Executive Board 2 and General Membership Meeting

ALA Annual 1999

New Orleans, LA

Attendance: David Allen (chair), Steve Rogers, Scott McEathron, Joseph Winkler, Alice Hudson, Karl Longstreth, Barbara Story, Elizabeth Mangan, Mary Larsgaard, Dan Seldin, Mark Thomas, Katherine Rankin, Chris Kollen, Susan Moore, Mary McInroy, Donna Koepp, SueAnn Lewandowski, Paul Stout, John Stevenson, Barbara Rapoport

Officer's reports

Chair's report - David Allen

Report from the Round Table Coordinating Committee

There was a report from the Budget Administration and Review Committee. There was a rumor in the RTCC that there was an ALA credit card that could be used for charging meeting expenses. David Allen had made inquiries about the existence of the card and apparently one does not exist. There is a procedure that would allow ALA to pay for some expenses directly, which may be of interest to future chairs. It was asked whether the Round Tables received interest for money ALA is holding for the Round Tables. The answer is no. However, endowments can be set up with a minimum of $5000 in the fund and the money is put aside for a number of years and interest is earned on the endowment which can be used by the group. This may be an area to be explored.

The Coordinating Committee for the 2001 conference is well underway. There is no representation on this committee from MAGERT. More information will be coming out on the mail list for Vice Chairs/Chairs Elect, Chairs, and Past Chair as well as information that will probably be shared at Midwinter. There will be opportunities to talk with people on the Coordinating Committee. One member of the committee is Judy Card who is the representative for the Round Tables. The Round Table Councilor is Bob Doyle. There will be a meeting at Midwinter between Mr. Doyle and all the chairs and chairs-elect of the Round Tables he will be representing. Chris Kollen asked if she would be added to the mail list automatically or if she needed to contact someone at ALA. Joe Winkler replied that she should be added at the end of the Annual Meeting.

Mailing lists were also discussed at the RTCC. One of the ALA liaisons said that you could specify the information you want and the order you want them in and ALA will run the list for $30. It was suggested that waiting until after the new automated system is in place. Joe Winkler will try to get a list. Later, it was stated that what people should be asking for is a roster.

Another topic discussed was placing the Round Table web pages on the ALA server. There are apparently several different reports floating around. The report distributed at the Round Table Coordinating Committee seemed favorable. However, there are some things we might want to do that if not taken care of at this stage may cause problems down the line. For example, portions of our web pages are located at various sites around the country and we may wish to continue to do that. There was a statement at RTCC that participation in placing the web pages on the ALA server would be strongly encouraged but not required. David urged that the Round Tables support that statement.

Chair-Elect - Joe Winkler

No report at this time.

Past Chair - Karl Longstreth

Karl Longstreth made an appeal for people to be thinking of candidates for the upcoming election as well as nominees for the Honors Award. He also thanked the board for their work during his tenure.

Secretary - Susan Moore

One question that had come up a couple of times is the disposition of the sign-up sheets. The plan is that copies can be sent to the chairs and the originals will be sent to the Chair.

Treasurer - Steve Rogers

This is an interim report. Through the end of March of this year, MAGERT's total revenues for the current fiscal year were $6,800 and total expenses were roughly $5,900. Our expenses in large part were due to the cost of printing and distributing base line and Meridian issue #14 during this time period.

Again this year we have a large carryover balance of $17,199. (But note that five months of the fiscal year still remain.) In general, MAGERT's finances are in accord with its budget for this fiscal year.

Steve attended the ALA Planning and Budget Assembly meeting on Friday afternoon. At that meeting, ALA shared the phases for the implementation of the new system (AMS), which will allow the ALA web site to be more responsive to the membership. Phase I took effect in March, Phase II is to take effect in September (which will allow people to join ALA through the web site and access your individual membership information and make updates in real time), and Phase III will take effect at the end of 1999 and will allow the membership to vote over the web.

