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Archive: June 2010 (6 Posts)

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The Business of Congress

Posted by: Donna Scanlon

Our guest author today is Ellen Terrell, Business Reference Specialist. In a letter to Samuel H. Smith offering his collection to Congress to re-establish the Library after it was burned in 1814, Thomas Jefferson wrote “I do not know that it contains any branch of science which Congress would wish to exclude from this collection …

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Child Labor

Posted by: Donna Scanlon

Child labor in one form or another has existed in America from our beginning. As the country was mostly agricultural, much of the work involved a family’s farm, or in the case of slaves, on plantations. With the advent of industrialization that began to change. In the early part of the 20th century when the …

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Celebrate with a chocolate chip cookie

Posted by: Jennifer Harbster

Our guest author today is Constance Carter, head of the science reference section, mentor, and cookie goddess.   Today is the birthday of Ruth Graves Wakefield, “mother of the chocolate chip cookie.”  She was born on June 17, 1903, and Inside Adams is celebrating by unveiling the division’s latest acquisition, the 1938 edition of Ruth Wakefield’s …

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It’s so hot you can fry an egg on the sidewalk…

Posted by: Jennifer Harbster

As summer approaches and the days heat up, we get an influx of “Why is it hot in the summer?” questions in our reference queue.   In the Northern Hemisphere, our summer months (June-September) are usually hot because of the tilt of the Earth’s axis. It is popular belief that it is hot in the summer because the …

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Credit Reference Books

Posted by: Donna Scanlon

Our guest author today is Ellen Terrell, Business Reference Specialist, with another in our “Favorites from the Fifth Floor.” We get many questions about business from around the country and often we utilize credit reference books. The most well known, and one I have previously written about, is Dun & Bradstreet. This title has gone …