Results tagged “chicagopubliclibrary”

Special to Chicagoist from Elizabeth Mikel

If you habitually return books late to the library like we do, you'll have to dig a little deeper into your pocket come January 1, 2009, when the Chicago Public Library is doubling its late fee, from 10 to 20 cents per day. The maximum fine -- provided the book is eventually returned -- is increasing from $5 to $10. Other large library systems in the country have already been charging a similar fee -- New York is 25 cents, and Los Angeles is 30 cents. (They read books out there?) Late fees brought in $1.6 million to the CPL in 2007, so if people don't starting pinching those extra dimes and circulation rates stay at their current highs, they may be looking at over $3 million next year.

Strapped for cash? Had to cancel the Netflix membership? The Chicago Public Library has added video to its Downloadable Media Catalog page. According to Library Director Mary Dempsey, any downloaded programs would be available for a three-week period after which they would delete themselves. The catalog features around 530 titles currently but looks to expand in the near future. This comes on the heels of yesterday's announcement that circulation at area libraries is up 28 percent. The bad news? Not even the library is immune from budget cuts: late fines are going to double and five employees are being laid off. In addition, 443 vacant full- and part-time positions are being eliminated, but there is no indication that library hours will be cut.

This Thursday, Harold Washington Library will participate in Jumpstart’s Read for the Record, an event aiming to break a world record for the largest shared reading experience by encouraging children across the country to read the same book with an adult on the same day. The official campaign book is children’s classic Corduroy, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year.

Thanks to the Sun-Times for putting together this great list of ways to save on tickets to local live theater. Harris Theater’s price reduction on tickets for the upcoming ballet is mentioned, as well as the fairly well-known daily drawing for front row seats at Wicked (we won once!) but otherwise it’s a pretty thorough list – recommending both general and theater-specific tactics to help you save money.

We just heard a car ran into the side of the Bucktown/Wicker Park branch of the Chicago Public Library. We're still waiting to hear what caused the crash, but we can confirm that no one was hurt and no copies of any Oprah's Book Club selections were damaged. [Trib]

Mayor Daley held a press conference today at the Harold Washington Library, and even though it's tough to hear the questions, it's fun listening to the answers. Evasive! He was on-hand to help drum up enthusiasm for the Chicago Public Library's newly enhanced technology.

Several years ago, we read Philip Gourevitch's powerful book on the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, We Wish To Inform You.... This led us to eventually pick up Samantha Power's brilliant A Problem From Hell: America in the Age of Genocide, winner of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction. Power's book is a riveting look at the United States' policies, approaches -- and more than occasional avoidance -- to genocide during the 20th Century, beginning with the Armenian Genocide during World War I and running through the Kosovo War of the late 1990's. With it, Power established herself as one of the leading experts and writers on U.S. Foreign Policy.

In news of the bored today, the Chicago Public Library finally updated their website. You know the one that was just white with a little bit of green and just linked to a bunch of PDFs? Now it's all pretty and red and green like, yeah, kind of like a Christmas tree, but the redesign is better organized and most exciting, has an entire section devoted to digital media with ebooks, audio books, and archival photos available.

We love to read and write, and not just our own posts here on the World Wide Webs. We’ve been working on our first novel for years. It’s a love story involving time-traveling unicorns and so far we have about 850 pages of it written, but we don’t know when we’ll get it published (fingers crossed!). As such, we have a soft spot in our heart for local writers who have been a tad more successful. Luckily we live in a city that gives us a chance to here these talented scribes read!

It was twenty years ago today that Mayor Harold Washington collapsed at his desk in City Hall. He died of a massive heart attack. In 1983, Washington surprised Chicago by winning the Democratic Primary for Mayor. He won with 36% of the vote, beating out incumbent Mayor Jane M. Byrne and Richard M. Daley. In the April 1983 general election, Washington received 52% of the vote to become Chicago’s first black mayor, trumping Bernard Epton...

The debate over the Chicago Children's Museum plan to relocate to Grant Park has escalated since Monday’s neighborhood meeting at Daley Bicentennial Plaza. There, museum officials introduced plans for a more sunken, environmentally friendly design adjacent to the Plaza. The Museum’s growth has been remarkable. Founded in 1982 in two Chicago Public Library hallways, it’s since moved three times, most recently to Navy Pier in 1995. Twelve years later, they’ve apparently outgrown that tourist magnet....

Here’s what you missed while you were sneezing and burning: Guest #18, your comments are hilarious, but how do you fare with a live audience? If you think you’ve got the chops, submit a 1-2 minute video to Time Out Chicago by September 20. Best entries will be screened online for their discerning website visitors. The top four will compete live for the chance to be crowned “Chicago’s Funniest Person.” (... at least according to...

Chicagoist got a blast from the past yesterday when our man in Dirksen, Patrick Fitzgerald, announced the indictment of former 10th Ward Alderman Fast Eddie Vrdolyak on charges of federal fraud and bribery in connection with an alleged scheme to collect kickbacks in exchange for the sale of choice Gold Coast property. The charges allege that Vrdolyak conspired with businessman Stuart Levine to defraud the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science of the full...

