We know what you're reading...

There are many daily duties in the life of a library that keeps things running smoothly. One of the weekly tasks is managing interlibrary loans. As a member of OCLC (Online Computer Library Center), we can search the collections of libraries all over the world in order to borrow their books for staff and patrons. In return, they may ask to borrow ours. Participating in this system allows us to share resources with scholars all around the globe. Think of it as lending a your favorite book – the one you bought on Amazon just before it went out of print – to a friend that lives all the way across the country. When an institution requests a loan, we find the book on the shelf, check it out to “interlibrary loan,” package the item safely, and ship it off. Items are returned in about a month so that books may be shared fairly.

Over the last year, we’ve noticed that some books are lent out on a regular basis. The four that seem to go out the most are Traditional Korean Wrapping Cloths, Codex Seraphinianus, Memento Mori: Death in Nineteenth Century Photography and Let Us March On! Selected Civil Rights Photographs of Ernest C. Withers, 1955 – 1968. Of those four, The Codex Seraphinianus has been lent the most: 4 times this year! That might not sound like a lot, but in a collection of 111,000 items, that makes “The Codex” our M.V.P.

You too can see what others are reading! Please drop by the Jean Outland Chrysler Library and have a look at some of our most popular and well traveled holdings.

Library Assistant Sara Mason (a.k.a. The Interlibrary Loan Lady)

Wondering where our Interlibrary loans go? The map above features just a few of the locations items from our collections have visited in the United States in 2009.