Committee reports

Cataloging and Classification - Barbara Story

There were sixteen people in attendance. The meeting began with a question from the chair as to whether those committee members whose two-year terms were ending would like to serve another term. Four of the five members were present and agreed to continue. Those members are Jo Davidson, Lucinda Hall, Barbara Rapoport, and Dan Seldin. The committee also has two new members. They are Dorothy McGarry and Betsy Eggleston, who is from Harvard University.

The committee then heard reports from Susan Moore on MARBI, Elizabeth Mangan on CC:DA, Barbara Story reporting for Ellen Caplan from OCLC, Barbara Story reporting for the Library of Congress, and Barbara Story reporting for Mary Larsgaard on AACCCM.

Elizabeth Mangan stated she had recently received a draft revision of ISBD(CM). Ms. Mangan asked if others were interested in reviewing the document. This revision has not been seen by the body in IFLA that oversees revisions of the ISBDs. Dan Seldin gave the web address for the document. Comments should be sent to Elizabeth Mangan or John Byrum. Comments are due in August, 1999.

Barbara Story announced that there will be a pilot test of the Library of Congress classification web interface. The pilot is expected to begin early in 2000 and will last 2-3 months. The pilot will include the G schedule. If anyone is interested in participating in the pilot, please contact Cheryl Cook (ccoo@loc.gov).

Constitution and Bylaws - David Allen for Margaret Brill

Margaret Brill has agreed to continue as Chair through Midwinter to finish up the revisions of the Education Committee charge and the procedures for nomination for the MAGERT candidate for ALA Councilor for the twelve small round tables. The change to the charge of the Education Committee will largely be to de-emphasize the extent to which the Education Committee is involved in developing curriculum for library schools and change the membership guidelines to reduce the number of the liaisons. Instead, there would be more of an emphasis on continuing education and outreach with a programming component.

Education - T. Wangyal Shawa

Present: T. Wangyal Shawa, Scott R. McEathron, Patrick McGlamery, Peter Linberger, Chris Kollen, Marina Oliver, Joseph Winkler, David Allen.

The meeting largely concentrated on the purpose of the Education Committee.

Before we discussed the purpose of the Education Committee, Peter Linberger suggested that we should find out about the possibility of putting the appendix section of the committee's article, recently published on ERIC document, onto the Education Committee's web site.

Joseph Winkler expressed that the purpose of the Education Committee is to provide continuing education on map librarianship, such as distribution of programs offered by MAGERT on various levels connected with cartography and geography. Expert level program training should involve GIS and electronic mapping issues.

Patrick McGlamery agreed that our main purpose is to provide continuing education. This can be achieved through developing packaged training curricula for map librarianship, such as map cataloging, and map and GIS librarianship. He also suggested that we could create map librarianship tutorials online or on CD-ROM.

David Allen suggested that our purpose should be defined broadly. He said that continuing education could be provided through the MAGERT web page, publication and other means.

Wangyal Shawa expressed that one of the purposes of the Education Committee should be to offer workshops on various issues of map and GIS librarianship such as map cataloging, managing and accessing geospatial data etc. on a regular basis in different regions in the United States, because the majority of map librarians or map cataloguers or GIS librarians have accidentally landed in their positions without a good understanding of cartography, geography and GIS. The workshops would provide an opportunity to those librarians who want to learn more about map and GIS related issues in libraries. Another suggestion was to interview map and GIS librarians about how they manage their collections and publish the results either on the MAGERT web page or in a separate publication. This information could become a good resource for map and GIS librarians.

Marina Oliver said she is one of the librarians who were given the responsibility to run the map and GIS service in her library. She is new to maps and GIS, and learning how to provide these services. She said the problem with map librarians is that there is nobody to help or mentor when they start a map librarian's job, unlike other library services such as reference librarian. She came to the meeting to see what sort of help she can get from MAGERT.

Joe Winkler said we are the most congenial group and she should feel free to contact us for any help. David Allen suggested that we create a list of resource people to help with various map and GIS librarianship related questions, and put them on the MAGERT web page.

Patrick McGlamery raised the issue of creating FAQ in the MAGERT web page. Chris Kollen said that if we create FAQ, we should archive them for future use. This issue will be discussed further with David Allen, who hosts the MAGERT web page.

