Let’s Go Giants!

A Day in the Bleachers by Arnold Hano, illustrations by Mark Ulriksen and forward by Andrew Hoyem. Arion Press, 2006.

It’s spring, it’s Opening Day, it’s time for baseball and perhaps a visit to the Rare Book Room. You might not think to look in Special Collections for baseball books, but you might also be pleasantly surprised. Here’s a fine example: A Day in the Bleachers by Arnold Hano, illustrations by Mark Ulriksen and forward by Andrew Hoyem. This Arion Press edition pays homage to the legendary catch made by Willie Mays during the first game of the 1954 World Series between the New York Giants and the Cleveland Indians. Here’s the link to the Arion Press’s virtual tour of this beautifully produced tribute. The Schmulowitz Collection of Wit & Humor, also part of Book Arts & Special Collections, offers quite a few tempting titles about the game as well. According to Wes Westrum, “Baseball is like church, many attend but few understand” -- kind of like Special Collections maybe? Enjoy the game and happy reading.

Baseball is a funny game by Joe Garagiola, 1960.

Butchered baseball: illegal text by F.S. Pearson; with illogical illustrations by R. Taylor; with Mel Allen at bat and Tom Meany on deck, 1952.

Choice cartoons from Sports Illustrated selected by Charles Preston; with a foreword by Sidney L. James, 1957.

Clowning through baseball by Al Schacht; grammar and adjectives by Murray Goodman; foreword by John Kieran; illustrations by Willard Mullin, 1941.

Curve ball laughs by Herman Masin, 1955.

It's only a game by Charles M. Schulz and Jim Sasseville; edited by Derrick Bang, 2004.

Li'l leaguer by Al Liederman, 1960.

The New Yorker book of baseball cartoons edited by Robert Mankoff with Michael Crawford, 2003.

Say it ain't so! by Mac Davis; illustrations by Arnold Spilka, 1953

A sports bestiary by George Plimpton; with drawings by Arnold Roth, 1982.

A Treasury of baseball humor edited by Stan Lomax and Dave Stanley, 1950.

The wit and wisdom of Yogi Berra by Phil Pepe, 1974.

p.s. Be sure to save the special keepsake supplement to today's SF Chronicle (30March2011) which includes a beautiful painting of the World Champs by Mark Ulriksen.

Every Little Thing: Make a Zine in 2011

Everyone has something creative within, and we at the San Francisco Public Library think our readers are some of the most creative people anywhere. So when we were alerted to the Revenge of Print project, we found ourselves wanting to tell you about it and support the effort by encouraging you to make a zine in 2011. You know you can do it.

A confession first: aside from a zine made in the early 1990s, this Special Collections librarian has only produced a list of the titles for zines she wanted to make. That list is sitting on my desk next to the Edison cylinder. Hmm, what does that say about yours truly? OK, so I'm a writing sluggard. I've been a little busy doing the collecting thing.

As I said, I have a bunch of lovingly thought-out titles, and more than one person has encouraged me to turn my title list into a zine. Taking a line from one of my favorite zines (The Lower East Side Librarian Winter Solstice Shout Out) "every little thing" is a pretty good description of my would-be zine-making possibilities. Just about anything can be written about, with inspiration found in mundane and everyday events; all you have to do is pick something! If you need ideas, The Little Maga/Zine Collection is a good place to start. Search the Library catalog (call number = little magazines) and the title list for complete holdings.

For the actual making of your zine, get some tips from this terrific instructional video :




How to Make a Zine by nicki sabalu
The song on this video is from "Vs. Wilderness" by Finn Riggins.



Here's my list of zine titles. I guess I better get down to it, and not "in my own sweet time!"

1.  Bricolage (describing a visit to Paris in 2007)

2.  Rootin' Tootin' (the discovery of a basement full of 20 years of wrapping paper)

3.  She Looked Like a Good Girl, She Wore White Socks (overheard conversations)

4.  In My Own Sweet Time (personal procrastination issues)

5.  Miss Augusta Terris, Post Mistress (ordinary people doing extraordinary things)
6.  Loafer (I thought about this title during last year's San Francisco Zine Fest)

7.  Every Little Thing (an unfocused look at life's minutiae. Thank you, Jenna Freedman and Lower East Side Librarian!)

How to Research a Building Program at Sunset Branch

[Mound of sand at 32nd Avenue and Quintara Street in the Sunset District], July 2, 1942. Courtesy of the San Francisco Historical Photograph Collection, San Francisco Public Library.

Join us tonight at 7:00 p.m. at the Sunset branch library for another neighborhood rendition of the San Francisco History Center's popular program, "How to Research a San Francisco Building." An archivist from the San Francisco History Center will give an overview of how to find out when a building was built, who owned it, who the architect was, and other related questions. We will cover both online and print resources, as well as photographs.

You can review our online guide to researching a building here. Hope to see you there!

Workers Compensation Time Capsule



[State Compensation Insurance Fund, Golden Gate & Polk], Aug. 21, 1964.
Courtesy of Alan J. Canterbury, San Francisco History Center

All archival collections--once they are transferred to the archives and become archival--involve saving documents for researchers of future generations, but some archival collections are produced with the intent to be saved. Such is the case with time capsules, in which materials are compiled and stored in order to be literally uncovered later. In 2009, when the building at 525 Golden Gate Avenue was torn down  to build a new Public Utilities Commission Building, the Public Utilities Commission called the City Archivist to come and retrieve a time capsule they'd found stored in a copper box in the cornerstone. That is how the San Francisco History Center acquired the State Compensation Insurance Fund Time Capsule for April 25, 1960, commemorating the dedication of its then-new building.

While the copper box was not retained, the materials inside it were. After carefully soldering off the lid of the container, we found the photographs and documents inside to be intact and in good condition. Besides offering us a glimpse into the dedication day and history of the building itself, the collection documents the formation of California workers' compensation laws and the insurance fund created to help implement them. The time capsule includes microfilmed working drawings of the building, photographs of the Board of Directors and architects, a dedication day program, newspapers from the day of the dedication, and a copy of San Francisco's Civic Center Development Plan from Oct. 1958; along with copies of legislation and administrative documents of the State Compensation Insurance Fund of California.

 To see the State Compensation Insurance Fund time capsule for yourself, please visit the San Francisco History Center during our open hours. A detailed guide to the collection is available at the Online Archive of California.