CARL Book Beacon

Brownbag Schedule

2012-01-30T08:26:00.000-06:00

2012 STUDENT BROWNBAG SCHEDULE

Brownbags are on designated Tuesdays from 12:15 – 12:50

Location: CARL RM 112 - Call Reference at 758-3053 for info

e-Books and e-Readers - 14 FEB 2012

Electronic book vendors now allow users to download entire e-Books to their computer desktop or to most of the major e-Readers on the market (with the exception of the Kindle). Come to a lunchtime brownbag where we will show you how to find e-books, audio books or digital documents. Come to the CARL or discover us online at: http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/CGSC/CARL/

DTIC/STINET – 13 MAR 2012

Please join the CARL for training from the Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC). The DTIC database contains student papers from Major DOD Schools, After Action Reports, Senior Officer Debriefs, Command Histories, and many other useful military documents which CARL staff use daily. You too can use it to find technical and historical sources.

http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/search/advanced_search.html

REFWORKS – 10 APR 2012

Create your bibliography just by a click of a mouse. OK, so it’s not that easy, but RefWorks can make it much easier to organize your sources, cite them and create a bibliography for your thesis or long paper. Come and learn the tricks. http://lumen.cgsccarl.com/login?url=https://www.refworks.com/Refworks/

SOCIAL NETWORKING –08 MAY 2012

Do you know how to tweet, flick or add to the wall? Learn how to use Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and how to have a wiki. The focus is to have safe and effective social communication while following Army and DoD guidance.

http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/CGSC/CARL/

Paraskevidekatriaphobics Fun Facts

2012-01-13T08:04:00.000-06:00

Do you have Paraskevidekatriaphobics which is a morbid, irrational fear of Friday the 13th?

Here are some facts about the fear of Friday 13th!

Friday the 13th, 'the most widespread superstition'

The sixth day of the week and the number 13 both have foreboding reputations said to date from ancient times. It seems their inevitable conjunction from one to three times a year (there will be three such occurrences in 2012) portends more misfortune than some credulous minds can bear. According to some sources it's the most widespread superstition in the United States today. Some people refuse to go to work on Friday the 13th; some won't eat in restaurants; many wouldn't think of setting a wedding on the date.

Although no one can say for sure when and why human beings first associated the number 13 with misfortune, the superstition is assumed to be quite old, and there exist any number of theories, one such is primitive man had only his 10 fingers and two feet to represent units, this explanation goes, so he could count no higher than 12. What lay beyond that — 13 — was an impenetrable mystery to our prehistoric forebears, hence an object of superstition.

To the ancient Egyptians, we're told, life was a quest for spiritual ascension which unfolded in stages — twelve in this life and a thirteenth beyond, thought to be the eternal afterlife. The number 13 therefore symbolized death, not in terms of dust and decay but as a glorious and desirable transformation. Though Egyptian civilization perished, the symbolism conferred on the number 13 by its priesthood survived, we may speculate, only to be corrupted by subsequent cultures who came to associate 13 with a fear of death instead of a reverence for the afterlife.

The name "Friday" was derived from a Norse deity worshipped on the sixth day, known either as Frigg (goddess of marriage and fertility), or Freya (goddess of sex and fertility), or both, the two figures having become intertwined in the handing down of myths over time (the etymology of "Friday" has been given both ways). Frigg/Freya corresponded to Venus, the goddess of love of the Romans, who named the sixth day of the week in her honor "dies Veneris."
Friday was actually considered quite lucky by pre-Christian Teutonic peoples, we are told — especially as a day to get married — because of its traditional association with love and fertility. All that changed when Christianity came along. The goddess of the sixth day — most likely Freya in this context, given that the cat was her sacred animal — was recast in post-pagan folklore as a witch, and her day became associated with evil doings.
Various legends developed in that vein, but one is of particular interest: As the story goes, the witches of the north used to observe their sabbath by gathering in a cemetery in the dark of the moon. On one such occasion the Friday goddess, Freya herself, came down from her sanctuary in the mountaintops and appeared before the group, who numbered only 12 at the time, and gave them one of her cats, after which the witches' coven — and, by "tradition," every properly-formed coven since — comprised exactly 13.

For more facts check out theses items in CARL

031 Extraordinary origins of everyday things by Panati, Charles

1987, ISBN 0060960930, 1st ed., xi, 463 p.

390 How did it begin?: customs & superstitions, and their romantic origins by Brasch, R

1966, 1st American ed., xix, 352 p.

394.26973 The folklore of American holidays by Cohen, Hennig and Coffin, Tristram Potter

1987, ISBN 9780810321267, 1st ed., xxxi, 431 p.

398.303 A brief dictionary of American superstitions by Ferm, Vergilius Ture Anselm

1959, 259 p.

Popular New Year's Resolutions

2011-12-30T08:47:00.001-06:00

These New Year's resolutions are popular year after year. Find resources to help you achieve your goals.

CARL Website outage

2011-12-27T07:24:00.002-06:00

Currently we are experiencing a web page outage. If you need access to our databases, see the following links. We apologize for the inconvience.

Search Summon using this URL
http://carl.summon.serialssolutions.com/

CARL databases through the E-Journal Portal
http://fw8pk7vf4q.search.serialssolutions.com/

CARL's catalog
http://comarms.ipac.dynixasp.com/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=carlcgsc&reloadxsl=true#focus

CARL's Digital Library
http://cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm4/search.php

Full Text Electronic Journal List

fw8pk7vf4q.search.serialssolutions.com

CARL's Alternate web address
http://www.cgsc.edu/cac2/CGSC/CARL/

CARL Website outage

2011-12-23T13:14:00.000-06:00

Currently we are experiencing a web page outage. If you need access to our databases, see the following links. We apologize for the inconvience.

CARL databases through the E-Journal Portal

http://fw8pk7vf4q.search.serialssolutions.com/

CARL's catalog

http://comarms.ipac.dynixasp.com/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=carlcgsc&reloadxsl=true#focus

CARL's Digital Library

http://cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm4/search.php

New Virtual Reference Center from Gale

2011-12-06T13:20:00.001-06:00

With Virtual Reference Center researchers can access more than 5,000 (and growing) eBooks in virtually any subject, including health, business, careers, history, literature, biography, science and many more. User's can navigate a list of subjects and titles from the homepage; view titles without performing a search; export citations (EndNote, ProCite, Reference Manager) as well as generate (APA, MLA, tagged format); bookmark and return to virtually any spot in the research via a persistent URL; translate content into more
than 11 languages such as Spanish, French and Portuguese; and utilize the ReadSpeaker technology (text-to-speech) which allows text to be read aloud to users and downloaded in MP3 format.

So if your having trouble finding eBooks and looking for starting information why not try the GALE Virtual Reference Center.

You can also find a link to the Virtual Reference Center on our Find Articles the Articles - Galegroup option on our webpage.

Kansas EZ Library replaces Overdrive ebook content

2011-12-05T09:38:00.000-06:00

Kansas EZ Library is the new name for Kansas’ econtent, which will include audiobooks and ebooks. This service will replace the current Overdrive e-book and audio book the Kansas State Library currently provides.

Here is the link to the new Kansas EZ Library. http://www.kslib.info/digitalbooks

The current subscription to Overdrive through Kansas State Library will end today Dec 5th, 2011. If you have an AKO account you can still have access to Overdrive through the army library site.

Thanksgiving Message

2011-11-23T13:26:00.000-06:00

As a reminder, the library will be closed on Thursday in observance of Thanksgiving. We will open Friday at our usual time.

We hope you and your family have a safe and happy Thanksgiving!

Some Thanksgiving Trivia

2011-11-22T08:07:00.001-06:00

What food was served at the first Thanksgiving Dinner?

There is no evidence that turkey was eaten at the first Thanksgiving, a three-day meal shared between the pilgrims and Wamponoag tribe in 1621. It is more likely that they ate venison and a lot of seafood.

Today, though, we sure eat a lot of turkey. According to a study done by the National Turkey Association, Americans eat 690 million pounds of turkey during Thanksgiving 2007. That is equal to the weight of the entire population of Singapore.

An estimated 46 million turkeys are eaten on Thanksgiving (the birds weigh, on average, 16 pounds). That is more than double the amount eaten on Christmas (22 million) and Easter (19 million). In 2010, more than 244 million turkeys were raised and about 226 million of those were consumed in the United States.

What Utensil was missing from the first Thanksgiving day dinner?

The fork.

What did they use to eat their meal with?

A knife, a spoon, and their fingers.
The fork was not brought by the pilgrims. Governor Winthrop of Massachusetts introduced it 10 years later, but it did not really catch on until the 18th century.

