Tag: reference resources

San Francisco Historical Street Names Index [Updated]Sticky

I have recently migrated the San Francisco Historical Street Names Index away from Google Fusion Tables since the index, at the moment, lacks a spatial component. The data, however, is still available online as an interactive index through a simple Google Spreadsheet view. The spreadsheet allows users to filter, sort, and view the historical data in a much simpler and…

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Back in the library…in southern California!

Beginning March 30, 2015 I will be starting a new position as the Map Curator in the Department of Geography at California State University, Northridge (CSUN). As Map Curator I will be responsible for managing a collection of historical maps, atlases, photographs, and reference materials related to maps, cartography, and geographic information systems. As part of my responsibilities, I will…

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Index of Old San Francisco Street Names

You can now find an online index of San Francisco’s historical street names. The index contains a list of street names that have been altered over the years, as well as street names that have simply been lost due to changes in the city’s built environment. The reference tool is available to anyone online (scholars, amateur historians, etc.) and includes…

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Using Google Tools to Improve Findability and Access to UCLA’s Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps

UCLA’s Young Research Library maintains a great collection of Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps of the metropolitan Los Angeles area, including Venice, San Pedro, Culver City, and North Hollywood. From about the 1870s until the 1970s, the Sanborn Company was one of a few companies that specialized in producing fire insurance maps for the purpose of assessing fire risk and helping…

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Map neatlines

The neatline on a map is: “A border drawn around a map to enclose the legend, scale, title, geographic features, and any other information pertinent to the map, often showing tick marks that indicate intervals of distance. On a standard quadrangle map, the neatlines are the meridians and parallels delimiting the quadrangle.” Citation The ERSI Press dictionary of GIS terminology…

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Challenging Reference Question: Searching Hansards and British Parliamentary Papers

Here was a challenging reference question I received at the Young Research Library reference desk that was ultimately solved by a couple of my colleagues. A patron was looking for a transcript of a debate that took place in the British Parliament in 1937 about, as the patron asked, whether any black representatives would be able to (allowed to?) attend…

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From the Reference Desk: The First Martini

The martini was first mentioned in O.H. Byron’s The Modern Bartender’s Guide, published in New York in 1884. A martini is a cocktail made of gin or vodka and vermouth, with a dash of bitters. The origin of the name is in dispute. Byron called the drink a “Martinez” and described it as a Manhattan (a whiskey cocktail sweetened with…

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