dec04d.indd


G r a n t s  a n d  A c q u i s i t i o n s  Ann-Christe Galloway 

The Rhode Island Historical Society 
(RIHS) will begin development of an OPAC 
to encompass its varied library and museum 
collections thanks to a $75,000 Museums for 
America grant from the Institute of Museum 
and Library Services (IMLS). The database 
is scheduled to launch in September 2005 
and will be available via both the RIHS Web 
site (www.rihs.org) and public computer 
terminals at the RIHS Library in Providence. 
The three­year grant will help fund a pilot 
program called the Rhode Island Family 
Heritage Project. The first year will be used 
to select and install database and processing 
software. The following two years will be 
devoted to identifying, cataloging, and enter­
ing data on materials that relate to families 
in Rhode Island. 

The Simmons College Graduate School 
of Library and Information Science has been 
awarded more than $2 million in grants for 
several projects, including an international 
study on image retrieval and management, 
a collaboration among three of the nation’s 
top library schools to increase the number 
of high­level academic library professionals 
in the field, and an effort to train university 
librarians from the Eastern European nation 
of Kosovo on modern library policies and 
procedures. 

Syracuse University (SU) has received a 
two­year $713,492 IMLS grant to develop a 
cost­effective, collaborative distance edu­
cation program that will increase quality, 
access, and diversity of online educational 
opportunities. The program, known as the 
Web­based Information Science Education 
consortium, is a joint effort between SU, the 
University of Illinois at Urbana­Champaign 
and the University of Washington. Its focus 
is on developing faculty training for online 
pedagogy, standards and metrics for online 
library and information science (LIS) educa­
tion, and a collaborative marketplace for 
online LIS courses. 

A c q u i s i t i o n s  

A collection of 3,000 playbills from Ernest 
Albrecht, editor and publisher of SPECTACLE 
magazine, a periodical devoted to the new 
age circus, has been donated to the Circus 
and Allied Arts Collection at Illinois State 
University’s Milner Library. While the major 
emphasis of the collection is on the circus, 
the collection also includes related arts such 
as carnivals, carousels, conjuring, music 
halls, and vaudeville. The collection’s book 
holdings of more than 6,000 volumes makes 
it among the most comprehensive and in­
depth circus and allied arts book collections 
anywhere. In addition to book items, the 
Circus and Allied Arts Collection includes 
photographs, circus posters, programs, route 
books, correspondence, business records, 
band scores, videotapes, audiotapes, and 
realia. 

Don Tosti, the “Godfather of Latino 
rhythm and blues,” donated his musical ar­
chives and an endowment to the University 
of California­Santa Barbara (UCSB). Tosti 
was a musician, composer, band and or­
chestra leader whose career spanned several 
decades. In 1948, Tosti’s “Pachuco Boogie” 
sold a million records and opened a new 
chapter in American music by pioneering 
the subgenre of post­war Mexican American 
jump blues. Prior to his death earlier this year, 
he donated the Tosti papers to UCSB, which 
include historical documents, sheet music 
and lyrics, music recordings, photographs, 
broadsides, correspondence, scrapbooks, 
and ephemera.

Ed. note: Send your news to: Grants & Acquisitions, C&RL 
News, 50 E. Huron St., Chicago, IL 60611-2795; e-mail: 
agalloway@ala.org. 

722 / C&RL NewsDecember 2004 

mailto:agalloway@ala.org
http:www.rihs.org