In what year did Football start being a Thanksgiving tradition?

It all started in 1934, when the Detroit Lions was bought by G.A. Richards. Trying to build up the fan base for the team, he scheduled a game for Thanksgiving Day to play the Chicago Bears, who at the time were world champions.

The game sold out and was broadcasted live on radio. And with that huge success,the tradition began. Since then, the Detroit Lions have played 67 Thanksgiving games!

What year did Macy's famous parade start?

The parade began in 1924 with 400 employees marching off from Convent Avenue and 145th Street in New York City. During this time the parade was accompanied not with the oversized ballons of our favorite cartoon characters, but with live animals borrowed from the Central Park Zoo -- from camels to elephants.

Refworks Brownbag

2011-11-15T09:31:00.000-06:00

Create your bibliography with the click of a mouse. OK, so it’s not that easy, but RefWorks will help you organize your sources, cite them and create a bibliography for your thesis or other long paper. Come and learn the tricks on Wednesday Novemeber 16th from 12:45 to 13:45 in Room 112.

5 Facebook Privacy Settings You Must Review Now

2011-11-01T14:23:00.000-05:00

The number of places where you can get tagged on Facebook continues to grow, but you can give yourself the right to approve all tags before they can appear on the site — and the ability to do this has gotten more refined than ever.
There are actually five different options you can enable that together limit whether anyone’s effort to tag you can go live on the site.
To get to these five options, fist click the down arrow in the upper right-hand corner of the screen and select “Privacy Settings.”
Then, scroll down to the heading “How Tags Work” and click on the linked words “Edit Settings,” located to the right.

The pop-up window shown above appears, listing the five options for controlling tags.
All but the middle one default to “off,” and you’ll want to decide whether to turn them on so you can:

Receive prompts to approve or decline everything your friends post on your wall or link you in before the item can appear on your profile.
Similarly vet all tags that your friends add to your content before they can become visible on your profile.
Opt in or out of being suggested to your friends when they are tagging photos.
Permit or disallow your friends to include you in their check-ins to places.

That middle option has more choices than simply on or off. Here you get to decide on how visible your profile or timeline content is.
The options here include “public,” “friends,” “friends of friends,” or “custom.”
So you can choose from any of those lists to create a customized audience for your timeline or profile.
We recommend that you make your timeline or profile visible to friends and consider blocking current and former coworkers.
Even if you have cool colleagues, remember that timeline can serve up everything ever posted to your profile since you joined the site — you can alter this as well by selecting different pieces of content to make visible, but it’s best to start with limited visibility as a default and then make specific posts public as you go.
Which privacy settings, if any, have you used on Facebook so far?

Halloween History

2011-10-31T11:56:00.000-05:00

Halloween is considered by most in the United States as a fun holiday, mostly for children, but it has roots in ancient religions and folklore, including paganism, ancient Roman religions, early Catholic Christianity, Irish folklore, and even British politics! Children and adults alike enjoy this holiday today, with funny costumes, candy, and parties, while some countries observe this time as a remembrance of departed loved ones and religious saints.

Around 2,000 years ago, the Celts, who lived in what is now the United Kingdom, Ireland, and northern France, had a festival commemorating the end of the year. Their New Year was November 1, and this festival was called Samhain, pronounced sow-en. The end of their year signaled the end of summer, the end of the harvest season, and the beginning of a long, hard winter that often caused many deaths of animals and people. Weaker livestock were often killed and eaten during this holiday, since most likely, they would not survive the winter anyway. Because of this, and the cruel winter to come, this time of year signified death to the Pagan Celtics. They believed the night before the New Year, that the wall between the living and the dead was open, allowing spirits of the dead, both good and bad, to mingle among the living. Some of these spirits were thought to possess living people, cause trouble, ruin crops, or to search for passage to the afterlife.
Samhain was considered a magical holiday, and there are many stories about what the Celtics practiced and believed during this festival. Some say the spirits that were unleashed were those that had died in that year, and offerings of food and drink were left to aid the spirits, or to ward them away. Other versions say the Celts dressed up in outlandish costumes and roamed the neighborhoods making noise to scare the spirits away. Many thought they could predict the future and communicate with spirits as well during this time. Some think the heavily structured life of the Pagan Celtics was abandoned during Samhain, and people did unusual things, such as moving horses to different fields, moving gates and fences, women dressing as men, and vice versa, and other trickeries now associated with Halloween. Another belief is that the Celtics honoured, celebrated, and feasted the dead during Samhain. A sacred, central bonfire was always lit to honor the Pagan gods, and some accounts say that individual home fires were extinguished during Samhain, either to make their homes unattractive to roving spirits, or for their home fires to be lit following the festival from the sacred bonfire. Fortunes were told, and marked stones thrown into the fire. If a person's stone was not found after the bonfire went out, it was believed that person would die during the next year. Some Celts wore costumes of animal skulls and skins during Samhain. Faeries were believed to roam the land during Samhain, dressed as beggars asking for food door to door. Those that gave food to the faeries were rewarded, while those that did not were punished by the faeries. This is reported to be the first origin of the modern "trick or treat" practice.

In the First century A.D., the Roman Empire had taken over most of the Celtic lands. The Romans had two festivals also celebrated at the same time of year as Samhain. One was Feralia, also in late October, was the Roman day honouring the dead. The second festival was for Pomona, the Roman goddess of trees and fruit. Pomona's symbol was the apple. These two festivals were combined with Samhain in the Celtic lands during the four hundred years the Roman Empire ruled over the Celts. The goddess Pomona's apple might be the root of the Halloween tradition of bobbing for apples.

Over the next several hundred years, Christianity had spread to include the lands inhabited by the Celtics and the Romans, but the festival of Samhain was still celebrated by the people. The Christian church reportedly did not like a festival with Pagan roots practiced by Christians, so a replacement was needed. Pope Boniface IV designated May 13 as All Saints Day to honour dead church saints and martyrs. Samhain continued to be celebrated, so in 835 A.D., Pope Gregory IV moved the holiday to November 1, probably to take attention away from the Pagan Samhain festival and replace it. Since All Saints Day was sanctioned by the church, and related to the dead, the church was happy, but many Pagan traditions of Samhain continued to be practiced, including bonfires, parades, and dressing up in costume. All Saints Day was also known as All Hallows, or All Hallowmas (Hallowmas is Old English for All Saints Day). Since Samhain was celebrated the night before November 1, the celebration was known as All Hallows Eve, and later called Halloween. In the year 1000 A.D., the church designated November 2 as All Souls Day, to honour the dead who were not saints, and they eventually became combined and celebrated as Hallowmas.

On All Souls Day in England, the poor would "go a-souling". They would go door to door asking for food, and in return, would pray for the souls of their dead relatives. It was widely believed at the time that the souls of the dead would await passage into heaven until enough people prayed for their souls. The Christian church encouraged this practice to replace the old Pagan tradition of leaving cakes and wine out for the spirits of the dead. The poor would be given "soul cakes", which were pastries made for those who promised to pray for their dead relatives. In some cultures, soul cakes would be given in exchange for a performance or song as well. Children eventually adopted this practice, and were given food, ale, or money.
Jack o'lanterns are a Halloween staple today, with at least two historical roots. The early Pagan Celtic peoples used hollowed out turnips, gourds, or rutabagas to hold an ember from the sacred bonfire, so they could light their home fires from the sacred bonfire. Another tale from folklore gives jack o'lanterns their name. In Irish myth, a man known as "Stingy Jack", who was a swindler and a drunk, who asked the devil to have drink with him. Jack convinced the devil to change himself into a coin so he could pay for the drink, but Jack put the coin in his pocket next to a silver cross, which trapped the devil, preventing him from changing himself back. Jack agreed to free the devil on the condition that the devil would not bother Jack for a year. Next year, Jack tricks the devil into climbing a tree to fetch a piece of fruit. While the devil is up the tree, Jack carves a cross into the trunk, preventing him from climbing back down the tree. In order to get out of the tree, the devil promised Jack not to seek his soul any more. When Jack died, he was not allowed into heaven, because of his drunken and swindling ways, but he was not allowed into hell either, because the devil kept his word. Taking pity on Jack, the devil gave him an ember to light his way in the dark, putting it into a hollowed out turnip for Jack to carry on his lonely, everlasting roamings around the Earth. People from Ireland and Scotland would make "Jack o'lanterns" during this season to scare away Stingy Jack and other evil spirits wandering about.

Over the next several centuries, superstitions about witches and black cats were added to to the folklore and legends of Halloween. Cats were thought of as evil, especially black cats, and were killed by the thousands in Medieval times, possibly contributing to the Black Plague, due to the shortage of the rat's natural enemy, the cat. During this time, the church created the belief that evil witches existed.

