Free zine picked up from a Nashville record shop: Jackie Shane, 1940-2019, #4 in the Nashville Queer History mini zine series.

In Nashville & got to take a tour at Hatch Show Print, which has designed & printed letterpress posters for music shows & other events since 1879.

📚 Academic Freedom: A Brief History📚 Check out this awesome event featuring Joan Wallach Scott and Alex Gourevitch, organized by AAUP - Brown! November 17, 7:30pm ET over Zoom Register via QR code in graphic @aaupbrownchapter.bsky.social

Amelia Acker: "Each chapter introduces data archiving processes that relate to the evolution of data sovereignty...: from magnetic tape + timesharing computer models from the 1950s,... to file structures + virtual containers in cloud-based information services over the past 40 yrs" — open access!

Chicago Public Library's budget cuts would mean losing HALF of the materials budget. It would mean losing 90 staff members. Cop budget's fine, though.

This is such an interesting article on the importance of Stephen Duncombe's Zines: Notes from Underground to zine history & scholarship: f5archive.org/duncombe/.

Highlight of this week: a new donation of more than 150 advertising cookbooks, mostly from the early and mid-twentieth century, largely in absolutely amazing condition 😍

My colleague Madison Good will be giving a virtual talk about artist Margaret Armstrong & the books we have designed by her on Wednesday. Details & registration: library.osu.edu/events/the-b...

Here's an important way to make a difference: become a public library board member! Get training and support from Libraries for the People. Library workers--get a friend or community member to sign up. 📚 docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Emily Dickinson’s Herbarium: A Beautiful Digital Edition of the Poet’s Pressed Plants & Flowers Is Now Online

Had the Star Trek original series scripts (SPEC.RARE.CMS.0017) out for a couple events recently & loved learning from a theatre grad student that the different colored pages indicate the additions / changes to a script.

Looking through Bela Koe-Krompecher's weekly planners in the Anyway Records collection (SPEC.RARE.0336) & came across this note he made about which zines were featured (Ben Is Dead, Bunnyhop, etc.) in the Columbus stop of the Kill Zinesters tour in July 1996.

!!! Interview at: f5archive.org/held/

Thrift store find in Athens, Ohio:

If your Monday night-in is looking a little dry, listen to me and my fantastic friend and colleague Barrye <3 luma.com/cyxih6zu

Interview with John R. Davis about his new book, Keep Your Ear to the Ground: A History of Punk Fanzines in Washington, DC: newbooksnetwork.com/keep-your-ea....

Somehow wasn't aware of the amount of college radio material on the Internet Archive until reading this post: blog.archive.org/2025/10/03/h.... Excited to see the related zines, but the flyers & playlists are so fun to look through, too.

repost this if an editor has ever saved you from yourself

If you happen to be in Columbus & would like to see sci-fi fanzines, pulp magazines, UFOlogy reports & publications, Star Trek scripts, etc. later this month! library.osu.edu/events/out-o....

"As punk received little mainstream media coverage by journalists who understood its nuances, the most comprehensive print record of its past is not made up of newspapers or magazines, but zines." contingentmagazine.org/2025/10/07/y...

Some highlights of a new cookbook donation that came in today:

Great news! JSTOR now have a free account with an Independent Researcher category. You can access 100 documents per month www.jstor.org/action/showL...

The new issue of Billy McCall's Behind the Zines is so good & focuses on the (I think) endlessly fascinating topic of zine distribution. (Available on Etsy, if you want to get yourself a copy.)

Just realized that my article on zine distros came out a year ago this month! It looks like there's still free access to it via this link: www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10....

First edition of Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles (1951) includes an author bio on the back cover that notes, "He wrote his first book at the age of 12 -- a sequel to an Edgar Rice Burroughs book, written because he could not afford to buy the next volume in the series."

Thanks to @finebooks.bsky.social for picking up the story of this year's winners! #bookcollecting #bookcollector #bookcollection www.finebooksmagazine.com/fine-books-n...

Pages from the 1975 dream diary of William S. Burroughs, from the William S. Burroughs Papers (SPEC.CMS.40).

Printed copies of my new zine are now for sale in the continental US, $10 per copy including shipping. For ordering info, visit robinderosa.net/printed-copi... #HigherEd

I’ve been making zines for about 45(!) years, and the longer I do it the more incredible I think it is that so many people have done so much essential work just by realizing that there’s no one to stop them from using the means of production for themselves and their communities.

