AUL's Death Liberates Library

One nefarious strain of Teutonic and Slavic bloodlines commingled following World War II, which by 1977 had launched the career of the mouth-breathing Überadministrator who would de facto rule Pinchcock University Library for three decades, has mercifully reached its biotic expiration, as Bertha Hammhoxx, Associate University Librarian for God-knows-what, passed away stubbornly but intestate Tuesday morning at her home in the Hoosier state.

Described by subordinates alternately as a hidebound obscurant who worked tirelessly to foster institutional obstipation and as a micromeddling, sausagey-fingered pen-clicker with the personality of a wooden saddle, Hammhoxx had been blamed by staff for single-handedly depriving Pinchcock of a functional organizational culture and the technology that now defines the modern academic library. “After the botched bum’s rush to remove her from office in ’87, that God-fleering woman began sowing the seeds of our current bureaucratic bramble without any regard for the library as a whole,” recalled Emeritus Curator of Indiana-ana Gavin Cromarty.

Apart from generally throwing her managerial flab around, Hammhoxx’s career was highlighted by interfering in low-level personnel decisions, declawing librarians of any professional acumen they possessed on arrival at Pinchcock, riding shotgun with underlings whenever undeserved credit was in sight, and—her crowning achievement—creating committees galore, which so mired the staff in endless meetings that progress on any front became impossible. Maxine Lowtower, Pinchcock’s Coördinator of Institutional Incompetence and long-time friend of Hammhoxx, was particularly shaken by the news and dreaded the library’s prospect of filling some sizable shoes.

A campus psychological profile leaked to this LP reporter indicated Hammhoxx had long ago been diagnosed with three kinds of neurosis and concluded that her character combined the worst possible traits for an administrator to possess. When confronted with the suggestion that his lieutenant rightly should have been relieved of her duties years ago, however, University Librarian Willis Litefelt deftly parried the idea, noting how well Hammhoxx had insulated him from the trifling minutiae of running a library. “I couldn’t have asked for more from my hatchet-man in administration: ruthlessly territorial; champion of rabid mediocrity; and proud owner of an uncarbonated intellect that posed no threat to my…well, let’s just say she was too visceral to be cerebral,” he waxed sentimental.

Bertha W. Hammhoxx: requiescat in pace.

Librarian Even Ganglier in High Def

At Laffingstock University in downstate Oregon, greenhorn tenure-track librarians regularly find themselves in the cross-hairs of peril, as Frenchie Stevenson, gender studies librarian of indeterminate gender, learned last month when senior colleagues deflected attention away from their own lack of community outreach by volunteering the newbie to appear on local public TV for pledge drive service. “It may seem like we threw Frenchie under the bus,” elucidated senior linguistics librarian Kevin Finestra, “but it would be fairer to say we threw hume in the deep end of the pool, where at least hu had a chance to tread water.”

Far from merely treading water, Stevenson helped KPUT raise record pledge donations during huse stint on the small screen through what station manager Bernie Zatarain characterized as mature insights on the value of public television, linking the benefits KPUT offers the community to those of a public institution of higher learning such as Laffingstock. “It was crucial for this pledge drive to go well in order for us to pay for KPUT’s recent capital investment in HD broadcasting; thanks to Frenchie’s efforts our financial picture looks a lot rosier now,” noted Zatarain contentedly.

But soon after the drive a ghastly revelation by station intern and part-time library student assistant Matthew O’Grady swiftly infected the Laffingstock library grapevine and completely punctured Stevenson’s community service triumph. According to O’Grady, phone bank volunteers were overheard to remark that the record pledges KPUT took in were the result of lost bets on Stevenson’s gender, not any real desire to do right by the station. “I heard phone bankers quoting callers throughout the day. When told Frenchie’s true identity, one said he’d seen ‘better curves on a Venn diagram’ before giving his credit card information and angrily hanging up the phone; another compared huse looks to a defective computer age-progression program,” he explained.

A skeptical Zatarain was ultimately forced to come to terms with the reality of this unfortunate episode, but nevertheless balked at calls for Stevenson to receive financial recompense as a gesture of goodwill. In a follow-up phone interview he concluded, “How ironic that this move to HD broadcasting gave the station its first true-to-life picture of our viewers and some of their repugnant prejudices.”

Librarian’s Res Gestae Scanned into Irrelevance

The final piece of a periodicals jigsaw puzzle 41 years in the making was put into place earlier this week as colleagues at Apple Ridge University (ARU) surprised retiring serials librarian Anne T. Herstamine with sundry gift-wrapped journal issues accompanied by a signed card, thus filling in the remaining gaps she inherited when she began the job as a young hippie fresh out of library school. “Crossing off the last few titles on the D-List means I can retire content in the knowledge that I’ve achieved my career goal of making ARU the only institution in this time zone with complete runs of all 1,100 journals on the list,” blubbed Herstamine at her farewell cake and punch nosh.