Scott McEathron suggested the idea of a mentoring program for a new map or GIS librarian for one or two years. He also expressed concern about the issue of interviewing map librarians and publishing results because "Cartographic Perspectives" publishes a profile of the map libraries, and we should be careful not to duplicate their work.

Wangyal Shawa decided to write the purposes of the Education Committee and share it with the committee members and then submit it to the Constitution and Bylaws Committee.

At the General Membership meeting, Barbara Rapoport stated MAPS-L is certainly a good resource. David Allen suggested that we may want to put more mention of MAPS-L on the web page. Elizabeth Mangan suggested that another avenue the Education Committee might want to pursue is improving geographic literacy and GIS literacy, perhaps by coming up with ideas that map libraries and ALA MAGERT members could do in conjunction with National Geography Week or GIS Day.

GeoTech - David Allen for Pat McGlamery

GeoTech does want to sponsor a program in Chicago on the acquisition of GIS data with several topics being covered. Possibilities for inclusion are a basic section on what's out there for free on the web, sources for foreign data, how to evaluate the quality of GIS data, how to convert data from one form to another, where to get historical data, and consortial acquisition.

Honors and Awards

No report.

Membership - Joe Winkler

Since we have received no reports from ALA, Joe Winkler is assuming a steady membership count at around 375. Mary McInroy will be the new Chair. One committee member is interested in doing welcome notices. Mary is also interested in getting the lists of those who attended the programs. The committee also wants to resume sending the names of new members to be published in base line. There was some discussion of the "New Member Breakfast" that used to be held and perhaps there could be a vendor-sponsored small party for new members. Joe Winkler will examine the schedules to see what can be done to ease conflicts. Some consideration may also be given to move the General Membership meeting from late Tuesday afternoon. The problem with that would be that there could not be reports from meetings that hadn't occurred.

Nominating

No report.

Program - Joe Winkler

The committee plans to try to have a balance between "beginner" level and "expert" level programming. There appears to be a need for programs on acquisitions and cataloging and bibliographic control. Since GeoTech is interested in doing a program on acquisitions, the Program Committee will look for a second program in the cataloging realm for beginners or part-timers. There are several angles that have been mentioned: rare and old materials, classification schemes, and ways of arranging collections. The cataloging session may not just focus on MARC cataloging but on alternative approaches to controlling maps and other cartographic materials. For the cataloging program, several people encouraged asking ALCTS to cosponsor in name only. For a third program, perhaps a program or field trip on local geography or cartography of Chicago. Another possibility would be a contributed papers session.

Publications - Donna Koepp

The web site maintenance will be moving from David Allen to Jeff Kosokoff. Jeff will explore the possibilities of placing the web page either on his local site or moving it to the ALA server. Some pages will continue to be maintained away from the main site.

Base line has been doing quite well and the committee is pleased with the content.

The committee spent a great deal of time discussing Meridian. There is no new editor as of yet to take over after David Cobb's last issue which will be out this summer. This issue should be out in August or September. There are a couple of ideas for the issue following and the issue after that has been planned to be on national geographic societies with John Garver as a special editor. Donna has been reluctant to finalize the societies issue since the future of Meridian seems uncertain at this point. Donna also plans on stepping down as Publications Chair. If we stop publishing Meridian, we will be giving up some other opportunities. Meridian has always been in the black and the revenue created by the journal helped defray the cost of publishing two of the Occasional Papers and both of the Circulars. The mission and purpose of Meridian was discussed, which was to increase our knowledge of maps rather that how to be better map librarians. No conclusions were reached at the meeting.Donna will continue as chair for the time being until another chair of Publications can be found and issues with Meridian are resolved. Some more names were suggested at General Membership meeting.

Task Forces and Discussion Groups

Exhibits - Joe Winkler

We received an exhibitors badge this year after encountering some difficulty in not having one last year. For the most part, the booth was not staffed as much as in the past. There was some indication that people had been stopping by the booth. One item that might be helpful would be to post the MAGERT schedule in the booth.