In the 1500's, Martin Luther created the Protestant Church, which had no saints, so no All Hallows Day was allowed. On November 5, 1606, Guy Fawkes was executed for attempting to blow up England's Parliament. Fawkes, along with an extremist Catholic organization he belonged to, wanted to remove the Protestant King James from his throne. The English wasted no time to have a celebration to replace All Hallows Day, so Guy Fawkes Day was celebrated from then on. Many traditions of All Hallows Day were practiced, such as bonfires, and children asking for money, but the reasons why were different. Bonfires were known as "bone fires" originally, because they were lit in order to burn an effigy of the Catholic pope, burning his "bones". Two hundred years later, the effigy of the pope was replaced by an effigy of Guy Fawkes, prompting children to go door to door, asking for a "penny for Guy", so they could make their effigy to burn. In the New World, the colonists celebrated Guy Fawkes Day for a while, but as the colonies became the United States of America, Guy Fawkes Day fell by the wayside.

In the United States, Halloween was not a popular observance in early United States history, as most of the early settlers were Protestant. At the time, Halloween was considered mostly a Catholic, Episcopalian, and Pagan holiday, and therefore largely ignored. In the southern colonies, such as Virginia and Maryland, there were some Halloween customs observed. The first common events were called "play parties". These parties got neighborhoods together to celebrate the harvest, dance, sing, tell stories of the dead, tell fortunes, and have pageants for children in costume. By the mid 1800's, immigration increased, and many Irish immigrants, mostly Catholics fleeing the potato famine, brought many Halloween traditions with them. Jack o'lanterns found a new face, the pumpkin, which was very plentiful in the New World. Catholics and Episcopalians sought to preserve their traditions, so started an effort in the late 1800's to popularize and make their holidays known to the general population. By campaigning to put these holidays (Halloween and All Saints Day) on public calendars, magazines and newspapers started to publicize these holidays, and soon became popular in the United States more as a community and family holiday, rather than one of great religious and supernatural importance.
By the mid twentieth century, Halloween turned into a secular holiday, community centered with parties city-wide, parades, and great costumes. Halloween is mostly aimed to children, but young and old enjoy this holiday, with events and parties for both children and adults. Starting in 1950, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) started a campaign for children to collect money at Halloween for underprivileged children around the world. Halloween is the United States' second largest commercial holiday, spending approximately $6.9 billion a year.

In Other Countries, such as Mexico, Latin America, and Spain observe All Saints Day and All Souls Day with a three day celebration starting on the evening of October 31, through November 2. In most areas of Mexico, November 1 is set aside to honour dead children, and November 2 to honour those who died as adults. Starting in mid October, shops are filled with decorations, flowers, toys made like skeletons and other macabre shapes, sweets, pastries, and candies shaped like bones, coffins, and dead bodies in preparation for the festivities. Called "Day of the Dead", the spirits of relatives are supposed to visit their families homes. An area of the home is cleared away, and an altar is erected decorated with flowers, photographs of the deceased, candies and pastries shaped like skulls inscribed with their name, candles, and a selection of the deceased's favorite foods and drinks. Even after dinner cigarettes and liquors are provided for the dear departed's after dinner enjoyment. Incense is burning to help the spirits find their way home.
In preparation for November 2, the graves of the deceased are cleaned, painted, and decorated for the occasion. Families gather November 2 for a festive family reunion. Food, drinks, and tequila are brought along, along with sometimes even a mariachi band. In some areas, fireworks announce an open-air mass, the most solemn time of the Day of the Dead. Many customs vary depending on the particular city, town, or culture, but all over Mexico, Latin American, and Spain, the Day of the Dead is considered a celebration of their departed family.

Eastern Europe's celebration of All Saints Day are usually spent by praying most of the day, praying to the Saints and thanking God. Often, they visit their departed family members at the cemeteries. Slovakia, Hungary, Lithuania, Slovenia, and Poland observe All Saints Day as a public holiday, but unlike Mexico and the United States, this day is a somber day of remembrance and reflection. France, Italy, and Germany are celebrating Halloween, American style, as does Canada. Ireland celebrates American style, but a common town bonfire, a remnant of Celtic days is still lit. England still celebrates Guy Fawkes Day on November 5 with bonfires, burning effigies of Guy Fawkes, and fireworks.

Halloween Traditions

Costumes: Dressing in costumes has its roots in the Pagan Celtic roots of Samhain. One theory is they dressed as ghouls to fool evil spirits let loose on October 31, so they would not be possessed by these spirits. Another theory is they dressed in costume just for fun, and to make mischief. Yet another theory is that faeries would dress as beggars asking for food, which would also be the origins of the "trick or treat" practice. After the Catholic Church replaced Samhain with All Saints Day, people would dress as dead Saints and devils for their festivities.

Trick or Treat: This practice might have had it's start in the legend from Celtic days that faeries would dress as beggars going from door to door asking for food, and those that did not show hospitality would be harshly dealt with by these magical faeries. On All Souls Day, the poor would beg for "Soul Cakes" (sweet pastries) in exchange for prayers for their departed loved ones, expediting their passage to heaven. Sometimes costumed groups would sing and perform in exchange for food, ale, or money. In the United Kingdom, Guy Fawkes effigies to be burned were prepared by children, going door to door, asking for a penny for Guy, on Guy Fawkes Day.

Bonfires: These have two origins. The first is the sacred ritual of extinguishing home fires, and one sacred bonfire is lit in each town for the end of the New Year. Some say the reason home fires were extinguished is to scare away evil spirits from homes, while others say that home fires were supposed to be lit from embers from the sacred bonfire to start the New Year. The second origin was from Guy Fawkes Day in the United Kingdom to burn effigies of the Catholic pope, and later of Guy Fawkes himself.

Apples: A seasonal fruit, and also the symbol of the Roman goddess Pomona, commonly thought at the time to possess qualities of knowledge, resurrection, and immortality. Bobbing for apples, peeling a long apple peel, and other manipulations of the fruit were thought to foretell the future, on this night of Samhain.

Jack o'lanterns: From the Irish folk tale of Jack, who tricked the devil, but was not allowed in heaven or in hell. The devil, taking pity of Jack, gave him an ember to light his way on his eternal walks on Earth, carried in a hollowed out turnip. Because of their size and availability, pumpkins were substituted for turnips in the United States. The Celtics did use a hollowed out rutabaga to carry an ember from the sacred Samhain bonfire home to light their home fires, but the significance and relation to the Irish tale of Jack is unknown.
Ghost Stories: Ghost stories probably have their roots in the original Celtic belief that the spirits of the dead (both good and bad) wandered the Earth on October 31 (Samhain). Later, when the church replaced Samhain with All Saints Day and All Souls Day, the dead were remembered, and spoken about. In the United States today, they are used to amuse and scare children (and some adults) to get them in the "spirit" of Halloween.
For more info check out the History Channel website.

Special Report - Afghanistan 10 years on

2011-10-19T09:29:00.000-05:00

The beginning of this month marked 10 years since military operations started in Afghanistan. In recognition, the editors and analysts at Jane's have produced a 65pp report detailing operations and analysis.

The report includes:
* detailed analysis of insurgent tactics & targets generated by JTIC's database (now 134000 events and growing!)
* profiles of the Taliban and Haqqani Network groups
* US war spending by sector and category & forecast spending
* Selected IHS Jane's articles on both insurgent threats and ISAF's counter efforts.

Additionally, a few quotes from our experts: Peter Felstead: "The degree to which NATO is ultimately seen to prevail in Afghanistan is now increasingly in the hands of the Afghan National Security Forces themselves, but one thing is certainly true: Afghanistan has changed NATO as much as NATO has changed Afghanistan. Coalition warfare has come of age."

Dan Wasserbly: "From a kit perspective, Afghanistan has proven a difficult environment for which to equip coalition troops. The prevalence of improvised explosive devices has pushed militaries to field heavier armoured vehicles that can shield against blasts, but the mountainous terrain necessitates more mobile trucks and lighter personal gear."

Jeremy Binnie: The Afghan war was justified by the need to prevent the country being used by international terrorists. Some argue that this objective has been achieved, with Al-Qaeda largely displaced to Pakistan's tribal areas, where it has suffered numerous blows, while the Taliban leadership has promised that it will not be an international threat when it re-establishes control over Afghanistan. However, a myriad of foreign jihadist groups continue to operate in the tribal areas and may relocate to Afghanistan in the future. It remains far from clear whether the Taliban is capable of breaking all ties with its foreign allies and preventing them from using Afghanistan as a base for activities that threaten foreign states."

