Ask a Librarian 24/7
By Susan Braunstein,
Reference Services Library Associate.
It is 3 a.m. and you are working on a project for work or school with a deadline the next day. All of sudden you realize you need some statistics you don’t have and can’t complete the report without them. Where do you turn? All the sane humans that you know are in bed, unless they have a night job. You don’t want to phone a friend, but you remember reading an article in the newspaper informing you that you can e-mail the library and get an answer through the 24/7 Ask a Librarian service. It’s true that 24 hours a day there is someone ready to take your questions and find an answer for you through a chat on the Library’s website, www.rapidcitylibrary.org.
A chat service has been available for a couple of years at the Library, but the 24/7 is a recent addition. If a chat is received during regular library hours you will reach one of the Rapid City Public Library public services staff. After hours, Ask a Librarian has trained library staff around the country available to talk with you. This offers a unique opportunity to talk to someone in the library field who can conduct research and get back to you in a reasonable period of time. If it is a simple question, the chat would normally take less than 10 minutes. If the answer requires some in-depth research, the librarian can e-mail a response within 24 hours. You can also call on the phone or send an e-mail to the Library if you prefer.
The type of questions asked can be related to a variety of subjects, such as who owns a certain piece of property in Rapid City and what its appraised value is, how to find an old obituary from the Rapid City Journal, or where to find addresses of former classmates as you put together a list for a reunion.
When questions like these are asked, we like to take the opportunity to train people in the techniques used to discover the information on their own. We strive to create independent library users by demonstrating step by step explanations of how to get where the answer is located. In the example mentioned where someone wants to know who owns the property and how much it is worth, we would show how to explore the layers of map levels found on RapidMap, www.rcgov.com. This database is provided through the Rapid City website.
When people are trying to locate an obituary, the library owns microfilm copies of the Rapid City Journal dating from back to the late 1800’s. It is not indexed, but the Rapid City Society for Genealogical Research has compiled two different resources to aid the obituary seekers. There is an Index to Obits from 1975-2001 and an Index to Behrens’ Mortuary Records, 1879-1971. If we receive a long distance request for an obituary or news article, we have a volunteer who will assist in the search and printing of that article.
If someone is seeking an address or phone number, the library offers a database called ReferenceUSA. This resource includes listings of 120 million U.S. households, 13 million businesses and 650,000 physicians and dentists. It is found under the resources tab on the library’s website. We also use www.switchboard.com or www.anywho.com as directory resources.
Another reason questions may arrive electronically at the public service desks is that when people run across an item in the library’s card catalog listed as an electronic resource, they may not understand how to actually look at this book. This electronic collection is a popular new addition called NetLibrary eBooks that you can read online or visit through www.netlibrary.com and search for subjects directly on the website. It should be noted that in order to gain access to the books, the Rapid City Public Library reference staff must first register your library card. This excellent academic enhancement includes almost 9,000 digital full-text versions of books. You will also find over 1,000 titles of downloadable unabridged audiobooks from Recorded Books available through NetLibrary.
The Ask a Librarian chat can also be handy for library-related business such as how to renew a book, check to see if a certain title is in the Library’s collection, and how to place an item on hold.
In this day and age when we are all so busy, the library offers convenient methods to do your research and can work with you to make it easier to find the information on your own if you choose to pursue that direction.
Writer Zora Neale Hurston’s viewpoint is very similar to the library public services staff when she said, “Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose.”