Herstamine’s infamous “D(esiderata) List” became legendary at Apple Ridge as much for its scope as the sometimes unorthodox ways she whittled it down over the years, in some cases entailing cumbersome exchanges, long drives to pick up materials and, more recently, fighting for issues in on-line auctions. “Anne’s long-standing service to ARU has been distinguished by thoughtful attention to detail, supreme tenacity, and the enduring scent of buckram; we thought getting these last few issues for her would be a fitting send-off,” toasted splay-footed library director Dexter Luce-Bawls at her reception.

But the day before Herstamine’s departure, mega journal archive JSTOW unveiled a stunning new addition to its “Lazy Undergraduate” suite, comprising complete full-text runs—sans moving wall—of all 1,100 journals Herstamine had so meticulously amassed in print plus an added 900 boutique journals across the social sciences and humanities for graduate student poseurs. The announcement of the “2K4$20K” package reportedly sent ARU bibliographers and periodicals check-in clerks into a do-se-do as a barrage of forwarded e-mails choked library in-boxes throughout the building. “Even with their higher than usual access fee, JSTOW’s package will save us tons of money on serials expenditures and processing, freeing up needed cash for our emaciated book budget,” noted relieved head of collection development Ronnette Pilturnin.

Herstamine’s gallant efforts to forestall her print journal collection’s passing into fossilized library curiosa all went for naught, however, as she was forcibly removed from the compact shelving to which she had chained herself on her last day. Three months later Luce-Bawls arranged for the wholesale removal of that shelving and its contents from the library to make way for his faddish dream of “wide open collaborative study spaces for today’s users, where yesterday’s restrictions and prohibitions would be irrelevant in the absence of three-dimensional content,” according to a campus bulletin.

ARU librarians are now nervously holding their collective breath awaiting the next pillar of the profession to go the way of the dodo, the ’60s, and Herstamine herself.

The Annoyed Librarian Revealed: An LP Exclusive!

In a revelation sure to rock the library world, former ALA president and current dean at Fresno State Michael Gorman has been unmasked as the hotly sought Annoyed Librarian. Even more shocking: he unmasked himself. "I was tired of all the speculation," Gorman said, "not least because some of the people under suspicion are simply too nice to be the Annoyed Librarian. I want my awesomeness to be known, and I want credit for it, as with everything else I have ever done."

In the letter he sent to LP, Gorman pointed out that only someone filled with such venom toward new technologies could sustain the curmudgeonliness necessary to craft those long, technophobic posts for which AL is known. "I was already bitter and angry when people like Farkas and Stephens were in diapers," he wrote. When asked later how he got the idea, he pointed out that given his anti-blogging screed in Library Journal, it should seem obvious that the irony in using a blog as a platform for his views was simply too rich to miss.

Gorman was once offended at being called an idiot by a blogger. How fun it is instead to know that he himself is a blogger, which is surely worse than being an idiot.

Lowly Librarian Says No to Faculty

Bucking widespread practice in the academic library profession, Mildred Ruckgrat recently did something positively seditious: she said no. That would seem to be a normal part of one's everyday work life in most professions, not least in academia, where resources are limited. But as anyone even passingly familiar with academic librarians knows, it is an exceedingly rare occurrence of naysaying.

"I had simply had it with years of bludgeoning and haranguing," noted Ms. Ruckgrat, explaining how faculty members seemed to find great sport in sending her commands--to order books, not to cancel even the most underused and marginal journal, to do their research for them--laced with a cynical and patronizing tone. "We call ourselves a profession, but if you always have to say 'yes, sir' or 'yes, ma'am' to anyone, even the most deluded faculty," she continued, "what's the point? We could be replaced by high school graduates." She pointed out that most subject librarians--she's the Social Sciences Librarian at Northsouth Central University--have at least two graduate degrees and that the national average is nine years of professional library experience.

Despite that, even a newly washed assistant professor's word carries more weight with her library's administrators. NCU's dean of libraries, Wanda Lackey, has repeatedly overruled Ruckgrat's attempts to trim her budget by paring unused journals, citing communication from faculty members as the reason. One professor wrote a stinging rebuke when Ruckgrat attempted to cancel The Journal of Ononastic Research, even though she could show that it had not been used at all in nearly ten years. "He told Dean Lackey that masturbation was the next great field for discovery and teaching, and that any librarian who would cancel it must be a prude," mused Ms. Ruckgrat, pointing out that she wrote her dissertation on the development and use of bondage gear. "I know sex," she says.

