From the Announcement:

Finding relevant literature on a specific African topic or country - this is possible with the “internet library sub-saharan Africa” (ilissAfrica), which is now online and accessible to everyone. Users can search for books, anthologies, journal articles and Internet resources…They are then led directly to the corresponding website or shown at which library the book or journal article can be found. The portal is a joint project of the University Library in Frankfurt and the GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies in Hamburg. Both institutions were made responsible for the Special Collections for Africa South of the Sahara by the German Research Foundation (DFG) in the 1960s and hence have the largest collections of Africa-related literature in Germany today.

The ilissAfrica portal offers its services in three languages: German, English, and French.

Direct to ilissAfrica Portal (in English)

Source: University Library in Frankfurt and the GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies

From an E-Mail Announcement:

The Library of Congress has recently launched a series of “topic guides” to the newspapers included in Chronicling America (http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ ). Each topic guide (e.g., Baseball’s Modern World Series, Ellis Island, or the Russo-Japanese War) includes subject-specific terms (including name usage, historical language, unusual spellings, etc.) and dates that can be readily used to search this topic in Chronicling America, as well as a list of sample articles found in Chronicling America. These topic guides are presented by the Library’s Newspaper and Current Periodicals Reading Room. More topics will be added over time as the Chronicling America site continues to make new mat

Direct to Topic Guides

Source: LC

See Also: Milestones: Library of Congress, National Endowment for the Humanities Celebrate Millionth Page in Chronicling America Program

From the Article:

Northwestern University has put online more than 7,000 rare photographs of East Africa that document the European colonization of the area from 1860 through 1960.

The images made available to the public today in the Humphrey Winterton Collection of East African Photographs were purchased by the university in 2002 for an undisclosed price.

Direct to Humphrey Winterton Collection

Source: Wired Campus

From a News Release:

You can now quickly hone your research results list to the documents you need and then share them via social networking sites using the new features at WorldWideScience.org. This free online science gateway to global databases now offers clustering of results by publication and author, as well as by topic and date. This enhancement allows you to quickly narrow a results list from the databases of approximately 60 countries to the research you are seeking.

Using a quick share tool, you can add your results to social networking sites to discuss and share with friends and colleagues. In addition, you can easily bookmark your search topic as well as set up weekly alerts.

WorldWideScience.org has been upgraded for increased speed and improved relevance ranking. WorldWideScience.org searches more than 375 million pages of research information in real time via a single query. Advanced search options are available.

Direct to WorldWideScience.org

Source: Office of Science and Technical Information, US Dept. of Energy

From the Announcement:

The Federal Election Commission has launched the final phase of a project to make its full archive of closed enforcement matters, called Matters Under Review, or MURs, available online. This will result in approximately 4,000 closed MURs – consisting of approximately 770,000 pages of documents covering the 24-year period from the inception of the Agency to 1999 – being accessible in digital form on the FEC web site. Upon completion, this project will be the largest expansion of the digitization of enforcement matters in the history of the Agency.

Documents related to all investigations closed January 1, 1999 or later are already available on the FEC web site.

Direct to Federal Enforcement Query System

Source: Federal Election Commission

It appears that the BL science page has had a makeover. You can review the new page here.

From the Web Page:

The British Library’s collection of scientific, technical and medical information is one of the world’s foremost resources, providing researchers with access to a vast array of content.

These science pages will help you find the information you need and discover the range of services and activities that we provide.

Source: British Library

Wow! This is one to bookmark and explore! Over 250 projects, grouped by state, and by topic are listed. ResouceShelf plans to start monitoring some of these sites for new content.

Direct to Compilation

This list contains over 250 libraries and archives that focus mainly on localized, regional, and U.S. history, but it also includes larger collections, eText and eBook repositories, and a short list of directories to help you continue your research efforts.

The sites listed here are mainly open access, which means that the digital formats are viewable and usable by the general public. So, such sites as the Connecticut Digital Library (iCONN) are not listed, as they operate on the premise that the user has a Connecticut library card in his or her possession.

Efforts were made to go to the root source for these collections. In other words, if you’re seeking the American Memory Project, which was created and housed at the Library of Congress, then you’ll find the link for the Library of Congress rather than the link for American Memory (although we included that link in the description of the Library of Congress listing). The root sources, in most cases, will lead you to collections that are too numerous to list here. In fact, it would be impossible to list all sources and we know we may have missed some favorites.

Source: OEDB.com

A impressive free resource for health info the UK.

