can access the two major abstracting services of historical literature: America: History and Life and Historical Abstracts. Each database indexes over 2,000 journals and pertinent dissertations and can be searched by keyword, subject, author, title, language, document type, journal name, publication date and time period.

In terms of number of scholarly journals covered, America: History and Life and Historical Abstracts are superior to JSTOR. However, while including only 18 titles JSTOR provides coverage back to1895 for the American Historical Review and to the period of the 1930s and 1940s for the others. Adding to its value, JSTOR provides texts of the articles, which are fully searchable.

In addition to the comprehensive databases mentioned above are more subject specific databases, such as HAPI: Hispanic American Periodicals Index, Iter: Bibliography of Medieval and Renaissance Europe and Medieval Feminist Index.

HAPI can be searched by keyword, author, article title, subject, journal title and year(s). To overcome an obstacle of foreign text searching, one "can search foreign language titles using English language keywords, so that 'horse' will retrieve... records containing the words 'caballo' 'cheval' 'cavalo' in the title."

Iter currently indexes complete runs of over 300 scholarly journals published from 1843 to date and covers European culture from 1300-1700. Plans are to include journals dating back to 1700 and coverage of all aspects of the Renaissance and Middle Ages.

Medieval Feminist Index checks 363 journals for articles pertaining to women during the Middle Ages. Journal coverage varies from 1994 to 1998. The advanced search option, in addition to author, title and subject, allows searches by source, primary evidence (charter, financial record, marriage contract), article type, geographic area, century, author's affiliation, year of publication and language.

Under History / Selected Websites explore American Memory, the Library of Congress's Historical Collections for the National Digital Library. It currently consists 45 searchable collections of manuscripts, printed texts, maps, motion pictures, photos and prints. The Alexander Graham Bell Family Papers, Documents from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, Selected Civil War Photographs, Map Collections: 1544-1996 and Early Motion Pictures, 1897-1916 are just a few of the many fascinating collections that are available.

Another intriguing site, the United States Historical Census Data Browser provides statistical population and economic data for each state and county from 1790 to 1970.

While providing an increasing number of electronic resources, Falvey Library also continues to purchase major print references. Some recent acquisitions of interest to historians and history buffs alike include:

American National Biography. Ed. John A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. ( Reference CT213 .A68 1999)

Published under the auspices of the American Council of Learned Society, the ANB updates and enlarges upon the Dictionary of American Biography using broader criteria for inclusion. An "American is loosely defined as someone whose significant actions occurred during his or her residence within what is now the United States or whose life or career directly influenced the course of American history" (Preface). Villanova faculty contributors include Professors James Bergquist, Marc S.Gallicchio, Richard Juliani, James Kirschke and Mark Sullivan.

Schwartz, Richard Alan. Cold War Culture: Media and the Arts, 1945-1990. New York: Facts On File, 1998. (Reference E 169.12 .S39 1998)

Alphabetically arranged articles on the people, literary and artistic works and social, political movements and events that reflected or responded to the Cold War.

Southwick, Leslie H. Presidential Also-Rans and Running Mates, 1788 through 1996. 2nd ed. North Carolina: McFarland & Co., 1998. (Reference E175.1 S695 1998)

Do you remember the names of Adlai Stevenson's, Barry Goldwater's or George Wallace's running mates? Southwick's volume lists standard biographical information for each candidate and includes a narrative summarizing major events and influences, an "Analysis of Qualifications" and a bibliography.

by Dr. James Mullins

What do the following have in _common: the Vietnam War, Lyndon Johnson, Italians in Philadelphia and a Russian countess? These diverse topics were all discussed this year at the new "Faculty Book Talk at Falvey" series.

In November, Dr. David Barrett, political science, opened the new series with a discussion of his recent books, Uncertain Warriors: Lyndon Johnson and His Vietnam Advisors and Lyndon Johnson's Vietnam Papers: A Documentary Collection. In January, Dr. Richard Juliani, sociology, presented the research undertaken with the writing of his book, Building Little Italy: Philadelphia's Italians Before Mass Migration. Dr. Adele Lindenmeyr recently completed the series with her thorough presentation on her research for a forthcoming book tentatively titled Citizen Countess: Life of Sophia V. Panina, 1871-1956. In every respect, this inaugural year was very successful.

It is apparent the series has filled a need on campus. The "Faculty Book Talk at Falvey" provides a forum where faculty can share their experiences with the research and publication process, its trials and tribulations, as well as the joy of seeing years of research culminate in a book.

It has been so successful that now we have two objectives: Invite faculty to do a "Book Talk at Falvey" for 1999/2000, and create a parallel series for articles and papers.

Focusing these talks on books alone has excluded faculty whose primary means of disseminating research findings are through journal articles or conference papers. Therefore, another series will be created called "Faculty Research Talk at Falvey." This will be an opportunity for faculty in the sciences, engineering, nursing and business to discuss their continuing research. A specific article or paper may only reflect one step in a faculty member's research agenda. However, knowing these various steps and understanding how each fits together a particular experiment or survey, for example -- enables us to become more familiar with the research process in that discipline.

These two series will help us understand and appreciate the excitement of the research process in the various fields represented at Villanova. If you are interested in presenting either a "Faculty Book Talk" or a "Faculty Research Talk at Falvey," please contact the Director's Office, Falvey Library, 519-4290.

by Dennis Lambert

Falvey Library's third Faculty Book Talk on March 15 featured Dr. Adele Lindenmeyr, chair of the history department, speaking about her current research on Countess Sophia Panina, a project she plans to turn into a book.

