OCTOBER

September's activities were overshadowed by the terror of the eleventh. Although we are approaching a state of normalcy (whatever that will mean) it has been difficult for me to find real meaning in my work, but I keep doing it. Only Austro-Hungary, Germany, Great Britain, (England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales) remain to be marked, but these are 3 of the largest Photochrom LOTs. Nearly all of the 516 photochroms of France are digitized, soon to join Russia, Algeria, Denmark, Belgium, Serbia, Holland and the Holy Land, which have also been digitized. Housing and labeling for Holland and Belgium is on hold until more countries are scanned. Norway and Sweden are in line for the PhaseOne. They will follow behind the Riviera, Spain, Tunisia, Turkey, Luxembourg, Montenegro and Romania, which Mary Mundy has handed over for digitizing. Italy, which we should complete baby-bibs for within a week or two, will be the next scanning victim. Shifting will continue with New York World next week. We remain stuck at Roosevelt, but I believe we should start making headway when we meet in the glass cage on Wednesday, almost one full month since the crime that changed the world. New York World has slowed, but it goes on much as it always has, even if the world we once knew does not.

NOVEMBER

October saw New York World activity fall off sharply to a point where Birdie has suggested that our patrons must have perished in the Pentagon or World Trade Center. We still have major shifting to do with NYWTS. If we are fortunate, we can finish before December. The Photochrom project continues along. Digitizing and cataloging of the baby-bibs is functioning like clock-work. However, some fifty-odd scans from the France LOT failed to make it onto the server, therefore they will have to be rescanned. I completed 190 baby-bibs for the country of Switzerland. Maybe by early December the Switzerland LOT will be ready for digitization. The Library was closed 4 days: from Thursday October 18th through Tuesday the 23rd, due to fears about biological warfare. The anthrax scare! Jersey barricades have been positioned around the Library and throughout Capitol Hill. Streets have been closed and police are everywhere: Capitol Hill Police, National Guard Troops, Secret Service, F.B.I., etc. Fighter planes and attack helicopters are flying overhead. The Library is being shored-up against bomb blasts. DC has been militarized before our very eyes, yet life, to a great degree, has returned to normal. I look forward to working with Karen Chittenden to assist her with processing 300 soft-focus photographs from the Coville Collection. I understand that this work must be completed by January 1st, 2002, and I believe that it will.