From an E-Mail Note:

The Health Management Specialist Collection is a free, web-based library of high quality information resources. It is aimed at all healthcare professionals with a management role or interest. The site has a growing number of subject-based RSS feeds and regularly updated information on hot topics such as commissioning, patient safety and service provision. A free, twice-weekly alert service comprising of links and short summaries of the key documents published that week from national healthcare organisations is also produced. If you wish to sign up for the news alert, please e-mail hmsc@kingsfund.org.uk. The resource does not require any registration and is managed by a dedicated information specialist.

Source: NHS Evidence Health Information Resources website (formerly the National Library for Health)

From a Blog Post:

1) Updates to Advanced Search

Advanced Search has been streamlined and updated in anticipation of the single-search access to your library’s OCLC eContent on WorldCat.org, coming this summer. There are now three dropdown boxes that contain index choices such as OCLC number (also called Accession Number), Author, ISBN, ISSN, Keyword, Title and Subject.

2) Privacy settings now easier to spot

…now it’s even easier to tell at a glance which items you’ve marked as public or private. Individual items such as favorite libraries, lists and saved searches are now marked with a red circle to indicate private, or a blue parentheses for public. Make any privacy updates from your profile page by clicking on each area’s summary section header.

Source: Worldcat Blog

First, a bit about the database from the Alexander St. Press Web Site:

Produced in partnership with Arcadia Publishing, Local and Regional History Online: A History of American Life in Images and Texts includes more than 150,000 images—it will continue to grow to include thousands of Arcadia volumes and more than one million photographs and other primary materials. Each Arcadia book tells a small piece of American history, but when searched together, the collection becomes a massive and powerful primary-source research tool for academic libraries, and a great way to bring local history and genealogical information into the public library.

To Access the Database Simply Enter:

Username: reviewer
Password: 69preventative2

in the appropriate boxes.

This trial is through July 31, 2009.

Thanks to Alexander Street Press for making it available.

From a OSTI Posting:

Librarians were provided opportunities to test drive efficient ways to share DOE, federal agency, and global research information at two SLA Conference booths supported by OSTI June 13-17. OSTI exhibited the DOE Science Accelerator, a science information portal that provides single-query search of 10 DOE databases. Also at this booth, OSTI showcased its MARC records capability, which allows records of DOE technical report literature to be downloaded in a format suitable for library catalogues everywhere, expanding access to a variety of scientific research. OSTI also planned and helped staff a Science.gov exhibit in coordination with CENDI, the interagency group of senior information managers. The exhibit provided live demonstrations of the Science.gov search engine as well as WorldWideScience.org, the global science gateway. The search engines are maintained and hosted at OSTI.

Source: Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI), U.S. Dept. of Energy

A news item today from the U.S. Census is about how the world’s aging population (65 and over) will double by 2050.

Where do these stats come from? They arrive via the U.S. Census International Statistical Database that’s free to access and search.

It’s a very useful resource that offers tons of both current, historical, and projected stats for most countries around the globe. You’ll find:

+ Country Rankings

Largest countries for any year, 1950 to 2050.

+ World Population Information

Global population trends, links to historical population estimates, population clocks, and estimates of population, births, and deaths occurring each year, day, hour, or second.

You’ll also find access to tabular data for countries and regions as well as demographic indicators, population pyramids and source information for countries.

Well worth a look and bookmark (or whatever you use to save and share useful web tools).

Direct to U.S. Census International Database

Source: U.S. Census

This is a “Best of ResourceShelf” posting.

Nozasearch is a massive database–over 41 million records–offers both free and fee-based access.

The free service (registration required) allows you to search information (by name or by cause) on nearly 1.3 million charitable foundations. The fee-based portion of the service provides records on over 40 million charitable donations by people and companies. A 24 hour free trial to the fee-based side of the database is also available.

Results are available in either list form or as a .XLS spreadsheet.

+ Direct to Nozasearch

+ Direct to Noza Blog

See Also: Nozasearch offers (free) a searchable database (Beta) of Form 990-PF (private foundation) tax returns (about 800,000 records).

Source: Noza Search

From the OED Web Site:

In our archive section, you can now read the prefaces to the original fascicles in which the OED was issued between 1884 and 1928. This material, long unavailable, will be of great interest to scholars and dictionary enthusiasts.

Direct to Archive Section

Source: Oxford English Dictionary

From an Announcement:

The complete 1911 census records for people living in England, Wales, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are now online at 1911census.co.uk, including full details of British Army personnel and their families stationed overseas.

On completion of the project, Debra Chatfield, Marketing Manager at findmypast.com which has developed the 1911census.co.uk website service in association with The National Archives, said: ‘We’re delighted that the final records have been uploaded from the 1911 census including the military records and the records for Wales, the Isle of Man and Channel Islands. We hope many generations will gain a huge amount of valuable information about their ancestors by consulting the records and that they’ll discover new chapters of their family history that they previously knew very little or nothing about.’

Source: National Archives (UK)