Periodically, I get curious about what happened this day, this week, or even this month in history and due to the fun I’ve had with this recently I thought I’d share it with you. I’m going with a “this month in history” theme since the day (and sometimes week) that I write this column isn’t the same as when you read it.
I admit that these historical facts aren’t actually from that long ago, for most of us anyway, but they remain fun. For instance, back in January of 2007 Apple announced the first iPhone; now its 12 years later and smartphones are fairly prevalent. But, did you know that technically the first of what we would now term as a “smartphone” was actually invented back in 1992 by IBM? It wasn’t until 1994 that the Simon Personal Communicator was released for consumers but when it was it had a touchscreen, email and fax capabilities, as well as notes and calendar “apps”. The downside was its one-hour battery life; the upside is that it obviously helped get us to the smartphones enjoy today.
My second reminiscence from the recent past is actually something you probably wouldn’t think a librarian would be fond of, but in January of 2001 Wikipedia, a free online encyclopedia, was launched by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger. As most students know, you can’t use Wikipedia as a source because your teachers and professors will not be pleased; however, in my professional opinion, you can use it as a starting point for a topic that you are completely unfamiliar with. Researching an unfamiliar topic can be daunting, so using Wikipedia to give you some keywords to search isn’t a bad idea. But make sure you then go to reliable sources for the facts you’ll use in your paper! Or, if you’re not sure where to go for reliable sources, you can ask your friendly neighborhood librarians. Our skills are pretty impressive.
Coming Up:
Aulds 742-2337
Sunday, Jan. 27 @ 2:00pm – Kids Crafternoon, ages 3-12
Benton 965-2751
Friday, Jan. 25 @ 10:00am – Baby Laptime, ages 0-2
Bossier Central 746-1693
Thursday, Jan. 24 @ 5:00pm – Lyon’s Pride Coffee Demonstration, ages 18 and up
Tuesday, Jan. 29 @ 5:00pm – Financial Literacy Series: Budgeting, ages 18 and up
East 80 949-2665
CLOSED FOR RENOVATIONS – Update: Noticeable progress on the parking lot is slated to begin in January 2019 (barring more weather delays)! Thank you for your continued patience.
Haughton 949-0196
Friday, Jan. 25 @ 10:00am – Trivia Through the Decades, ages 18 and up
History Center 746-7717
Thursday, Feb. 7 @ 6:00pm – Pages Past Book Club: Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly, ages 18 and up
Plain Dealing 326-4233
Monday, Jan. 28 @ 5:00pm – As the Page Turns Book Club: read a book with a person’s name in the title, ages 18 and up
Tooke 987-3915
Thursday, Jan. 24 @ 4:30pm – Little Bookworms Book Club: Calendar Mysteries: January Joker by Ron Roy, ages 6-12
New Materials:
- The Angel in the Glass by Alys Clare (Fiction; Book)
- The Best of Us by Robyn Carr (Fiction; Book)
- Craftily Ever After: Breaking the Piggy Bank by Martha Maker, illustrated by Xindi Yan (Children’s Fiction; Book)
- The Distance Between Dreams by Sherry L. Brown (Fiction; Book)
- First, Kill the Lawyers by David Housewright (Fiction; Book)
- The Hangman’s Secret by Laura Joh Rowland (Fiction; Book)
- The New Iberia Blues by James Lee Burke (Fiction; Book)
- Through Fiery Trials by David Weber (Fiction; Book)
- Turning Point by Danielle Steel (Fiction; Book, Audiobook)
- Untouchable by Jayne Ann Krentz (Fiction; Book, Audiobook)
