A legacy worth preserving

Before today you might never have heard of Judith Krug, but it is very likely you have heard of her legacy. Krug, who died of cancer April 11 at the age of 69, was head of the American Library Association’s (ALA) Office for Intellectual Freedom and the founder of Banned Books Week.

BBW has been celebrated annually by libraries since 1982 as a way to call attention to the continuing international threat of censorship and its effect on the intellectual freedoms of all people.

To quote from the ALA's website, books usually are challenged with the best intentions—to protect others, frequently children, from difficult ideas and information. However, as John Stuart Mill wrote in On Liberty: “... the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race... If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.”

Thanks to the tireless efforts of people like Krug, Americans have continued to have access to a diversity of thought and ideas that most of us take for granted, including works such as Lord of The Rings, To Kill a Mockingbird, the Harry Potter series and more.

Though there are many willing to take up the mantle she shouldered, it is often the first name, the first voice, that gives guidance for so many to follow.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Freedom to Read Foundation, 50 East Huron St., Chicago IL 60611.

Read more - ALA: Judith Krug, librarian, tireless advocate for First Amendment rights, dies

School Library Journal: Judith Krug, Defender of Intellectual Freedom, Dies at 69 (Photo)

Literacy at Your Library

Did you know the Jasper County Public Library has a Literacy Committee?

Did you know that as part of our mission to "Inform, Enrich and Empower" our diverse community, the library purchases items each year to promote literacy for all ages, from pre-readers to life-long learners?

Some of our recent and annual purchases have included:

• English as a Second Language materials
• Spanish language materials
• Hooked on Phonics
• Leap Pad and Leapster units and books
• Study guides for GED, Praxis and more
• Career Planning and Development Guides
• High-Interest Low-Skill (Hi-Low) books for developing reading skills in teens and adults
• Great Courses (college-level courses on DVD and CD)

We also recently added a bi-lingual computer at DeMotte devoted to educational games and concepts for preschool through later elementary school learners. This project was supported by the Institute of Museums and library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act, administered by the Indiana State Library.

Each year we invite teachers, home school parents, adult literacy workers and other groups to communicate their needs to us. If there are items or programs that you feel could benefit your particular educational needs, we are open to suggestions from the community.

We hope you enjoy the efforts we make to help all the learners of the JCPL community.

Flooding information

It's spring time again in Jasper County and in recent years that's come to mean flood time.

Whether you are simply looking for safe ways to get to work or worried about your home and property, there are some links online that can help you with your water-related plans.

To keep an eye on the weather, or the water, the U.S. Geological Survey keeps a flood site for each state, including the Indiana Flood Watch page. You will find real-time flood information and stream conditions. You can also check out the National Weather Service forecast for Northern Indiana, as well as a great flood preparedness brochure with safety tips and instructions on how to pack an emergcency kit and have a family safety plan.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has a website about floods with sections about preparing for a flood, dealing with the aftermath, and more importantly, what to do during a flood.

Some simple tips to keep in mind, from their site:

If a flood is likely in your area, you should: Listen to the radio or television for information.

If you plan to leave your home, you should secure it. If you have time, bring in outdoor furniture. Move essential items to and upper floor. Turn off utilities at the main switches or valves if instructed to do so. Disconnect electrical appliances. Do not touch electrical equipment if you are wet or standing in water.

If you have to leave your home, remember these evacuation tips: Do not walk through moving water. Six inches of moving water can make you fall. If you have to walk in water, walk where the water is not moving. Use a stick to check the firmness of the ground in front of you. Do not drive into flooded areas. If floodwaters rise around your car, abandon the car and move to higher ground if you can do so safely. You and the vehicle can be quickly swept away.

When driving in flood conditions: Six inches of water will reach the bottom of most passenger cars causing loss of control and possible stalling. A foot of water will float many vehicles. Two feet of rushing water can carry away most vehicles including sport utility vehicles (SUV’s) and pick-ups.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has another good site to check after a flood. On their site you can find specific information to deal with septic systems and drinking wells.

The Weather Whiz Kids site has a nice page of flood terms and lingo, plus family weather experiments that show the power of rain and storms.

Finally, the National Flood Insurance Program and Department of Homeland Security have a website to help you file your flood insurance claim and work through the aftermath of a flood.

Hopefully none of these sites will be needed by you or anyone you know, but it's good to know they are out there, just in case.

Food Safety on the web

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has recalled peanut butter and products containing peanut butter from several companies within the last two weeks because of concerns over Salmonella outbreaks. Some of the recalls include products made by Wal-Mart, Meijer, Trader Joe’s, and more.

You can search for Peanut Butter Product Recalls at their website to make sure your kitchen doesn't contain the suspected products. The list is updated almost daily. You can also check for other product-related health alerts.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the case count is now 488 in 43 states with the latest reported illness beginning on January 8, 2009. You can access a map of the outbreak via the CDC’s Investigation Update. See also the CDC and FDA recommendations for consumers. The American Peanut Council provides a list of peanut butter brands NOT affected by the FDA recall. The Indiana State Health Department also keeps a list of Recalls and Advisories. More information on Salmonella can be found at the USDA Food Safety & Inspection website.

