nov04d.indd I n t e r n e t R e v i e w s Joni R. Roberts and Carol A. Drost, editors Adherents.com. Access: www.adherents. com/. Adherents.com is a collection of more than 41,000 “adherent statistics and religious geography citations.” Adherents.com has no specifi c affiliation and claims to be the second most frequently visited general religion site on the Internet. The site is the brainchild of Preston Hunter, a computer programmer in Texas. Its target audience is “anybody who desires statistical information about the size or spread of a faith group or wants a general idea of the religious make up of a specifi c country, continent, state or province.” The homepage contains summary statis­ tics of the world’s major religions, the major branches of these religions, and a list of the largest religious groups in the United States. Within Islam, for example, 940 million Mus­ lims are Sunni, while 120 million are Shiites. Also on this page are links to the religious affiliation of U.S. Presidents, Vice Presidents, Supreme Court Justices, members of Con­ gress, and state governors. Two disclaimers, taken from Adherents. com’s homepage, must be kept in mind when navigating this site: Adherents.com incorpo­ rates statistics from several, sometimes con­ tradictory, sources (often listed side­by­side), and the statistics provided on the site are not exhaustive. A visit to Adherents.com suggests a further caveat: the site itself needs main­ tenance. The link “Congressional Religious Affiliation” dates from 2000 and, of course, we have had a general election since then. Ad­ ditionally, Adherents.com contains a number of broken and out­of­date Internet links. Joni R. Roberts is associate university librarian for public services and collection development at Willamette University, e-mail: jroberts@willamette.edu, and Carol A. Drost is associate university librarian for technical services at Willamette University, e-mail: cdrost@willamette.edu The homepage also provides two handy indexes: “Religion by Location” and “Religion by Name.” Each index provides a comprehen­ sive, alphabetical listing of religious statistics. For instance, in the first index, we learn that 26 percent of Minnesotans are Lutheran. In the second index, we can find the number of Presbyterian churches and/or members in any particular state in the nation. Unfortunately, in the same index, we fi nd no such state­by­ state breakdown for the Lutheran Church in America, this country’s largest Lutheran body. Such information is provided, however, for the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod. Bottom line: check Adherence.com for religious statistics, but be prepared to search further for up­to­date data.—Wendell Johnson, Waubonsee Community College, WJohnson@waubonsee.edu Civil Rights in Mississippi Digital Archive. Access: www.lib.usm.edu/~spcol/crda/. In the midst of the Civil Rights Movement, large numbers of activists traveled throughout the southern United States marching to inte­ grate public institutions, as well as educating and registering voters. Many of the volunteers concentrated reform efforts in Mississippi, where segregation was deeply ingrained and institutionalized. During Freedom Summer 1964, recruits organized activities in local schools and com­ munity centers, expanded voter registration efforts, and worked towards establishing a political party to challenge the whites­only status quo. The largest site for Freedom Sum­ mer events was Hattiesburg, home of the Uni­ versity of Southern Mississippi (USM). Thanks to a generous Institute of Museum and Library Services federal grant, students and researchers can now return to Hattiesburg and the turbu­ lence of those times through a digital archive established by the USM Libraries. The collection currently includes letters, diaries, pamphlets, photographs, oral histo­ ries, and audio transcripts that focus on events that occurred in Mississippi during the Civil Rights Movement and Freedom Summer. The 616 / C&RL NewsNovember 2004 www.lib.usm.edu/~spcol/crda mailto:WJohnson@waubonsee.edu http:Adherence.com mailto:cdrost@willamette.edu mailto:jroberts@willamette.edu http:Adherents.com http:Adherents.com http:Adherents.com http:Adherents.com http:Adherents.com www.adherents http:Adherents.com wealth of the archive is to be found in its extensive oral history and image fi les. The site contains lengthy interviews with major figures such as Charles Evers, Fannie Lou Hamer and Mississippi Governor Ross Bar­ nett, as well as interviews with local residents and northern Freedom Riders. High­quality digitized photographs and other images are fully searchable through the USM Libraries catalog and the Web site database. In addition to original source documents from the period, a brief essay and timeline giv­ ing a historical context to the period are pro­ vided, as is a link to other relevant resources. The site also contains intellectual property rights and permissions information as well as preservation and digitization guidelines. While the content of the archive is of great interest, the site itself appears to be in need of some updating and maintenance. Some audio­enhanced transcripts and picture fi les contain errors that prevent downloading. While search features work well, navigation through the site and away from the USM Libraries catalog could be improved. Finally, although messages on the “Manuscripts and Photographs” page indicate that more digi­ tized materials are forthcoming, it appears that many of the pages have not recently been modified. Visitors to the digital archives will find here a fascinating collection of artifacts from a momentous period in U.S. history but will leave wishing for more.—Linda Frederik­ sen, Washington State University, Vancouver, frederik@vancouver.wsu.edu The National Agricultural Law Center. Ac­ cess: www.nationalAgLawCenter.org. If you are researching farm commodity programs or landowner liability, international agricultural law or the National Organic Pro­ gram, this is the Web site for you. The National Agricultural Law Center (NALC) is based at University of Arkansas School of Law and is funded through the National Agricultural Library of the USDA Agricultural Research Service. Its mission is to provide online research tools in the fields of agricultural and food law. The NALC’s staff includes law and research professors, lawyers, research fellows, as well as other specialists in the fi eld. The NALC’s site was recently reorganized and has an attractive look. Clearly labeled links at the top of most pages ensure easy naviga­ tion. The addition of some brief instructions for searching would be helpful. There are no search tools on the site, so it is necessary to investigate the different links in order to fi nd the hidden research gems. The 27 new “Reading Rooms” each focus on a particular aspect of agricultural law, such as biotechnology, country of origin labeling, food safety, and pesticides. Within each “room” users will find an essay that gives an overview of the topic as well as extensive links to federal regulations, statutes, case law, government publications, research publications published by NALC, and links to other resources. Ten more rooms are under construction. NALC research publications are also cross­referenced under “Research Publications.” NALC publishes an electronic newsletter with case summaries, a “Federal Register Digest,” and USDA judicial officer decisions. The newsletter is available through the Web site with archives back to 2002. Other resources include the im­ pressive “Agricultural Law Bibliography,” which is updated quarterly and is searchable using keywords. The extensive source list is up­to­date and easy to use. Users may also access Web sites of Senate and House committees and subcommittees as well as General Accounting Office and Congres­ sional Research Service reports through “Con­ gressional Links.” “Reference Desk” provides links to other bibliographies, glossaries, journals, associations, and online research guides, but not all of the links work. Overall, the site is an excellent resource for a specialized field. Graduate and advanced undergraduate students and researchers in the fields of agricultural and food law should fi nd it a valuable resource, even though the site makes its users earn its rewards. Because there are no search features on the site, with the exception of the aforementioned “Agricultural Law Bibli­ ography,” users must be willing to investigate all of the nooks and crannies by exploring all of the links. The patient researcher will be rewarded with a wealth of information.—Ann Flower, Monterey Institute of International Stud­ ies, afl ower@miis.edu  C&RL NewsNovember 2004 / 617 mailto:ower@miis.edu http:www.nationalAgLawCenter.org mailto:frederik@vancouver.wsu.edu