The Chain Letters of Blogdom

I done been memed by Mentor Texts & More.

Is it called a meme because it's all about me me?

Curious.

Irregardless, there are rules to this sort of thing. Observe.

Each player lists 8 facts/habits about themselves. The rules of the game are posted at the beginning before those facts/habits are listed. At the end of the post, the player then tags 8 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

We are in a contrary mood today, however. I will do the tag, but I talk enough about myself as it is. Now you want to know more? 8 facts? I'm feeling dull at the moment, so I'll instead offer you 8 facts you might not know about my workplace, The Central Children's Room of New York Public Library instead.

1. We have Eric P. Kelly's Trumpeter of Krakow Newbery Medal. No, really! It's in a cute little green velvet case. I've shown it to people who were unaware that the Newbery was an actual honest-to-goodness medal medal. Well, it is, and this is what it looks like.


2. We have a bunch o' original paintings by N.C. Wyeth from an edition of Robin Hood he illustrated.


3. We have a couple cut paper scenes by Hans Christian Andersen. Andersen enjoyed cutting paper into complex little scenes which he would hand out for fun. We have two, I think.
   


4. We have a collection of letters sent to a little girl. As a child she would write to famous authors and illustrators and she saved all their responses. In her later years, these were donated to the Central Children's Room. One by L. Leslie Brooke (I still feel the Caldecott should have been named the Brooke Medal) is a lovely little creation involving unhappy balloons.


5. We have the real Mary Poppins umbrella. Author P.L. Travers donated it to the library. Yet another item Disney will never get its greedy paws on. HA!
   


6. We try to keep every single drawing done in this library by its illustrator. That means that we've a lot of great James Marshall and Jose Aruego pictures done long long ago on butcher paper.


7. We're currently about to digitize our entire collection pre-1923. Then it will be available for free online. We're also sending books off-site to a remote storage facility where they will be available only by request.


8. We've an original woodcut by Wanda Gag from her book Millions of Cats. It's quite lovely.
   

I'd meme 8 more people, but honestly I don't want anyone to feel obligated. If you think it would be fun, however, go wild.