Email hoax spotting 101

Every now and then some caring person in my email network, trying only to save her friends from certain doom, spreads around an email hoax.

A hoax is anything designed to trick someone into believing or accepting as genuine something false.

A lot of these are rather clever, but I like to think I have a pretty good success rate at sniffing them out, so I thought I would share my tips and tricks at hoax spotting:

1. Does the email overly excite or threaten you in some way?
After reading the email do you get a little tingling feeling in the pit of your stomach, or feel the hairs rise on your arms or the back of your neck? These are primal responses to fear. Even in the age of Internet, they serve you well.

The email could be threatening you with annoying calls from telemarketers on your beloved cell phone (with the additional threat that you may have to pay for these unwanted calls) or with the loss of value of your cash cards for store merchandise at the Christmas season, but these threats are just that: promises of potential harm to you or things you value. Hoaxers and spammers have also gotten smart, using devices such as politics and primal urges to get you to click on their unexpected emails.

2. Does the email prompt you to immediate action?
Are there clear consequences for your failure to act at once? Is there a deadline? Is there a clearly defined path of easy action for you to take in your fearful or excited mood?

3. Does it seem in any way incredulous?
Do you read the email and think to yourself, Why haven't I heard of this before? How could this have been a big secret? How could this have happened? This isn't fair!

4. Are you wondering how did I get this email?
Most email has an easily defined purpose:
Friends or co-workers communicating directly with you.
Jokes and inspirational notes from friends to make you smile, laugh or ponder.
Information or offers from businesses you know for services you signed up for.
Spam -- email you did not ask for about services you did not ask for from people you don't know

Hoaxes blur the borders between these classes. They are usually email you did not ask for about services you did not ask for from people you know.

If your email meets any of those criteria, it should be enough to send you to the Internet to search.

Usually just doing a random search for the subject of your email (google or your favorite search engine) will get you a recent post or two on the subject. The Internet is pretty small these days. If you've heard about your email, chances are pretty good someone else has too.

If that hasn't given you enough information to decide, you can always try the Urban Legends Reference Pages at snopes.com. The folks there have been testing and debunking Internet myths since 1995, so they have a lot of records to compare to. It's amazing how often the same hoaxes come around dressed in different clothes.

Sometimes the email is not a hoax at all, but has been sent to you so you will open it, read something, and click on a link (or download a video player) to see more, allowing the hidden programs at the other end of the link to infect your computer.

Sometimes the email is not even a hoax. There was one last summer about a ship being launched made of scrap steel from the World Trade Center. It met the first of the criteria, overly exciting, and the third, why didn't I hear about this before? but not the other two. Enough to prompt a dive for snopes, and to a page which said, "Rumor... True."

So not all news is bad news, but it never hurts to be critical, or optimistically skeptical, as I call it.

Nine things you are looking forward to in 2009

It's the end of another year, and while it is tempting for many of us to close the door quickly on this particular one and not look back, it might be better to think of the opportunities that always lie ahead.

I'll challenge each of you to come up with nine things you are looking forward to in 2009. If you can come up with three, keep pushing. The other six are out there.

Better still, take a piece of notebook paper or a journal page and hand-write them all on there with your new year's resolutions. If you have a facebook or a blog, share it with your family and friends.

Sometimes just the act of writing it down makes it more real. Or maybe you like to say them out loud to a friend. Whatever it takes to make 2009 the best year it can be.

I'll include a few quotes here from a website I've stumbled across. BrainyQuote.com is a great resource for that perfect bit of inspiration to add to an email (or a blog post ;) from people who said it perfectly.

So goodbye to 2008:
"It's a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose yours."
-- Harry S. Truman

"You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space."
-- Johnny Cash

And hello to 2009:
"Life is a series of collisions with the future; it is not the sum of what we have been, but what we yearn to be."
-- Jose Ortega y Gasset

Here's hoping you a bright and wonderful 2009

A picture worth a thousand words

If you have been to the Rensselaer Library this fall, you might have noticed the display of large artworks and photos throughout the library. These images were provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of a project to make important images of our history available for the public. The Picturing America program is also available online and gives details about the images and their meaning to us as a nation.

On Dec. 2, CNN had an interesting story that ties in to this collection. Katherine McIntosh of Modesto, Calif. turns 77 this week. She is one of two young children, faces turned from the camera, pictured with their mother in an iconic photograph depicting the Great Depression.

McIntosh, who remembers the hard lessons she learned as a migrant child living in a tent with her mother and siblings, says the photograph brought both shame and determination to her family and is still talked about the family today.

These photos and paintings are part of our national story. We really hope you take the time to check them out and see what stories they inspire in you.