Matthew Henman: The increasing ability of the Taliban and allied groups to conduct high-profile attacks in Kabul repeatedly calls into question the ability of Afghan security forces to protect the seat of government let alone achieve the basic counter-insurgency precept of projecting security, stability, and the rule of government across the remainder of the country."

James Brazier: "Pakistan is positioning itself as the sole intermediary capable of forging peace with the Taliban. However, Pakistan's efforts to interpose itself into Afghanistan's peace process have created dangerous questions over the nature of Pakistan's relationship with the militants."

Terry Pattar: "Time is running out to leave Afghanistan in an acceptable shape that would justify the time, money, and lives spent in expanding the mission from counter-terrorism to state building. With major doubts over the current Afghan government and whether they will be able to maintain stability after NATO withdrawal, the US now has to choose if they are going to back Karzai or find an alternative. Either way, there will have to be some form of rapprochement with elements of the Taliban if Afghanistan is not going to descend back into civil war."

Click here for the complete report.

Super Computer Trivia

2011-10-14T14:47:00.000-05:00

Which was the first supercomputer?

a. CDC 6600

b. Cray-1

c. IBM 7030 Stretch

d. UNIVAC

Give up? Well the answer is ...

The CDC 6600 from Control Data Corp., is generally recognized as the first

supercomputer, according to Wikipedia. Built in 1964, it was designed by

Seymour Cray, and ran at about 1 megaflop (a million floating point

operations per second). That was about three times faster than the previous

fastest computer, the IBM 7030 Stretch. (Today, an iPhone 3Gs can run at

about 6.42 megaflops.)

The UNIVAC, which first appeared in 1951, was the first commercial computer

produced in the United States.

Seymour Cray left CDC in 1972 to start his own company. The first Cray-1

supercomputer was installed at Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1972.

Columbus Day

2011-10-06T07:26:00.002-05:00

On Monday Oct 10th, we will celebrate Columbus day,just a reminder that CARL's Hours on that day will be from 10:00 to 17:00. In honor of his voyage here are some facts.

For decades and decades, American history books and school teaching told us that Christopher Columbus discovered America. What those books and teachings did not give credit to was the fact that Native Americans were already here first and truly discovered America. It also gave little mention to the fact that Nordic explorers had travelled down the eastern cost of Canada thousands of years earlier.

Today, we celebrate Columbus day for what it accurately is. Columbus did discover the existence of the New World for Europeans who until then, believed the world was flat and ended somewhere in the Atlantic. And, the focus is more upon discovery of the "New World", and less upon Columbus himself.

Did You Know? Columbus day is sometimes referred to as "Discoverer's Day".

Some key facts (in case you forgot them since grade school):

Columbus Discovered America in 1492. He originally set sail on August 3, 1492, but had trouble with the ships, stopping at the Canary Islands for a month. The ships left the Canary Islands on September 3,1492.
He travelled with three ships: The Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria
While Columbus was an Italian, he could not find funding in Italy, so he turned to the King of Spain. King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella provided the funding.
He did not land on the U.S. mainland. He landed on an island in the Caribbean. While many believe he landed on San Salvador, there is still debate on which island he originally landed on.

Corruption/Anti-Corruption in Afghanistan: a Selected Bibliography

2011-09-20T10:05:00.000-05:00

The U.S. Army War College Library is pleased to announce the publication of Corruption/Anti-Corruption in Afghanistan: a Selected Bibliography, compiled by Lenore K. Garder, Research Librarian.

The purpose of this bibliography is to introduce some of the resources readily available at the U.S. Army War College or on the Internet about corruption and anti-corruption efforts in Afghanistan.

click below to view:

http://www.carlisle.army.mil/library/bibs/corafg11.pdf

Military Families: A Selected Bibliography

2011-09-19T13:43:00.002-05:00

The U.S. Army War College Library is pleased to announce the publication

of Military Families: A Selected Bibliography, compiled by Greta H.

Andrusyszyn, Research Librarian

Modern military life affects not just service members, but also their

families. This bibliography provides research, resources, and

information for military families and service providers.

Please click below to view online:

http://www.carlisle.army.mil/library/bibs/milfam2011.pdf

CARL Databases

2011-09-19T12:53:00.002-05:00

Access to our databases from outside Ft. Leavenworth is currently unavailable. We apologize for the inconvience.

Ahoy, mateys!

2011-09-12T07:59:00.000-05:00

On Friday afternoon, Sept. 16th, from 3:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. we will be celebrating "Talk Like a Pirate Day" with the children. We would like as many children to come with parents as possible.

Ye'll be learnin' the proper way to hail yer cap'n and get the landlubbin' scallywags on board a-sailin' smartly, among other phrases ye'll be needin' on the high seas and reading pirate stories and children can come dressed as a pirate. However, we will not have a pirate costume judging. We will have cookies and an assortment of door prizes.

To brush up on your Pirate check out these resources.

Mango Language Tool for libraries.

International Talk Like a Pirate Day

New CSA reading list

2011-08-23T09:55:00.000-05:00

GEN Dempsey has released a new professional reading list. You can download the PDF here http://www.history.army.mil/html/books/105/105-1-1/index.html

CARL's Website Maintenance

2011-08-18T07:25:00.000-05:00

CARL's Website will be unavailable for an hour on Friday Aug 19th starting at 1600 for server maintenance. We apologize for any inconvience. If you access here are some helpful links.

CARL databases through the E-Journal Portal

http://fw8pk7vf4q.search.serialssolutions.com/

CARL's catalog

http://comarms.ipac.dynixasp.com/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=carlcgsc&reloadxsl=

true#focus

CARL's Digital Library

http://cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm4/search.php

Such Language

2011-08-10T07:44:00.000-05:00

Strange and Twisted Tongues.

A Book review by Erin Mckean. John McWhorter's "What Language Is (And What It Isn't and What It Could Be)" challenges our text-centric views, introducing us to many an odd language bird. Mr. McWhorter, who teaches at Columbia University and is a contributing editor at the New Republic, wants us all to look at the phenomenon of language from the linguist's perspective, and toward this end he outlines five characteristics that all languages share.
First, they're "ingrown," in that they have developed organically, including convolutions—such as grammatical gender—that aren't strictly necessary for communication. Languages are "disheveled," in that they are messy and illogical (in both the "I see/you saw" irregular-verb sense and the hokey "why do we park on a driveway but drive on a parkway?" sense). Languages are "intricate," in that even the languages we consider "simple," such as creoles, have rules that utterances must follow to be considered grammatical. Languages are primarily "oral," in that the living form of all language is speech, not writing. And, finally, all languages are "mixed": Every language shows at least some signs of having been influenced by the neighbors (or invaders) of those who speak it. No language is "pure."
You might have noticed by now that the keywords Mr. McWhorter has chosen to mark "language-ness" spell out the word "idiom"—which is apt, in that idioms are the parts of language that are the most ingrown, disheveled, intricate, oral and mixed. (Idioms couldn't care less about being grammatical, orderly, regular or pure.)

View Full Image

What Language Is

By John McWhorter
(Gotham, 228 pages, $26)

Mr. McWhorter walks through his five signal characteristics of language with a spring in his step and armed with a vast collection of interesting—and convincing—examples, drawn not only from English but from Arabic, Mandarin and lesser-known languages such as Tukang Besi (spoken on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi) and Twi (spoken in Ghana). Some of the exemplars of the baroque "ingrown" languages are so complicated (from an English speaker's point of view) that it makes you wonder how anyone ever holds a conversation in those languages at all.
To conjugate a verb properly in Berik, a language of New Guinea, you must know how big the object was, whether it was high or low, how far away it was and the time of day the action was undertaken. But at the same time, Berik has no plural pronouns other than "we." (Oh, and "nice to see you" in Berik? It translates in English as "My gall bladder is really warm today.") Mr. McWhorter gives an easy rule of thumb for determining whether something in a language is "grammar" or not: If a native speaker can't explain why a certain construction is used, other than to shrug and say "I don't know, that's just how it's said!"—that's grammar.
"What Language Is" isn't another "oh, that wacky language!" book; its mission is far broader than just to give a tour of other languages' customs and habits. The crux of the book is Mr. McWhorter's insistence (shared by most linguists) on the oral language as the living, breathing language. He shows that most pedantic objections to language change are due to our insistence on holding on to the fixed form of the written language—fixed, that is, at some point just after we became competent writers and just before some change that we dislike.
Our insistence on the standardization of written language creates weird pockets of inconsistency. Ready to defend until your last breath the distinction between "lie" and "lay"? Why not also argue for "pease" as the singular form of those "spherical, typically green seeds of the plant Pisum sativum" (in the words of the Oxford English Dictionary) and abandon the error, dating to the 1600s, that is "pea"? We're happy with "alone," although it was originally "all one"—but we don't like "alright," which could be formed by the very same process from "all right."
Mr. McWhorter is intent on refuting what he sees as the Indo-Europeanized, textbound perspective that blinkers our understanding—and appreciation—of language. Do you think Black English is a "dialect" full of "mistakes"? You're likely to change your mind about its "languageness" after reading Mr. McWhorter's careful explanation of the similarities between Black English and Modern Hebrew—both being slightly simplified versions of their "parent" languages, Standard English and Biblical Hebrew. Do you think of Spanglish as an accidental byproduct of immigration? Mr. McWhorter explains why, linguistically, it would be incredibly unusual if we didn't hear Spanish interwoven with English words in the United States—in much the same way as English speakers picked up French words after the Norman invasion.
We like to think that human languages should be more like computer-programming languages: logical, orderly, efficient and goal-oriented. But they are more like our own DNA: complicated and full of junk information but at the same time gloriously mutable, able (for good or ill) to give rise to new living forms.

