Edward Lear

I had forgotten how much I loved Edward Lear's work,which include the Nonsense Books and his wonderful poems among them the THE OWL AND THE PUSSY-CAT and his great sketches and art work, Enjoy.

"The Emptied Prairie"

Have you ever driven around rural North Dakota or Minnesota and noticed that there are a lot of abandoned houses in the area? I know that I've often wondered what kind of people lived there or what could have happened to them to make them leave. There is a great article in the January 2008 issue of National Geographic magazine titled "The Emptied Prairie" that addresses this very issue.
The article starts, "In the early 20th century, railroads lured settlers into North Dakota with promises of homesteads. Towns were planted everywhere. Houses rose from the sweep of the plains, many... with a story no one can trace. People believed rain would follow the plow. But they were wrong."
Stop by our library to read this fascinating piece of local news.

The Birth of Jacob Grimm

On January 4, 1785, Jacob Grimm was born. Most people know him as one of the Grimm Brothers, but he did more than collect fairy tales. For more information, check out This Day in History by The History Channel.

Eyewitness to History

History through the eyes of those who lived it.

Holiday Reading

ManyBooks.Net: Free eBooks for your PDA, iPod, or eBook reader. Browse through the most popular titles, recommendations, or recent reviews special collections. There are 19,167 eBooks available here and they're all free! from our visitors. Perhaps you'll find something interesting in the special collections. There are 19,167 eBooks available here and they're all free!

Yale U. Puts Complete Courses Online

From the Wired Campus: Open Yale Courses provides free and open access to seven introductory courses taught by distinguished teachers and scholars at Yale University. The aim of the project is to expand access to educational materials for all who wish to learn.

Open Yale Courses reflects the values of a liberal arts education. Yale's philosophy of teaching and learning begins with the aim of training a broadly based, highly disciplined intellect without specifying in advance how that intellect will be used.

This approach goes beyond the acquisition of facts and concepts to cultivate skills and habits of rigorous, independent thought: the ability to analyze, to ask the next question, and to begin the search for an answer.

We hope these courses will be a resource for critical thinking, creative imagination, and intellectual exploration. http://open.yale.edu/courses/

If you're feeling the charitable spirit of the Holidays, the US government
links to a variety of volunteer opportunities and ways to support the
troops. http://www.usa.gov/Topics/Usgresponse/Help.shtml
For other ways to support American soldiers and their families,
see America Supports You,
http://www.americasupportsyou.mil/americasupportsyou/index.aspx

Courtesy of Marylaine Block

Munch Museet

I have always enjoy this artist's work, here is a posting from the Librarian's Internet Index:
This website is for this museum in Oslo, Norway, the city where Expressionist artist Edvard Munch bequeathed all his remaining works upon his death in 1944. Features a Munch biography and timeline, illustrated essays about Munch's paintings and graphic works, details about specific works such as "The Scream," online exhibits on topics such as "The Frieze of Life" and Munch's palette, conservation information and images of paintings stored on rolls, and more. In English and Norwegian.
URL: http://www.munch.museum.no/default.aspx?lang=en