Columbus folks: the new season of Aldus Society events starts in a couple of weeks w/ short talks on book history by OSU English PhDs. Bookish events every month at the Thurber Center, free & open at all. Super proud of helping put this lineup together: aldussociety.com

"Collective publishers are distinct from cooperatives, often more motivated by ideological ideals than by increasing the bottom line." - featuring the Publishers Cooperative, FC2, Ugly Duckling Presse, City Works Press, AK Press

Just discovered & looking forward to reading Duplicate, Copy, Print: Towards a Material History of the Zine by Peter Willis: works.hcommons.org/records/e767...

Reading the Memoirs of Elleanor Eldridge (1838) which is a serious, curious work about the life of a financially successful Black & Native American woman in early America who has property stolen from her. But also, I laughed so hard at this passage:

"Queer Book History" zine is done (32 pages!), just getting final team edits pre-pub. Built on upcoming @sharpnews.bsky.social Queer Book History Bibliography—100s of resources by team led by SHARP Bibliographer @bibliowingate.bsky.social. Zine=fave reads, teaching examples, community+conf info +

Have been thinking about this fascinating discrepancy lately: when zines come up w/ people my age-ish or older, they often say, "Oh, they still exist?" Whereas students don't have that frame of reference, it's more just: of course zines exist.

Looked at recently & still thinking about this guest book for the library at the Topaz Internment Camp. Part of the poet & librarian Toyo Suyemoto's papers (who helped manage the Topaz library).

Went to a book swap, got a DVD 🙃

I bought a hard copy of @halperta.bsky.social's "Finding Your Purpose" higher ed workbook zine a few years ago -- Regularly return to it & highly recommend it. A link to a PDF version is below.

New reviews up at SHARP News! Topics include Belle da Costa Greene, romance fiction & self-publishing, information collecting & organization in Early Modern Spain, contemporary book design, pamphlets in the 17th c. Ottoman Empire, & the boundaries of book history: sharpweb.org/sharpnews/

Question for other special collections & archives folks: do you ever take materials offsite, & if so, when & why? Curious to know how common this is; there doesn't seem to be much out there on the topic.

Newsletters created by a boy in the mid 1950s writing to a friend back in New York after he moved to Florida. News is about daily life, with stories like, "Charles and Billy went for a swim in the St. Petersburg Beach today and tried out Billy's new snorkel."

Finally got to visit @leviathanbookstore.bsky.social in St. Louis. Such an amazing selection. Bought a book I’d never heard of before but am excited to read, which is exactly what I hope for from an independent bookstore.

On the way back through Columbia, visited the State Historical Society of Missouri's absolutely fantastic exhibit "Mail Carrier With a Camera" featuring mid-century photographs of rural Missouri by Burford Royston. A couple of my favorites are below, many more at: digital.shsmo.org/digital/coll....

Hi everyone, As part of my dissertation, I am researching audiobook narration. If you have listened to an audiobook within the last two years, or have previously been a frequent audiobook user, I would really appreciate your thoughts! You can find the survey here: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Early Closure of House Leaves IMLS Future Hanging; What This Means & What You Can Do (7-29-2025) 📚 bookriot.com/imls-funding...

Reading lists of Columbus resident Dan Pelzer from 1962 to his passing this year: what-dan-read.com.

So impressed by / jealous of the Kansas City Public Library. Visited the central branch today which has a rooftop terrace, a movie theater in an old bank vault that shows free movies daily, & a zine-making space with some free zines to take.

Also visited the university's Museum of Art and Archaeology. Wasn't familiar with Claude Hirst but was excited to learn about this American artist who specialized in still-life paintings featuring books. The one below is of Isaac Bickerstaff's Lionel and Clarissa, with remarks by Elizabeth Inchbald.

Passed through Columbia, MO yesterday & stopped to see the University of Missouri's library which includes a somewhat amazing cast gallery (!) on the second floor: library.missouri.edu/inthelibrary....

Visited the Ohio State Fair a couple of days ago & am still thinking about the wild injustice of the book-inspired floral arrangement competition in which the Catcher in the Rye entry (a mitt & bunch of rye???) received 2nd place & the adorable Very Hungry Caterpillar entry didn't place at all.