Chicagoist has a confession to make. We were not living directly in the city in 1992. Sacrilege, we know. Being the reluctant suburbanites we were, however, we couldn't help but hear about the flooding that went on in the Loop. Yes, Friday marked the 15-year anniversary of the colossal city cluster. Months before the disastrous date, construction workers rehabilitating the Kinzie Street bridge unknowingly placed some wooden pilings atop an abandoned tunnel and drove them...

Chicagoist really has no idea if these public meetings that are supposed to be to hear community thoughts/suggestions/comments/feedback really are that. Or if they're just legal due diligence, or if they're just so people feel that they had a chance to express themselves, or what. We still plan on going to the last meeting* about the three-track-were-you-smoking-crack sitch in the hopes that we can say something about it, but we're not really sure what it...

The Chicago Cultural Center is one of those magnificent hives of activity that's so accessible that it's far too easy to take for granted. It's right there on Michigan Avenue, and impossible not to see; yet we often just rush right past it without giving it a thought. Well, we want to change that, especially after seeing the breathtaking Tiffany dome recently. Tonight at 7 p.m. the Cultural Center hosts an event sponsored by...

It’s that time of year -- leaves are falling, radiators are clunking, and the Chicago Humanities Festival is raring to go. We love the fest, we really do. Chicagoist even worked for them for a few years. We don't want to look in gift horses' mouths, but we can't help wishing they would un-stuffy it up a little bit. Maybe book some more fun guests and authors. (Neil Gaiman sold out in minutes a few...

We love the library. We can hardly believe this idea exists. Don't have THIRTY dollars to spend on a book you'll read in a day and a half? You can just go and check it out of the library, read it, and give it back. Ever since we were kids, we have been checking out piles of books, reading them quick, and getting more. There's something about getting lost in a book that we've never...

Chicagoist hopes you’re busy celebrating Labor Day the way most folks do: by sitting around on your fat ass and drinking some beer (BBQ called on account of rain). Admit it: you deserve a break. Even though Federal, state, city and county offices will be closed along with banks and the post office, many people are spending the day working in our fair city, so it’s only right that we take a brief look at...

Book burning, gay bashing, kicking a homeless woman out of a library for freeloading public resources? It sounds like the Holy Trinity of turn-ons in one of Rush Limbaugh's wet dreams, minus maybe a pharmacist handing out endless prescriptions to Oxycontin. But it turns out a fire at the John M. Merlo branch of the Chicago Public Library on 644 W. Belmont back in June was a little more pedestrian. Erica Graham, a 21-year-old homeless...

"[We’re] reminding the kids that there is another way of life, that you don't have to be Britney Spears. Trying to get 16-year-old girls to pick up guitars instead of hot pants. Or guitars and hot pants." The source of that quote is Justine Frischmann, lead singer of the punk rock band Elastica (ask your older brother about them; then ask your cool uncle to tell you about Wire). One could argue whether Elastica was...

We love to see people on the El all reading the same book. It’s a great conversation starter and it’s even more fun when it’s part of the Chicago Public Library’s One Book, One Chicago program. On February 15, CPL announced the tenth book in the program, "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. What’s extra cool about this pick is that we will partner up with readers in our sister...

James Frey discovered the glare of the Oprah’s Book Club spotlight isn’t always wine and roses. But Elie Wiesel and his haunting memoir Night, which Oprah selected for the next Book Club reading, isn’t likely to see the same fate. Wiesel's chilling account of life in a Nazi concentration camp and subsequent aftermath has stood up to 50 years of scrutiny. And anyone who suggests the Nobel Peace Prize winner embellished his story risks becoming...

Chicago’s cinematic history is being preserved in all sorts of ways this week. Steve James’s Hoop Dreams, the story of two Chicago high school basketball players, is now part of the National Film Registry, a list of films that have “cultural, historical or aesthetic significance.” Every year, the Library of Congress adds twenty-five films to its National Film Registry from a list of films nominated by the public (click here to send your recommendations for...

Facing Jury Duty

The Chicago Public Library yesterday announced the 9th selection for One Book, One Chicago: Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. We admit to feeling a thrill when we heard the news--an excuse not only to reread Pride and Prejudice, but to watch the positively dreamy Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy in the epic A&E movie adaptation. And again in Bridget Jones's Diary. Swoon.

How Do You Say "Chicago"?

Focus on Uptown Library

If you like holiday celebrations but can do without your neighbors’ steady stream of homemade firecrackers, head up to Ravinia this Saturday to celebrate “Don Quixote Day.” Professor Anne Cruz of the University of Miami will be on hand to discuss Cervantes’ seminal novel followed by a discussion of Richard Strauss’ own Don Quixote, the focus of Ravinia’s “One Score, One Chicago” initiative. That night, Chicago favorite bass-baritone Samuel Ramey returns to Highland Park for...