Get Your Craft On!

2011-07-21T08:33:00.000-05:00

Don't forget to come out Friday July 22nd at 2:00 PM for PaleoJoe and raffle items that will be given away for our last Summer Reading Program. Until then try beating the heat with some of these fun crafts.

A Midsummer Knight's Read Showcase Crafts
Below are links detailing this year's featured crafts.
Adult Crafts

Dip Some Candles	Mix Some Scent
Flowered Soap	Pilgrim Badge
Incense Censer	Drying Flowers and Herbs
Tapestry	Herb Garden
Storage Chest	Illuminated Journal
Book Safe	Learn to Weave

Decorations

Mini-Banner	Fairy Garland	Fairy Wall Hanging
Fairy Flowers	Fairy Paperchain	Stained Glassed Window Hanging
Floral Garland	Stained Glass Window	Titan
Peasant House	Windmill	Paper Bag Cottages
Rainbow Streamers	Coat of Arms	Tapestry
Life Mask	Galileo

Experiments

Fizzing Phantom Potion

Quicksand

Presto Changeo Chameleon Water

Food and Snacks

Games and Activities

Kids

Wig with Braids	Robin Hood's Cap	Princess Hat
Lady's Looking Glass	Cloak	Paper Ruff
Crowns, Tiaras & Garlands	Royal Mace	Magic Wand
Knight's Helmet	Shield	Lady's Favors
Shoebox Psaltery	Easy Marionette	Wooden Dolls
Yarn Doll	Paper Bag Prancer	Scroll & Carrier
Compass	Weaved Placemat	Falconry
Glorious Goblet	Dragon Sock Puppet	Castles for Your Pocket
Sandy Hourglass	Catapult	Royal Crown
Jester Hat	Juggling Sticks	Hennin
Clapper	Reliquary	Clan Pot Bell
Puppet Show	Peasant Sack	Coins in a Pouch
Kirtle and Tunic	Coffee Filter Fairy	Toilet Paper Roll Wizard
Paper Plate Crown	Torch	Chenille Fairy
Spicy Forest in a Jar	Goblets	Fire Breathing Dragon
Fairy Wings	Magic Wand	Sorceress Wand
Sorcerer's Hat	Fairy Tambourine	Dragon Scales
Dragon's Blood	Fairy Necklace	Fairy Magnet
Fairy Flying Lessons	Dragon Eggs	Tissue Paper Dragon
Frilly Feathered Quill

Toddler

Color the King	Color the Crown
Medieval Songs	Cereal Castle

Young Adult

Pocket & Almoner	Secret Letters in Invisible Ink	Twist Some Wire Jewelry
Scroll	Medieval Drugstore	Chain Mail
Marshmallow Cannon	Wizard's Lantern	Kaleidoscope
Illuminated Name Card	Cool Catapult	Illuminated Manuscript
Plague Mask	Red Sparkle Potion	Apothecary Carry-All
Fortified Gate	Quill Pen	Psaltery
Crystal Ball

New U.S. Army War College Library Bibliography on PTSD

2011-07-20T11:37:00.000-05:00

The U.S. Army War College Library is pleased to announce the publication of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and the Military: A Selected Bibliography, compiled by Jenny Silkett.

This revised and updated bibliography cites selected books, documents, articles, multimedia, and web sites for PTSD related topics such as diagnosis, prevention, training, treatment, reintegration, and family issues. A separate section also focuses on traumatic brain injury, the other signature injury experienced by military personnel serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Please click below to view online:

http://www.carlisle.army.mil/library/bibs/PTSD11.pdf

Or you can visit our bibliography page to find more resources.
http://carl.army.mil/gateway/ptsd.asp

The Down Low on Paleo Joe

2011-07-18T08:50:00.000-05:00

CARL is having their final event of the summer for the children and their families on Friday, July 22nd, at 2:00 p.m. A former Army officer and "dinosaur specialist" named PaleoJoe is coming to Fort Leavenworth.

Joseph has always been a "collector." Throughout his life, he enjoyed collecting unique items from butterflies to military medals. His greatest and most prevalent fascination is fossils; trilobites in particular. He began to develop his fossil collection and subsequent search for knowledge as a young boy growing up in the fossil rich Niagara Falls area. Joseph graduated from Lewiston Porter High School and subsequently Niagara University with a degree in Education in 1979. He has always enjoyed the opportunity to share his knowledge and experiences with others. He assembled a fine collection of marine invertebrates from the Niagara Frontier area and, prior to his entering the US Army with a Regular Army Commission, in 1979, donated it to the Schoelkopf Geological Museum of Niagara Falls. Following his military service he, once again, began to collect fossils and at this point began to specialize in Trilobites. Since moving to Midland, Michigan in 1993, Joseph has taught classes on fossils in many of the Midland County elementary and middle schools. As he gained a reputation as an energetic and entertaining speaker in the persona of "PaleoJoe", dressing and playing the part of a "digger" he has taught around the state of Michigan, Iowa, and Wisconsin and into northern Ohio. He taught "Family Fossil Fun" at the Midland Community Center and developed that curriculum into an ongoing series for Midland Community Television. In 1999, PaleoJoe was honored as a finalist in the Philo T.

Farnsworth Video Competition for an episode of that series. PaleoJoe has displayed a 4-month fossil exposition at the Midland Center for the Arts called Trilobite Treasures: Arthropods of the Ancients Seas. Also the collection has recently been on display at the Bay County Historical Society The exhibit was designed and built by PaleoJoe featuring most of the Kchodl Collection, his own personal collection of Trilobites. He has been privileged to be a keynote speaker many Rock and Mineral Society meetings and Guest Lecturer at the Greater Detroit Rock and Mineral Exposition. He led several Paleontological expeditions and given lectures for local organizations. PaleoJoe was also fortunate to participate in a Paleontological dig in the Czech Republic and toured the public and private trilobite collections of the Czech National Museum. PaleoJoe is honored to have one of his trilobites on permanent display in that Museum.

Friend Joe on facebook here http://www.facebook.com/pages/PaleoJoe/166965343336849 or visit his website www.paleojoe.com/default.asp?iId=JDGLH

He will be on post at 2:00 PM on July 22nd, hope to see you there!

Come one, Come All to the Puppet Show!

2011-07-07T13:57:00.000-05:00

CARL invites parents and kids to the next "Market Day" on Saturday, July 9th,

from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. There will be a puppet show, a story, a treat

and a raffle for prizes. Hope to see you there!

Here Ye Here Ye SCA and Summer Reading Program team up

2011-06-24T08:34:00.000-05:00

The Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA.org) is an international, non-profit, educational society celebrating pre-17th century history. It has members who study every aspect of medieval life. We are brewers, archers, calligraphers, heralds, fencers, spinners, blacksmiths, costumers, dancers, cooks and armoured fighters. We enjoy feasting, spinning, needlepoint, equestrian, leatherwork, beadwork, socializing, live weapons competition, period music, theatre and much more. If someone did it back then, you can bet someone is trying to do it now.

The goal is to learn through doing. Doing and sharing ones subject knowledge with others. The SCA encourages historical research and recreation, and most importantly: preserving a code of conduct, mentality and philosophy that, in many ways, is lacking in the modern world.

The local chapter of "The Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc." will be assisting us with the Summer Reading Program on Saturday, June 25th, from 11:00a.m.-2:00 p.m. They will have "stations" featuring different creative arts inside the library and if it is not too hot, a fighter's demonstration outside the library! See you there.

