11th annual Gene DeGruson Memorial Lecture

October 9, 2008 will mark the 11th annual Gene DeGruson Memorial Lecture. And to commemorate this occasion, we have invited Mr. Shelby Horn, attorney and one of Gene DeGruson's best friends and closest collaborators to present a talk about Gene’s much loved pet project The Little Balkans Review. This literary, historical and cultural journal from Pittsburg State University was edited by Gene, Shelby and other talented writers and artists. This journal, comprised of articles written by PSU faculty as well as citizens of Pittsburg and the surrounding area included stories, histories, photo and art essays and poems all relating to the history, culture and art of Southeast Kansas. (The "Little Balkans" refers to the unique Eastern European immigrant culture which came to Southeast Kansas along with the coal miners who left their home countries to work in the mines around Pittsburg.

Once again the lecture will take place on October 9th at 7p.m. in Axe Library in the Special Collections Department which is in the basement. After the lecture, refreshments will be served in the browsing area

For further information, contact Randy Roberts (4883, rerobert@pittstate.edu) or Jane Victor (4886, victor@pittstate.edu). We will be very glad to see you there.

Jane Victor
Director of Special Projects
Friends of Axe Library.

Library sees interior, exterior improvements

By KEVIN FLAHERTY

The Morning Sun

PITTSBURG — As Pittsburg State University students begin to move back for the year, they’ll be treated to a renovated Leonard H. Axe Library, both on the inside and the outside of the building.

Paul Stewart, PSU facilities planning director, said the exterior improvements were needed to keep water, and carbon off the library’s finish.

“We’ve done a lot of preventative work over the summer,” Stewart said.

Workers took time Monday cleaning the limestone on the building’s front, re-caulking and putting a waterproof membrane over the area.

Stewart said workers also took time to put new steps in.

“The old ones were brick and were starting to shift and settle,” Stewart said. “So we actually removed the old ones and put in new concrete steps.”

Other improvements include brick tuckpointing around the building, repairing some of the planters around the side of the building.

SEAN STEFFEN/THE MORNING SUN
Jerry Rich, left, and Eloy Diaz of Mid Continental Restoration out of Fort Scott, do work above the front entrance of Axe Library on the Pittsburg State campus Monday afternoon

All of those repairs were designed to modernize, clean and weather-proof the building, Stewart said.

But the exterior isn’t the only place that will be updated. Randy Roberts, curator of special collections at Axe Library, said the special collections had been upgraded and gone more online.
Among those exhibits to go online, Roberts said he was working on a Laura Bridgman exhibit that would focus on the writings, and a knitting done by Bridgman, a blind woman who taught herself to write. Bridgman, a New Englander, corresponded with a woman in Thayer.

“So there’s our Kansas connection,” Roberts said.

He said other collections included one on 1920s coal mining, a Gordon Parks collection, one featuring aerial shots of World War II, a log book for the Pittsburg Fire Department and records from the Picher, Okla., mining museum.

Overall, the special collections area has seen heavy upgrades in the last five years or so. More than 30 years ago, special collections was housed in a tiny room on the third floor of Porter Hall. Then, it was moved to another third floor, this time at the then-new Axe Library in 1979. The collections remained there until about five years ago, when they moved down to their current home in the basement of the library, where temperature and humidity could be controlled.
Roberts said the collection would continue to expand through the future. He said there were plans to add two more photo histories to the collection by the spring, one capturing the history of the city of Pittsburg in photos, and the other a feature on Pittsburg State.

“We’re very excited about the potential and the future of our collection,” Roberts said.


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SOURCE: The Morning Sun, August 19, 2008, p [A1]

Posted Aug 18, 2008 @ 10:38 PM

© 2008, The Morning Sun - Used by permission.
http://www.morningsun.net/news/x1543320130/Library-sees-interior-exterior-improvements

New Interlibrary Loan system launches in August.

Continuing the Axe Library’s goal to improve Library services, the Axe Interlibrary Loan Department will institute a major change this month. Beginning August 12th, a new Interlibrary Loan system known as ILLiad will be put into place. ILLiad, or “InterLibrary Loan Internet accessible database”, allows Axe patrons to monitor their Interlibrary Loan requests, ask for renewals, and pick up electronically delivered articles. In addition, citations from major databases such as WorldCat or PubMed will automatically populate request forms, saving time for patrons, and providing complete and accurate information to lending libraries. RSS technology, up to the minute request status, and the ability to search active and completed requests is also built into each account.

Accounts, created with the Gus Login ID and GUS PIN, are established when making the initial Interlibrary Loan request. Community patrons have access to Interlibrary Loan by obtaining a PSU Library Card and Axe PIN, after which they may set up an ILLiad account and begin using the service.

With ILLiad the Library will begin a Document Delivery pilot program for PSU faculty, scanning and delivering articles from our collection directly into personal ILLiad accounts, using a companion software package called “Odyssey”.

If you have any questions, please call the Interlibrary Loan department at 620-235-4890.