So what request did Ms. Ruckgrat reject? She had been asked, two days before the semester, to acquire a number of "essential" books for a course that had been added to the curriculum ten months previous. "I simply couldn't justify the expense of purchasing such marginal titles without more time to review the budget and consider other competing requests." Besides, she added, it was also a question of someone's lack of planning not being her problem. "All I said to the faculty member was that I expect to be treated as something more than a secretary or clerk," Ms. Ruckgrat sighed. "You would think after my years of service and with my publication record, one would not need to assert this, but here I am." When asked if she expects to be overruled by her dean, she simply groans.

Library Development Office Raises Eyebrows

In a familiar turn of events, Highsmith University Library has become the butt of jokes of late for another half-baked fundraising idea demonstrating just how clueless that campus entity remains. In a vain attempt to attract new memberships from alumni and community groups and augment existing levels of support, Highsmith’s novice director of development and confirmed perkaholic Geraldine Galimony introduced a new category of sponsorship known as “Friends with Benefits,” which, according to the latest Friends of Highsmith University Library Newsletter, conferred enhanced borrowing privileges, the availability of interlibrary loan services for the first time, personalized invitations to special events hosted by the Friends, and an impressive discount coupon book.

However, library staff were appalled that not a single person either in the development office or Friends group grasped the double entendre of the phrase as used in modern American parlance. “What I want to know is how the idea got clearance from library administration. I mean, this is more embarrassing than when Development tried to capitalize on the popularity of BET’s Redd Foxx retrospective by underwriting the publication of Sanford and Son for Dummies,” noted nursing librarian Sarah Smokepole tartly.

Worse still, a number of Highsmith undergraduate males who should have known better actually purchased memberships believing guilt-free sex would be theirs for the taking. “I joined the Friends thinking the library was gonna hook me up with some hotties; instead all I got was a welcome packet from this old chick who smelled like the antique store downtown,” confessed a dejected sophomore who wished to remain anonymous.

Having penetrated the upper reaches of library administration, the embarrassing news ultimately prompted university librarian Patty D. Foie-Gras to admit she had removed Galimony’s training wheels a bit too soon and that further schooling in the fine art of fundraising was indeed in order.

Systems Librarian Reinvents Wheel

Amidst a scene charged with palpable anticipation, librarians and paraprofessional staff at Beckwith University gathered yesterday to witness an epic unveiling not seen since the release of patent leather Hush Puppies. “All I know is that Benny [Blakeford, head systems librarian] has been working in almost total isolation on this ‘big project’ for the past few years and was even excused from committee obligations to focus all his time on it,” whispered Latin American studies librarian Pamela Montoya to this LP reporter as the lights in the auditorium dimmed.

Following a brief introduction by library director Donald Fudge, Blakeford launched the Internet browser on his laptop, which projected prominently onto a large screen, and began solemnly, “Three years ago my promise to Donald and you all was the development of a new Web-based tool that would revolutionize the efficiency of information retrieval by interconnecting all library resources, from our subscription databases and the OPAC to a range of e-collections, through sophisticated linking software that enables simultaneous searching across resource types. Despite some setbacks, the time has come to unveil my creation, which I call ‘Tarot.’”

Genuinely confused by the ensuing scowls and insults leveled at him, Blakeford asked why the fruits of his labor were meeting with such disapproval. “You retard, OpenURL resolvers have been around for years! Ever hear of SFX??” blared engineering librarian Justin Wee from the fourth row. As pages of Web sites were brought up on screen to demonstrate Wee’s point, even Fudge began to melt at the thought of the salary wasted on this boondoggle when the library could have had a high-end product out of the box for a fraction of the cost three years ago.

Scattered grumbles among library staff soon turned to murderous glances and muttered oaths for yet another grossly expensive failure by the systems department. In fear for his safety, Blakeford bolted from the room for the velvet refuge of his department only to have his key break in the lock while hastily trying to open the door. With livid library staff now in hot pursuit and himself in imminent danger of death by a thousand catalog card cuts, Blakeford extracted from the cap of his flash drive the single tiny white pellet all IT pros keep handy, ingested the cyanide, and swiftly dropped dead in a tragically perverse Pac-Man-like seppuku.

The pallor of mourning over Blakeford’s suicide, however, hasn’t prevented certain librarians within the Beckwith community from questioning whose shoulders must bear the ultimate burden of responsibility. Noted one, “It seems like every time Systems has another bright idea for a project, Fudge blithely dumps a bucket of money in their laps; then by the time it’s finished—always over budget—it’s obsolete and ends up costing us three times as much as a superior commercial product released in the meantime. Do you blame the beast or the one who feeds the beast?”