Join us @ the Library Monday, April 28th at 6:00 pm for the Phoenix release party! Come get a free copy of this year’s literary and art journal, featuring contributions from your fellow Milliganites. Be sure to stick around to hear the original artists read selections of their work. Light refreshments will be served. And don’t worry, you’ll be done in time to catch the Milligan Jazz Ensemble Concert in Seeger at 7:30! Hope to see you there!
Milligan Library Life
by the staff of P.H. Welshimer Memorial Library & Seminary Library
New Look to JSTOR
JSTOR has unveiled a sleek new look on April 7, 2008! Most veteran JSTOR users will find that the basic and advance search screens retain many of the old features, while adding a few new twists.
Highlights of the new features:
- In Advanced Searching, searchers can now specify that search terms be within a certain proximity to each other (within 5, 10, or 25 words). Using this feature can greatly improve full-text search results.
- Save citations within JSTOR and access them again at future sessions. To use the feature, create a MyJSTOR account from the tab at the top of the screen.
- All searches from a session are retained and can be reviewed.
- Simplified printing and viewing of articles in PDF format.
To learn more, watch several short tutorials on the new features at:
http://0-www.jstor.org.library.acaweb.org/action/showBasicSearch
In future posts, I will discuss ways to improve JSTOR searches. But if you have any questions or would like any assistance on JSTOR or any other database, please contact me at mjackson at milligan.edu
I didn’t know we had THAT in the Milligan Library…
As Milligan’s resident reference librarian, I am aware of some really great resources. Some of these are located physically in the library, some are available online through a subscription, and some are free out on the Internet. I hope to have occasional posts highlighting interesting resources that are often overlooked by students and faculty.
Gale Virtual Reference Library
What is it? As its name implies, it is an online reference library. Over 60+ multivolume reference books on social sciences, popular culture, religion, history, medicine and more. The complete text of every volume can be searched at one time, over 86,000 documents.
When would the Gale Virtual Reference Library (GVRL) be helpful in a research project? The GVRL is a great place to start almost any research project. Many of the articles give excellent overviews, show how a topic may be relevant in many different fields of study, and give keywords, concepts, and references for further study. The GVRL way also be helpful later in a research project to fill in gaps left by other resources. Most instructors won’t accept Wikipedia articles in a bibliography, but instructors like to see GVRL articles.
What kind of topics might be covered in the GVRL? Just a few examples: Bob Dylan (32 articles), Lord of the Rings (21), PATRIOT Act (50), and tobacco (265).
Accessing and using the Gale Virtual Reference Library
Milligan Library Homepage → Electronic Reference → Gale Virtual Reference Library
Type one or more search terms in the Basic Search box. Helpful tip–Return to the basic search screen EVERY TIME to revise a search or begin a new search.
Need help with Gale Virtual Reference Library or any other research question, contact me, Mary Jackson, mjackson at milligan.edu.
Living history: Navy V-12 alumni share their stories
Tuesday afternoon I joined members of the Phi Alpha Theta history honors society for a luncheon with local alumni of Milligan’s Navy V-12 program. These men came to Milligan between summer 1943 and summer 1945 as part of the Navy’s WWII officer training program. During those two years, the Milligan student body was composed entirely of Navy trainees and the campus was considered a naval base. Jane Anne Thomas organized the luncheon as part of Project Profile, which aims “to bring people in the Milligan community together with students, staff, and faculty they would not otherwise know.”
While we ate, the students, Theresa Garbe, Dr. and Jane Anne Thomas, and I talked to the V-12 alumni and their wives about classes and military training at Milligan. We took notes, were shown photographs of the men as uniformed students, and heard stories about what Milligan 
was like in the wartime 1940s. Back then, Stan Johnson told me, Milligan only had four buildings – the Administration Building (Derthick), Hardin Hall (then a dorm), Pardee Hall, and Cheek Gymnasium. Trainees woke up at 6am, reported for drill on Anglin Field for an hour, and went to “chow” at 7. Classes were taught by Milligan’s civilian faculty, including Sam Jack Hyder and Ivor Jones. A typical class load was between 17 and 20 hours with strong emphasis on math, engineering, and naval history. Basketball, baseball, wrestling, and football teams were formed and competed against other schools. In addition, an obstacle
course was set up in the athletic field and a running course wound around campus and up Pardee Hill (now Sutton Hill). Lights went out at 10pm after a long day of classes and physical training.
Many, but not all, of the young men who went through the V-12 program were deployed. After the war, some stayed in the Navy while others returned to civilian life. In 1945 Milligan was decommissioned as a naval base and launched a vigorous student recruitment campaign to help make the transition back into civilian use. In 1980 the first reunion of the Milligan V-12 alumni was held, and since then further reunions have been organized every couple of years. In talking with these alums, we could feel that they had good memories of their time on campus, were impressed with how far the college has come, and were delighted to share their stories about the V-12 and beyond with us.
If you would like to learn more about the Navy V-12 at Milligan, come by the Archives. We have lots of pictures and other materials to see!
Milligan Grad Joins Library Staff
After a seven month search the Library has a new Public Services Librarian. His name is Jeff Harbin, and he is a graduate of Milligan College.
Jeff Harbin enrolled at Milligan College in 1999 and graduated in 2003 with a degree in English. He began working in the P. H. Welshimer Memorial Library as a work-study student his sophomore year, and his experiences in the library inspired him to pursue a career as an academic librarian. Jeff completed his master’s degree in library science from the Catholic University of America in 2006, and has worked in a number of libraries in the Washington, D.C. area. Jeff is excited by the opportunity to return to Milligan, and he is confident his knowledge of the college and the library will enable him to promote the library’s services to the Milligan community. Jeff also hopes not to bore current students with aimless yarns that begin, “Well, when I was a student here…” He is married to Debbie Harbin, whom he met during the Spring 2002 semester at the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies in Oxford, England.
Jeff fills the position vacated by Tami Pettit, who resigned in July 2007. Being short-staffed has been a bit of a challenge for the Library, though essential public services tasks (e.g., supervision of student workers, and circulation issues) have been handled admirably by Jan Ricker, our Interlibrary Loans Manager.
“Although we have been short-handed for almost an entire academic year, the opening of the Public Services Librarian position has really proven to be a blessing in disguise,” or so says Gary Daught, Director of Library Services. “This opening has given us the opportunity to rethink the nature and delivery of public services at the Milligan College Library. ‘Traditional’ administrative, technical, and relational tasks relating to circulation of library resources, maintenance of library patron records, and the supervision of our student workers will continue to be important tasks of the Public Services Librarian. However, as the ways in which students and faculty access and use information resources continues to change, the academic library needs to change accordingly. We need to apply new energy, imagination, and creative thinking to reach out and promote library resources, library services, and library spaces to the Milligan College learning community. We are envisioning the Library as a destination for our students and faculty–a learning destination, a cultural activities destination, and a social destination. Jeff is energized by our vision, and I am very excited that he is coming to help us bring this vision into reality.”
Jeff will start on April 1. Be on the lookout for an invitation to a reception planned for before the end of the semester, where you will have an opportunity to meet Jeff and welcome him back to the Milligan College community.