The library will be closed until Monday, December 29. And again of course on New Year’s Day. Web pages, catalogs, databases, e-resources and all sorts of online goodies, of course, are all avaialble.
How about blogging? Well, almost anything is possible, I guess…..
Happy Holidays!

Just a note about additional content that we are developing for Ireland’s infant “Digital Library.”
For the time being content will appear on our own modest Ireland Library page, bringing the more or less sophisticated digital project (part of our comsortium digitization resource) together with home grown material we have done ourselves, which means in less than ideal pdf formats, using our slow and cumbersome equipment….
Here’s how the baby steps we are taking line up for now:
We have already written in this blog some about the first two small collections.
 Native American Texts : http://content.clic.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=%2Fnative-pam
Our library owns a few choice Christian missionary items, most in Dakota or Ojibwa.
 Temperance Tracts
http://content.clic.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=%2Ftemp-pamph
Selection from our collection (many came to the library from Archbishop John Ireland, 1838-1918).
The next two are new additions of individual works, chosen as much as exemplars as for content. John Ireland’s biography of Bishop Cretin is an example of what, in library parlance, might be called an “association item.” Unfished at the time of his death and in a difficultly “rotund” style as biography the work itself is less significant to us than the fact that it is written by our namesake, and not published beyond a local history magazine, the final installment appearing the year he died.
The Catholic hymnal is a different exemplar, one of creative destruction, if you will. This small book is in such terrible condition with brittle acidic paper in typically ephemeral binding, that it was impossible to repair, or even really handle. In consultation with our superb conservator, Sheila Hague, we decided to disbind it and scan as a preservation measure, even though this in fact destroyed the original.
 John Ireland’s Life of Bishop Cretin in pdf
http://www.stthomas.edu/libraries/ireland/theologyguides/cretinbio.html
Serialized biography of Joseph Cretin, Minnesota’s first bishop.
 Catholic Youth’s Hymn Book (1871) in pdf
http://www.stthomas.edu/libraries/collections/digital/documents/hymn_book1.pdf
Scarce collection of hymn texts — our copy had severely deteriorated

It is nice to give credit to our hardworking faculty ….
Ireland Library has drawn together a snazzy bibliography of UST Theology, Seminary and Catholic Studies faculty books by using a web service called LibraryThing (terrible name but a very innovative bunch of folks).
Recall how most bibliographies look – BORING! – and then take a peek at how LibraryThing handles this task.
Faculty Book Publications: a listing of monographs and contributions to edited works by full-time St Thomas faculty in the Theology and Catholic Studies departments as well as the Saint Paul Seminary School of Divinity.
Because many entries are contributions, more work is involved than for monographs, but still, on the whole, the extra effort is well worth it. Among other improvements, with a LibraryThing account one can make bibliographies not only look better but work better, too, since viewers can sort and resort results to their liking (by author, title, format, etc.), as well as make their own comments in the tagging feature, and get a better visual sense with book jackets as available.
More about LibraryThing.

In the glass case in the reference room, this month we have a simple display of some of the library’s “press book” holdings published by the (locally) well known printer, the North Central Publishing Company. For a number of years they did attractively designed, limited edition publications, many centered on religious topics. Several are done with Christmas themes accompanied by seasonal art work, most often of very simple design.
Only a few fit in our glass case (indicated in the listing below) and, of course, the library does do not own all these “press books” but here is a quick and dirty bibliography of the shop’s “Christmas” production over the years:
Christmas Books, 1947-1981, issued by the North Central Publishing Company (St. Paul, MN)
• Brett, Laurence. A Cloud of Witnesses : Reflections Drawn from the Book of Hebrews for the Year of Faith. 1967.
• The Office of Matins for Christmas Day as Done at Sarum. 1955. ON DISPLAY
• The Word is Man : Three Christmas Sermons of Saint Leo the Great. 1964.
• In the Day of the Nativity of the Lord at Compline. 1981. ON DISPLAY
• The Church in the World : Inaugural Address of Pope Paul VI at the Second Session of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council. 1963.
• Ephraem, Syrus, Saint. Homiletic Rhythms on the Nativity. 1977.
• Gran, John M., Christmas in St. Paul. 1951.
• Hanson, Glenn. The Frontier Holiday : Being a Collection of Writings by Minnesota Pioneers Who Recorded their Divers Ways of Observing Christmas, Thanksgiving, and New Year’s. 1948.
• Hovda, Robert, Frank Kacmarcik. No Land in Shadows : A Meditation on the Infleshing of the Son of God. 1953.
• In Days to Come : Pleading of Man for Peace. 1969.
• Peace and Justice : The Address of His Holiness Pope John Paul II before the General Assembly of the United Nations on the Feast of the Guardian Angels. 1979.
• Kacmarcik, Frank. Worship for Christmas : The First Mass in the Night for Christmas. 1960.
• Maris Stella. The Animals’ Carol and Other Poems. 1976. ON DISPLAY
• McCarthy, Eugene J. And Time Began. 1968.
• Muellerleile, Al, John Bailey. Christmas 1947. 1947.
• Muellerleile, Al. The Holy Gospel According to Saint Mark. 1978.
• Muellerleile, Al. Alfred’s Christmas, Reminiscences of a Childhood Christmas. 1975.
• Muellerleile, Mary Alice, and Frank Kacmarcik. Seasons of Hope : Visions of Man’s Fulfillment. 1970. ON DISPLAY
• Tales for Christmas Reading : 1949. St. Paul: 1949.
• Verse for Christmas Reading. St. Paul: 1950.
• O’Brien, Joseph Philip. A Bushful of Birds. 1968.
• Proclus, Saint, Patriarch of Constantinople. On the Incarnation of the Lord. 1961. ON DISPLAY
• Sangrinus, Angelus. A Mirror and Model for the Followers of Christ : The Life of the most Blessed and Saintly Benedict, Father and Patriarch of Monks. 1980.
• Shannon, James P. All Men Seek God. 1966. ON DISPLAY
• Walsh, John J., Jane McCarthy, and Frank Kacmarcik. A Nativity Sequence. 1954.