Having discovered in her research for Poverty is Not a Vice: Charity, Society, and the State in Imperial Russia (Princeton University Press, 1996) that women seemed absent from leadership roles in charity work in the late Czarist period, Dr. Lindenmeyr noted her surprise when she discovered two memoirs and papers by just such a woman leader in Columbia University's Russian emigre archives. This was the summer of 1991, but she knew that this would be her next major project.

In these memoirs, she learned much about the life of Countess Sophia Panina (1871-1956) and of her 1917 trial by the Bolsheviks. Despite what she'd learned about the countess, Dr. Lindenmeyr noted many gaps in the record, far short of what would be needed for a comprehensive biography.

Countess Panina was a great philanthropist. She established the Ligov People's House in one of St. Petersburg's working-class neighborhoods. That settlement house provided cultural activities and outlets for common people, such as plays, lectures and art exhibitions.

Luck has played a major role in helping Dr. Lindenmeyr augment Countess Panina's story. People like Countess Panina are of great interest to today's Russians, who wish to rediscover their pre-Soviet past. Dr. Lindenmeyr has been contacted by surviving relatives and friends of the countess who have volunteered information, supplied papers or identified relevant archives.

Somewhat miraculously, the Ligov People's House, later known as the Palace of Culture in Soviet times, still stands. Dr. Lindenmeyr found that the Palace of Culture had an exhibit on Panina when she first visited in 1991.

Persistence has also played a major part in furthering her research. Dr. Lindenmeyr has traveled to St. Petersburg, Moscow and Prague seeking correspondence and other papers.

Tracing Countess Panina's past is complicated by a number of factors. There is the difficulty getting into archives. The city historical archives of St. Petersburg, for example, has been closed since 1993; they are virtually unable to keep the building open.

Also, Panina moved frequently. She fled first to White-controlled Russia, and then lived the rest of her life in exile. Prague was her home from 1925 to 1939. She subsequently lived in New York City until her death in 1956.

Consistent with her upbringing and social and economic class, the countess was a private person. Subjects like money, sex, love and politics were simply not discussed, and consequently pose quite a challenge to a biographer.

Closer to home at Yale, Dr. Lindenmeyr found a memoir by Alexander Polovtsov, the countess' former husband, but found that it contained no mention at all of her or their marriage, which was terminated by a rarely granted divorce after only a few years. At Columbia, she also discovered the papers of Nikolai Astrov, an opposition figure with whom Panina lived from 1918 to his death in 1934.

Many questions about Panina remain. Little is known, for example, about her political life before the Russian Revolution. Dr. Lindenmeyr's book will present the various ways that Panina has been represented: as an enemy of the people by the Bolsheviks, as a community leader and as she is remembered by today's Russians. Last summer, Dr. Lindenmeyr did research in both Moscow and St. Petersburg. Later this year, she plans to start writing and identify gaps that require further research.

Panina's contribution to Russian history will finally be brought to the attention of English-language readers.

(Dennis Lambert, the subject liaison to the history department, is the head of Collection Development, Management, and Preservation.)

by Jacqueline Mirabile

When you see a crowd of students and a few library staff members outside the University bookstore in May during "Buy Back Week," you can be sure that the library staff is not buying or selling books. Falvey Library will be asking students to fill out a survey to indicate how satisfied they are with specific services and facilities of the library. Surveys will be distributed also at the library door as well as from a table in the South Campus parking lot.

In 1996, almost 500 students filled out a lengthy questionnaire with queries ranging from temperature control to ease of use of the library's resources. Services provided by the various areas in the library were rated.

One important section concerned the students' perception of their preparedness to use the library's resources. Many of the questions are being asked again to determine if there has been improvement in services and facilities. Additional questions will address new aspects of the library, such as the group study rooms and this year's pilot projects for first-year students in the Core Humanities program, the Quest tutorial and the Quest Strategies sessions.

Students completing the survey will receive a coupon to be used at the various locations of Holy Grounds.

As with the previous survey, the questionnaire and its distribution are the responsibility of Falvey's VQI team with considerable assistance from other staff members.

(Reference librarian Jacqueline Mirabile chairs Falvey's VQI team.)

Judith Olsen and Barbara Quintiliano, reference librarians at Falvey Library, presented a poster session recently at the national LOEX Conference in Houston, Texas. Their session, titled "The Quest for Information Literacy: Forging New Partnerships," highlighted the collaborative program with the Core Humanities Seminar program that teaches information gathering skills to all first-year students at Villanova. Instruction librarians from colleges and universities across the United States met March 11 to 13 at LOEX, Library Orientation Exchange, a clearinghouse for information literacy instructional programs.

Welcome to three new Falvey staff members. Ward Barnes joined the circulation department as a building monitor in February. Ward is from Iowa, and taught U.S. history, world history, and Western civilization at Mentor Public High School, Mentor, Ohio. He discovered, fell in love with, and moved to the Main Line in 1998. Anne Ford, a shelver in the circulation department, began in March. She is married with one son and one daughter. She previously worked at Haverford Public Library at the circulation desk. She reports that she likes it very much at Falvey. Susan Facciolli began in March as a library assistant in the Interlibrary Loan Department. A long- time resident of Havertown, Sue resides there with her family. She is a member of the Haverford Township Historical Society, likes to browse bookstores, old and new, and explore museums and historical sites.

Something new has appeared on the first floor of Falvey Library--a water cooler. In response to requests, a water cooler that filters tap water has been installed on the first floor, beside the existing water fountain. The filtering system in the cooler removes most of the mineral taste from the water.

The need for this water cooler filtering system was pointed out by the Falvey Student Advisory Council (FSAC). Funds that had been generated from the sale of the "Falvey Mug" were designated for the purchase. However, when University Dining Services were approached for information about such systems, they offered to donate one. The Falvey Mug proceeds were used to cover the cost of installation.

Drink up!