2011-06-16T11:22:00.000-05:00

Pentagon Papers

The Pentagon Papers, officially titled "Report of the Office of the Secretary of Defense Vietnam Task Force", was commissioned by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in 1967. In June of 1971, small portions of the report were leaked to the press and widely distributed. However, the publications of the report that resulted from these leaks were incomplete and suffered from many quality issues.
On the 40th anniversary of the leak to the press, the National Archives, along with the Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon Presidential Libraries, has released the complete report. The 48 boxes in this series contain a complete copy of the 7,000 page report along with numerous copies of different volumes of the report, all declassified. Approximately 34% of the report is available for the first time.
Check out the full papers here.

http://www.archives.gov/research/pentagon-papers/

Organizational Day at CARL

2011-06-09T07:43:00.000-05:00

CARL will close at 11:30 on Friday, June 10th for Organization day.
We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

New U.S. Army War College Library Bibliography

2011-06-07T13:35:00.000-05:00

The U.S. Army War College Library is pleased to announce the publication of Civil-Military Relations: A Selected Bibliography, compiled by Greta H. Andrusyszyn, Research Librarian.

This bibliography supports the Civil-Military Relations special theme of the U.S. Army War College's curriculum. It focuses on the principle of civilian control over the military in the United States, but also includes a wide range of references for topics directly related, such as the military profession, strategy, policy, homeland defense, civil support, and the use of force. We have also provided a section about the civil-military relations of other countries. Not a comprehensive listing, this selected bibliography is intended to be a starting point for research.

Please click below to view online:

http://www.carlisle.army.mil/library/bibs/CivilMilitary11.pdf

Come Meet Our Library Princess

2011-06-03T16:07:00.000-05:00

Our Summer Reading program kicks off today at 4:30 PM today with prizes, cookies, stories, fun, and a LIBRARY PRINCESS!

Don't Forget the Summer Reading Kickoff Party is today

2011-06-03T08:51:00.002-05:00

Here ye, Here ye!
Come one, come all!
To the Mid-Summer Knights Summer Reading Kick off party!
The party starts today at 16:30 to 18:00.
Grab some grub to eat, a good book to read, a bag of goodies, and all the tools for thy adventure of the Summer. Hope to see you there!

For more information call the library at 758-3053 or stop by the reference desk.

2011-06-01T07:44:00.000-05:00

We are experiencing a network problem. So if you are not able to get to our main webpage, please use the following links.

CARL databases through the E-Journal Portal

http://fw8pk7vf4q.search.serialssolutions.com/

CARL's catalog

http://comarms.ipac.dynixasp.com/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=carlcgsc&reloadxsl=

true#focus

CARL's Digital Library

http://cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm4/search.php

Summer Reading Kick Off June 3

2011-05-27T10:00:00.000-05:00

Accessing CARL's website

2011-05-23T16:58:00.000-05:00

We know there have been some issues with accessing CARL's website. If you are unable to access the website, here are some alternative links.

CARL databases through the E-Journal Portal
http://fw8pk7vf4q.search.serialssolutions.com/

CARL's catalog
http://comarms.ipac.dynixasp.com/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=carlcgsc&reloadxsl=true#focus

CARL's Digital Library
http://cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm4/search.php

History Lessons for Guys

2011-05-18T12:54:00.000-05:00

'Badass' Guys: Giving History A Kick (And A Punch)

by NPR Staff

Marvel Comics hero Thor smashed his way to the top spot at the box office this past week, but author Ben Thompson says you don't need to go to the multiplex to appreciate the Norse god of thunder.
The original Norse myths provide plenty of excitement on their own, Thompson says. "There's one time, these giants were pissing off the gods, so he disguises himself as a goddess, and goes to some, like, giant feast that they're having," he gushes. "And then, he throws off his costume and just wastes the entire dining hall with a hammer."
Thompson's new book, Badass: The Birth of a Legend, collects the stories of characters whom you do not want to mess with. It pulls from both history and legend, telling stories from Jesus and Genghis Khan to Captain Kirk and Chuck Norris.
Reading Badass actually gives you a decent grounding in history, literature and mythology. Thompson tells Guy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered, that his book has a not-so-secret educational mission.
"I've always been really interested in history," he says. His own father brought the past to life for Thompson with a collection of replica weaponry like Spartan swords and flintlock muskets.
"I never had a chance, growing up," Thompson says, "He would tell me, 'Oh, you know, here's the story of Thermopylae, and here's King Leonidas, and he fought and he had a sword that was like this.'" But when Thompson started taking history classes in high school and college, he says, the experience was disappointingly boring.
"I wanted to find a way of telling the story like a pulp fiction novel," he says. "To have it be as far away from a history book as I could get without sacrificing the actual history."

New Book Exposes Secret Presidental Surgery

2011-05-11T09:00:00.000-05:00

"The President Is a Sick Man: Wherein the Supposedly Virtuous Grover Cleveland Survives a Secret Surgery at Sea and Vilifies the Courageous Newspaperman Who Dared Expose the Truth" by Matthew Algeo; Chicago Review Press (272 pages, $24.95)

Think of a U.S. president who hid a serious medical problem from the country while in office.
Kennedy, FDR and Wilson all spring to mind.
How about a chief executive who condoned a cover-up and directed his people to discredit a reporter? The list starts with Nixon, but he has company.
Now, who did both of these things while being famous, in his day, for his honesty?
Class, Matthew Algeo would like to introduce you to Grover Cleveland (1837-1908). If you're not a history major and you know him at all, it's probably as an oddity: the only president who served two nonconsecutive terms (1885-'89 and 1893-'97). Cleveland actually won the popular vote three straight times, but Benjamin Harrison defeated him on electoral votes for the in-between term.
Incredibly, shortly after his second term began in 1893, Cleveland boarded a friend's yacht and sailed into the Long Island Sound where surgeons, in a makeshift operating theater, cut away cancerous tissue in his mouth and part of his jawbone.
Why did doctors perform this risky operation in such a haphazard setting? Algeo explains the historical situation crisply. Cancer was virtually taboo in Cleveland's day. He didn't want to lose public confidence or become a spectacle like former President Grant, who had died from cancer.
Also, Cleveland was in a contentious political struggle over whether the U.S. should return to the gold standard to back its money (his position), or continue with a policy that also accepted silver, the view of his vice president, Adlai Stevenson. Cleveland feared that should he become incapacitated, Stevenson would assume power and sway the country's financial direction.
The yacht's crew and surgeons kept mum, except for a dentist serving as anesthetist, who told a fellow doctor. Word found its way to Philadelphia Press reporter E.J. Edwards, who confirmed enough of the tale to print it. Cleveland's circle squatted on the scoop and undermined the reporter's reputation. "The policy here has been to deny and discredit his story," Cleveland wrote to a friend. His people passed off the president's medical event as the pulling of two teeth. Only decades later would one of the surgeons tell all in an article, and make amends to Edwards for the harm done to him.
Algeo, a former public radio reporter, has written two other books with long, amusing subtitles: "Harry Truman's Excellent Adventure: The True Story of a Great American Road Trip" and "Last Team Standing: How the Steelers and the Eagles - 'The Steagles' - Saved Pro Football During World War II." In his Cleveland tale, he mixes narrative and context smoothly, and keeps speculation minimal.
The Cleveland he depicts is a fascinating figure, often a noble one in his dogged dedication to duty. While sheriff of Erie County, N.Y., he pulled the hangman's lever himself on two executions because he refused to delegate such a task to subordinates. "He came to be known as incorruptible," Algeo writes. In four years, in part because of his reputation for honesty and reform, he went from mayor of Buffalo to governor of New York to president. Yet he also legally paid a substitute $150 to serve in the Civil War in his place, was openly accused of fathering an illegitimate child (he may have been covering for a married friend, Algeo suggests), and married a much younger woman while in the White House.
In 1975, pathologists examined tissue from Cleveland's oral tumor, still preserved in a Philadelphia museum. They determined it was a verrucous carcinoma, a rare, slow-growing cancer that can occur in the mouths of men like Cleveland, a cigar chomper, who chew tobacco.

Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/05/11/2866377/a-presidents-surgery-stayed-secret.html#ixzz1M3Iq7mD7

GUIDELINES FOR REPLACING LIBRARY ITEMS

2011-05-10T15:25:00.000-05:00

Here are some quick guidelines to remember if your library materials are damaged.

Damaged/ Lost item(s) must be replaced with the exact same item in -- NEW condition with No highlights, pen or pencil marks, marginal notes; Award Winning books must be replaced with same Award Winning books; Hardcover for Hardcover; and no damaged items can be replaced with another library’s used item. If the item is “Out-of-Print” a librarian can find a suitable replacement. The library staff has the right to refuse any replacements.

PURCHASE BOOKS FROM ANY OF THE FOLLOWING LINKS: amazon
; alibris ;bookfinder ; booksamillion ; or biblio.

