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Notes & Quotes

    Staff Notes…

    by Max Shenk, Periodicals Assistant

    RETIREMENTS

    Three long-time, full-time Brendlinger Library staffers started their retirements in the past year: Shelby Martin (Cataloger), Merry Rosenberger (Reference Librarian), and Phyllis Gabage (Library Processing Assistant).

    Shelby had been with the college since 1975. It is thanks to Shelby, in large part, that you can find your way around the Library catalog. As Cataloger, she ensured complete and accurate information in the catalog for print materials. She also served as a student advisor for many years. Her quiet presence will be missed.

    Merry started at the College in 1980 as a part-time librarian, and became the Reference Librarian in 1984. As such, she was responsible for building the reference collection and developing a bibliographic instruction program. Merry, also, assumed responsibility for the selection of a great portion of the print collection. We will miss her sense of humor and vivacious personality! Very few of us can tell a story as well as Merry!!

    Phyllis joined the Library staff in 1984. She was president of the Support Staff Union for many years, and was involved in many activities on campus. As Library Processing Assistant, she prepared print material for the shelves and supervised student workers. We wish Phyllis and all of our retirees health and happiness in the future!

    IN SCHOOL

    Deborah Robbins, Circulation Clerk, is pursuing a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology through MCCC's partnership with Albright College. Debbie is currently taking her second class of what will be a 22-month program.

    TRAVELS NEAR AND FAR

    Reference librarian (and organist) Robert Erb realized a lifelong ambition of his over the summer: he participated in a two-week Organ, Choral and Castle tour of the United Kingdom. The Tour made (pardon the pun!) stops to hear organ recitals at cathedrals in London, Liverpool, Windsor, Chester, and Bath, along with forays into the countryside of England, Wales, and France.

    The trip culminated with the five day Southern Cathedrals Festival in Winchester and the famed BBC Proms Concert at the Royal Albert Hall. Robert also took a daytrip through the Chunnel to visit Paris and hear the organ at Notre Dame Cathedral.

    The tour “was something I have long wanted to do,” Robert says. “The sense of history in these cathedrals, and the feeling of walking where so many have stepped before, was overwhelming. And because of the nature of this tour, we were able to see and do things that we would not have as ‘ordinary tourists.'”

    Incidentally, Robert arrived in Britain on the evening of the British subway bombings. Security, he said, was tightened in many places during his visit, but “it's been said before, and it's true: the British bore it well. They have developed a stiff upper lip toward this sort of thing.”

    OTHER TRAVELS

    Gretchen Keer also visited England, in February, traveling to Liverpool, then by train to Shiptonthorpe, in Yorkshire, where her partner's aunt and uncle were renewing their wedding vows (“The ceremony was lovely, even though the chapel was FREEZING”), and finally to the walled city of York, “where we went on a ghost walk around the city after it got dark and learned about all the hauntings in the town, and took a tour of Yorvik which is the archaeological dig of ancient York that has been turned into a museum. It was a great trip.”

    Sarah Penniman and her husband took a honeymoon trip to Iceland last July. “It was beautiful, a true nature lover's paradise! The weather was perfect--65 degrees and sunny every day. We went hiking and biking around Reykjavik , and then we rented a car and explored the northern and southern parts of the island. We saw glaciers, geysers, lava fields and thousands of puffins! We also climbed into the shell of an erupted volcano!”...

    Janet Perry visited Yellowstone over the summer, staying at two of the lodges that were built in the 1930s when Yellowstone became a park: Old Faithful Inn and Roosevelt Lodge...

    Marie Devine took a trip to New York City to see Bryn Terfel sing FALSTAFF at the Met (“Fourth row, center!”), and Max Shenk went to see SPAMALOT on Broadway in July...

    Max also visited the haunts of his favorite writer, Henry David Thoreau, last summer, stopping in Concord, Massachusetts. He hiked the woods at Walden and then swam across Walden Pond, and then went into town to visit Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, where Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Louisa Mae Alcott are buried “on a hill called Author's Ridge, literally within 25 yards of each other. Amazingly inspiring for a writer.”

    STAFF FAMILY IN THE SERVICE: SEND CARE PACKAGES!

    Sue Campbell's son, Chris, is currently serving in the US Army in Iraq . After enlisting in August 2003, he was transferred to Iraq in March 2004 and is stationed in Tall Afar with the 66th Military Intelligence company. “Chris was promoted to Sergeant in September,” Sue says, “At present he has little time for recreation as he is working 12 hours a day, seven days a week at regiment HQ”

    Sgt. Campbell hopes to come back stateside in March 2006. Anyone interested in sending Chris a letter or email should get in touch with Sue (X6585) for his contact information.