o, my balls and my word!

At first use, I’m impressed and delighted by the World Digital Library, which had its official debut today. The information is simply organized and browseable by a variety of criteria (Place, Time, Topic, Type of Item, and Institution), the files are available to stream or view online or download in a variety of formats, and the content is from all shapes and sizes of institutions from around the globe.

A single complaint: when browsing large books or manuscripts with hundreds of pages, it is frustrating to plod along through the book, scrolling through seven pages at a time. The digital reader is quick and handsome and intuitive, but desperately needs the ability to jump to a page by typing in its number, particularly since the framework of the reader does not offer you a stable link to an individual page. (It’s true that most manuscripts and books are also offered as PDFs, but to be fully useful to all patrons, the digital reader on the WDL’s site should allow for skipping large numbers of pages.)

Just a few choice things I found today while digging:

• This photograph of piles of uncut diamonds taken by South African photographer F.H. Hancox.

• “The Fencing Lesson,” an ink and watercolor parody by Johann Gottfried Schadow that depicts a teeny Napoleon swording it up with Gerhard Leberecht von Blücher.

• Mary Sullivan, in her wavering voice, sings a song she wrote about how she left her beloved Texas as a dustbowl refugee, encountered a terrible flood in Colton, California, and finally settled in a Farm Security Administration camp set up by FDR. MP3 available at the site, a sampling of the heart-strangling lyrics below.

I left Texas one beautiful day
I made up my mind that I would not stay
No longer in Texas the place that I love
Though it was like giving up Heaven above.

[...]

I thought at first that I would not go
No further West than New Mexico
But the work it was scarce and the weather was bad
I felt like I’d left all the friends that I had.

We landed at Peori one sad, lonely day
No place for a shelter but a rag house to stay
I felt like Arizona was too much for me
I cried ‘til my heart ached and I scarcely could see.

Our next stop was California where the sun always shines
I know that is a saying but I’ll tell you my mind
In the little town of Colton hemmed up on a knoll
And the black water splashing ‘til the hearts had grown cold.

[...]

The black water rolled and the homeless were brought
To this little knoll at Colton for shelter they sought
The radios broadcastin’ begging people to stay
Off of the streets and off the highways.

The rain finally ceased and the sun shined out bright
How I prayed to Heaven and thanked God that night.
For our lives had been spared and all was made right
But I did wish for Texas and the old folks that night.

[...]

Now in the state of California I guess you all know
The President built homes for people to go
Who were homeless and broke and just travelin’ around
Tryin’ to find work and a place to settle down.

Now this little camp it stands here today
The little rag homes for people to stay
From there they find work and it really isn’t bad
Although it is different from the lives they have had.

• And finally, a few pages from From Tobol’sk to Obdorsk, a book of watercolors from the library of Tsar Nicholas II.

Have a peek at the wikipedia entry for all the information about this behemoth achievement.