If you are PSCing please purchase a replacement before leaving.

If the item is being shipped please provide CARL- Circulation Desk a copy of your purchase receipt in order to clear your account.

Shipping address: ATTN: CIRCULATION DESK
COMBINED ARMS RESEARCH LIBRARY (CARL)
EISENHOWER HALL 250 GIBBON AVE
FORT LEAVENWORTH, KS 66027-2314

Military reading lists oddities

2011-05-09T08:39:00.000-05:00

This was in the New Yorker magazine, Canon Fodder by Rolf Pott When allegations surfaced that details in Greg Mortenson’s memoir “Three Cups of Tea” had been fabricated, some reports noted that the book, a best-seller about doing good works in Central Asia, is “required reading” for U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. These reports were referring to the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center’s Pre-Deployment Afghanistan Reading List, which (in addition to cultural field guides and counter-insurgency manuals) recommends novels such as Khaled Hosseini’s “The Kite Runner” and George MacDonald Fraser’s “Flashman.” Reading has been a part of military life since Alexander the Great slept with a copy of the Iliad under his pillow. When the United States Military Academy was founded, in 1802, John Adams advocated an ambitious reading program for officers. “I wished to turn the Minds of such as were capable of it to that great Source of Information,” he wrote. During the Second World War, the Council on Books in Wartime printed more than a hundred and twenty million paperbacks for distribution to American soldiers. Touted as “weapons in the war of ideas,” these Armed Services Editions ranged from “Tristram Shandy” and “Candide” to “My Ántonia.” Harold Bloom, in “The Western Canon,” described the culture’s seminal books as possessing “strangeness, a mode of originality that either cannot be assimilated, or that so assimilates us that we cease to see it as strange.” Today’s military reading lists have a more pragmatic bent. Each major branch of the U.S. military has its own lists, usually targeted to specific ranks; the Marines alone maintain dozens of different reading lists, and the Army has at least six, overseen by such entities as the Chief of Staff, the War College Library, and the Center for Army Leadership. “Three Cups of Tea” appears on the Joint Forces Staff College Commandant’s Professional Reading List and on the list of the Chief of Staff of the Air Force Professional Reading Program. In terms of “strangeness,” the Navy Professional Reading Program recommends, along with Melville’s “Billy Budd,” “Starship Troopers,” the 1959 science-fiction novel about a war between mankind and an arachnoid species known as the Bugs. The self-help genre is well represented, too. Soldiers are encouraged to peruse “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” and Dale Carnegie’s “How to Win Friends and Influence People.” Race relations figure prominently. On a Navy list, alongside “When Affirmative Action Was White,” is “Black Titan: A. G. Gaston and the Making of a Black American Millionaire.” Business writers like military metaphors, and the military seems fond of business titles. The U.S. Army General Officers Suggested Reading List has a section devoted to them which includes Nassim Taleb’s “The Black Swan” and Chip and Dan Heath’s “Made to Stick.” The Navy list recommends “Freakonomics,” by Stephen J. Dubner and Steven Levitt; “The Lexus and the Olive Tree,” by Thomas Friedman; and “Moneyball,” by Michael Lewis. U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Zoltan Krompecher, who has served in Afghanistan and taught English at West Point, says that assembling reading lists is part of a broader effort by the U.S. military to help soldiers understand local cultures. “When you’re going into uncharted territory, you want to know everything about that culture that you can,” he said. “If I’m going out there and talking to an imam or a sheikh, I’ve got to demonstrate that I value his culture. Once you earn their trust, they’ll help you with the bad guys.” As for fiction, Krompecher called it “a way to understand or at least examine how others feel.” He said, “Consider Henry from Stephen Crane’s ‘The Red Badge of Courage.’ That fear of going into battle, when you’re tasting your own mortality: How are you going to react? Are you going to run away? Soldiers can relate to that.” Harold Bloom agrees, at least about Crane. Reached by telephone in New Haven, he listened to a list of some of the military’s recommended titles, among them Kafka’s “The Castle,” “Catch-22,” “The Tin Drum,” “The Brothers Karamazov,” and “Snow,” by Orhan Pamuk. “It’s a very mixed bag,” Bloom said. “The two surprising entries, really quite wonderful, are E. M. Forster’s ‘A Passage to India’ and ‘The Red Badge of Courage,’ which is a considerable work of realization.” He talked about a lecture he once gave at West Point, on Walt Whitman’s “Drum-Taps,” and found that the soldiers were “immensely open to what Whitman was doing.” What did he think about the inclusion of “Starship Troopers”? “I can’t take that seriously, I’m sorry,” he said. “I suppose it’s on the list because that’s the world we’re headed towards.” ♦ Read more http://www.newyorker.com/talk/2011/05/02/110502ta_talk_potts#ixzz1LrVPu2Vg

Star Wars Day!

2011-05-04T06:08:00.002-05:00

The penguins at Edinburgh Zoo would like to wish you a happy Star Wars Day! May the Fourth be with you!

New Bibliography on Strategic Vision

2011-04-28T15:27:00.000-05:00

The U.S. Army War College Library is pleased to announce the publication of Strategic Vision: a Selected Bibliography, compiled by Lenore K. Garder, Research Librarian. The purpose of this bibliography is to introduce some of the resources readily available in our Library's collection or on the Internet on the topic of Strategic Vision. It was compiled for students and researchers to expand their knowledge of this enduring theme of the U.S. Army War College. Please click below to view online: http://www.carlisle.army.mil/library/bibs/strvis11.pdf

Social media quickly alter diplomacy and military tactics - KansasCity.com

2011-04-25T10:35:00.000-05:00

Check out this article for more information on how Social Media impacts the Military and let us know what you think? Social media quickly alter diplomacy and military tactics - KansasCity.com

Network Maintenance on April 23, 2011

2011-04-20T07:57:00.000-05:00

Our site will be down on 23 April 2011 for network maintenance.
No CACnet services will be available. However, Public Internet computers will still be available for use in CARL.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Since you will not be able to access the site directly, here are some helpful links to access information.

CARL databases through the E-Journal Portal
http://fw8pk7vf4q.search.serialssolutions.com/

CARL's catalog

http://comarms.ipac.dynixasp.com/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=carlcgsc&reloadxsl=true#focus

CARL's Digital Library

http://cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm4/search.php

5 Myths about the Information Age

2011-04-19T07:59:00.000-05:00

This is a very interesting article that was recently published in the Chronicle of Higher Education. Let us know if you agree or not.

Myths About the 'Information Age'

By Robert Darnton

Confusion about the nature of the so-called information age has led to a state of collective false consciousness. It's no one's fault but everyone's problem, because in trying to get our bearings in cyberspace, we often get things wrong, and the misconceptions spread so rapidly that they go unchallenged. Taken together, they constitute a font of proverbial nonwisdom. Five stand out:
1. "The book is dead." Wrong: More books are produced in print each year than in the previous year. One million new titles will appear worldwide in 2011. In one day in Britain—"Super Thursday," last October 1—800 new works were published. The latest figures for the United States cover only 2009, and they do not distinguish between new books and new editions of old books. But the total number, 288,355, suggests a healthy market, and the growth in 2010 and 2011 is likely to be much greater. Moreover, these figures, furnished by Bowker, do not include the explosion in the output of "nontraditional" books—a further 764,448 titles produced by self-publishing authors and "micro-niche" print-on-demand enterprises. And the book business is booming in developing countries like China and Brazil. However it is measured, the population of books is increasing, not decreasing, and certainly not dying.
2. "We have entered the information age." This announcement is usually intoned solemnly, as if information did not exist in other ages. But every age is an age of information, each in its own way and according to the media available at the time. No one would deny that the modes of communication are changing rapidly, perhaps as rapidly as in Gutenberg's day, but it is misleading to construe that change as unprecedented.
3. "All information is now available online." The absurdity of this claim is obvious to anyone who has ever done research in archives. Only a tiny fraction of archival material has ever been read, much less digitized. Most judicial decisions and legislation, both state and federal, have never appeared on the Web. The vast output of regulations and reports by public bodies remains largely inaccessible to the citizens it affects. Google estimates that 129,864,880 different books exist in the world, and it claims to have digitized 15 million of them—or about 12 percent. How will it close the gap while production continues to expand at a rate of a million new works a year? And how will information in nonprint formats make it online en masse? Half of all films made before 1940 have vanished. What percentage of current audiovisual material will survive, even in just a fleeting appearance on the Web? Despite the efforts to preserve the millions of messages exchanged by means of blogs, e-mail, and handheld devices, most of the daily flow of information disappears. Digital texts degrade far more easily than words printed on paper. Brewster Kahle, creator of the Internet Archive, calculated in 1997 that the average life of a URL was 44 days. Not only does most information not appear online, but most of the information that once did appear has probably been lost.
4. "Libraries are obsolete." Everywhere in the country librarians report that they have never had so many patrons. At Harvard, our reading rooms are full. The 85 branch libraries of the New York Public Library system are crammed with people. The libraries supply books, videos, and other material as always, but they also are fulfilling new functions: access to information for small businesses, help with homework and afterschool activities for children, and employment information for job seekers (the disappearance of want ads in printed newspapers makes the library's online services crucial for the unemployed). Librarians are responding to the needs of their patrons in many new ways, notably by guiding them through the wilderness of cyberspace to relevant and reliable digital material. Libraries never were warehouses of books. While continuing to provide books in the future, they will function as nerve centers for communicating digitized information at the neighborhood level as well as on college campuses.
5. "The future is digital." True enough, but misleading. In 10, 20, or 50 years, the information environment will be overwhelmingly digital, but the prevalence of electronic communication does not mean that printed material will cease to be important. Research in the relatively new discipline of book history has demonstrated that new modes of communication do not displace old ones, at least not in the short run. Manuscript publishing actually expanded after Gutenberg and continued to thrive for the next three centuries. Radio did not destroy the newspaper; television did not kill radio; and the Internet did not make TV extinct. In each case, the information environment became richer and more complex. That is what we are experiencing in this crucial phase of transition to a dominantly digital ecology.
I mention these misconceptions because I think they stand in the way of understanding shifts in the information environment. They make the changes appear too dramatic. They present things ahistorically and in sharp contrasts—before and after, either/or, black and white. A more nuanced view would reject the common notion that old books and e-books occupy opposite and antagonistic extremes on a technological spectrum. Old books and e-books should be thought of as allies, not enemies. To illustrate this argument, I would like to make some brief observations about the book trade, reading, and writing.
Last year the sale of e-books (digitized texts designed for hand-held readers) doubled, accounting for 10 percent of sales in the trade-book market. This year they are expected to reach 15 or even 20 percent. But there are indications that the sale of printed books has increased at the same time. The enthusiasm for e-books may have stimulated reading in general, and the market as a whole seems to be expanding. New book machines, which operate like ATM's, have reinforced this tendency. A customer enters a bookstore and orders a digitized text from a computer. The text is downloaded in the book machine, printed, and delivered as a paperback within four minutes. This version of print-on-demand shows how the old-fashioned printed codex can gain new life with the adaption of electronic technology.
Many of us worry about a decline in deep, reflective, cover-to-cover reading. We deplore the shift to blogs, snippets, and tweets. In the case of research, we might concede that word searches have advantages, but we refuse to believe that they can lead to the kind of understanding that comes with the continuous study of an entire book. Is it true, however, that deep reading has declined, or even that it always prevailed? Studies by Kevin Sharpe, Lisa Jardine, and Anthony Grafton have proven that humanists in the 16th and 17th centuries often read discontinuously, searching for passages that could be used in the cut and thrust of rhetorical battles at court, or for nuggets of wisdom that could be copied into commonplace books and consulted out of context.
In studies of culture among the common people, Richard Hoggart and Michel de Certeau have emphasized the positive aspect of reading intermittently and in small doses. Ordinary readers, as they understand them, appropriate books (including chapbooks and Harlequin romances) in their own ways, investing them with meaning that makes sense by their own lights. Far from being passive, such readers, according to de Certeau, act as "poachers," snatching significance from whatever comes to hand.
Writing looks as bad as reading to those who see nothing but decline in the advent of the Internet. As one lament puts it: Books used to be written for the general reader; now they are written by the general reader. The Internet certainly has stimulated self-publishing, but why should that be deplored? Many writers with important things to say had not been able to break into print, and anyone who finds little value in their work can ignore it.
The online version of the vanity press may contribute to the information overload, but professional publishers will provide relief from that problem by continuing to do what they always have done—selecting, editing, designing, and marketing the best works. They will have to adapt their skills to the Internet, but they are already doing so, and they can take advantage of the new possibilities offered by the new technology.
To use an an example from my own experience, I recently wrote a printed book with an electronic supplement, Poetry and the Police: Communication Networks in Eighteenth-Century Paris (Harvard University Press). It describes how street songs mobilized public opinion in a largely illiterate society. Every day, Parisians improvised new words to old tunes, and the songs flew through the air with such force that they precipitated a political crisis in 1749. But how did their melodies inflect their meaning? After locating the musical annotations of a dozen songs, I asked a cabaret artist, Hélène Delavault, to record them for the electronic supplement. The reader can therefore study the text of the songs in the book while listening to them online. The e-ingredient of an old-fashioned codex makes it possible to explore a new dimension of the past by capturing its sounds.
One could cite other examples of how the new technology is reinforcing old modes of communication rather than undermining them. I don't mean to minimize the difficulties faced by authors, publishers, and readers, but I believe that some historically informed reflection could dispel the misconceptions that prevent us from making the most of "the information age"—if we must call it that.

Robert Darnton is a professor and university librarian at Harvard University. This essay is based on a talk he gave last month at the Council of Independent Colleges' Symposium on the Future of the Humanities, in Washington.

Celebrating National Library Week

2011-04-13T07:36:00.000-05:00

National Library Week was first celebrated in 1958 to promote library use and support as well as to celebrate libraries and librarians, this year’s theme is ”Create your own story @ your library®.” Libraries all over the countries have planned a wide variety of activities for this week.

Librarians, information specialists, knowledge managers or whatever title a librarian might have -- their skills are in high demand. And, though you might not know it, they are everywhere.
And so in their honor during National Library Week, we enjoy the following tidbits of information.

Famous people who were librarians
FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, Casanova, Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, former first lady Laura Bush and China's Mao Zedong. At one point in their lives, each of them either worked as librarian or in a library.

Librarians are techno-savvy
Librarians don't just use books anymore. Searching through tweets, blogs, podcasts, websites and more to find accurate and authoritative information has become more the rule than the exception.
At a time where anyone can Google just about anything, librarians don't just find information, they find the correct information -- and fast. The American Library Association reports reference librarians in the nation's public and academic libraries answered nearly 5.7 million questions each week in 2010.

Filmmaker's library
Even "Star Wars" creator George Lucas has his own research library on his Skywalker Ranch. Lucas started the library in 1978, and the collection is housed under a large stained-glass dome.

Librarians influence our culture and society
While clearing out old archives at the Palmer Theological Seminary in 2005, librarian Heather Carbo found a working manuscript of one of Beethoven's final compositions.

Librarians track spy info and classified intelligence
When the CIA needs to provide information to the U.S. president, they turn to their librarians. To become one of the U.S. intelligence's community research experts, a librarian must pass medical and psychological exams, polygraph interviews and clear extensive background investigations.

Librarians are heroic
Alia Muhammad Baker, the chief librarian of Basra, Iraq, removed 30,000 books from the city's main library before it was destroyed during the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Their numbers are many
In 2009, there were 206,000 librarians, 50,000 library technicians and 96,000 other education, training and library workers

Librarians are behind the scenes in current events

-- Federal government shutdown. Lawmakers go to the Congressional Research Service, a division of the Library of Congress, for information.

-- The royal wedding at Westminster Abbey. The Abbey's Library and Muniment Room has a historic collection of books, manuscripts and archival material.

-- NATO no-fly zone over Libya. NATO's Brussels Headquarters houses a multimedia library with a collection focusing on international relations, security and defense, military questions and world affairs.

Warning to readers about librarians
A character in "The Callahan Touch", one of science fiction writer Spider Robinson's books, said, "Librarians are the secret masters of the universe. They control information. Never piss one off."

Smothered Bread	Raisin Custard Tarts	Rose Petal Bread
Mock Mead	Pokerounce	Pretzels
Simple Pottage	Medieval Gingerbread	Spiced Cider
Potage of Ris (Rice Pudding)	Applemoyse	Quynces or Wardones of Paast
Dragon Fire Island	Fairy Wand Treats	Chocolate Toads
Wizard Cupcakes	Dragon's Breath Candy Mix	Spooky Trees
Princess Popcorn	Wizard Crystal Candy

Alquerque	Three Throws	Blindman's Bluff
Make Your Own Legend	Hunt the Slipper	Chess Medieval Game of War
Make Up a Ballad	Capture the Flag	Wassail a Fruit Tree
Orange and Lemons	Bocci	St. George and the Dragon
Learn How to Juggle	Dragon Egg Hunt	Nine Man Morris
Fairy Maze	Castle Maze	Medieval Times Tic-Tac-Toe
Medieval Crossword	Castle Connect the Dots