Research Libraries Collection Management Group - David Allen for Karl Longstreth

There was discussion of revising the Union List of Foreign Topo Maps and possibly posting it on the web. Another topic of discussion was the possibility of sharing collection development policies on the web.

Small Map Collection Discussion Group - Joe Winkler

The group was not especially well attended but it is still in the formative stage. Discussion focused on what people were interested in getting out of the group. The concerns expressed were varied, but the chief cluster of concern was bibliographic control. Given the low attendance, various means of getting the word out to the target audience were explored at the General Membership meeting. Suggestions included posting notices on the PLA list, the ACRL list, AUTOCAT, MAPS-L, and GODORT.

Federal Spatial Data Discussion Group - Mark Thomas

Sixteen persons attended the Federal Spatial Information Discussion Group meeting. After introductions, Mark Thomas briefly outlined what was discussed at the Cartographic Users Advisory Council (CUAC) meeting in Lakewood, CO, on May 6-7. Look for minutes in an upcoming base line. Rea Mueller of the USGS expanded on her comments at GODORT's Agency Update meeting the day before. Among other things, she touched on matters concerning Landsat 7 data, the addition of a "version date" in addition to the "currency date" in the USGS State Map Lists, and on the new phone number, 888-ASK-USGS, that will take the place of several previous toll-free numbers. There were two representatives from USGS's Wetlands Resource Center in Lafayette: Dan Foley and Judy Buys. Dan and others in the room discussed his work on a crosswalk to transfer FGDC metadata to MARC format. Among other matters discussed, be on the lookout for an upcoming GPO survey regarding map selections, for links to DRG information from Microsoft's Terraserver, and for DOQs from New York state on the Internet.

Reports from Representatives and Liaisons

CC:DA - Elizabeth Mangan

The CC:DA meetings at Annual primarily dealt with the discussion of reports from the various task forces dealing with Rule 0.24, Delsey's functional requirements document, and the harmonization of ISBD(ER) and AACR2.

Anglo-American Cataloging Committee for Cartographic Materials - Mary Larsgaard

Work continues on the revision of Cartographic Materials: a Manual of Interpretation for AACR2. The second edition will be expanded to cover the cataloging of remote sensing images and electronic or digital cartographic resources. The guidelines for cataloging early cartographic material will also be expanded. The early cartographic material sub-group is chaired by Velma Parker of the National Archives of Canada. The remote sensing sub-group was originally chaired by Helen Armstrong though, due to poor health, Mary Larsgaard has been working with that group. Currently the suggested rule revisions are at the Secretariate and Paige Andrew is currently applying the guidelines on cataloging an air photo flight and a LANDSAT satellite image to see if the rules and the guidelines for applying the rules are enough or if further information is needed. The electronic resources sub-group is just finishing their work. Each country that participates in the Anglo-American Cataloging Committee for Cartographic Materials sending exactly the same set of requested rule revisions to the rule making body in that country. This should help expedite the revision process. For the US, the rule making body is CC:DA and the group is planning on turning in the requested rule revisions for the Midwinter meeting in San Antonio.

Congress of Cartographic Information Specialists - Alice Hudson

MAGERT will be sending Karl Longstreth as a representative and will be giving $500 to defray the costs. The Congress will be held after ICA. CCISA will meet August 21, 1999. One issue to be discussed include how institutions are relating to the new technologies.

Cartographic Users Advisory Council - Mark Thomas

The Cartographic Users Advisory Council (CUAC) met in Lakewood, CO, at the Denver Federal Center on May 6-7, 1999. USGS was the host and we got a nice tour of their facilities and of the National Ice Core storage facility. Dan Seldin reported that the details of the transfer of domestic aeronautical charting from NOAA to DOT have not been worked out completely. Also, the details of print-on-demand nautical charts haven't been worked out, but GPO would hopefully provide one or two editions per year of each map through the depository program. Robin-Haun-Mohamed of the GPO helpfully explained to federal agency representatives who were present about the depository program and Title 44 requirements. Besides USGS, there were representatives from the Forest Service, the National Park Service, and the Bureau of Reclamation. Look for detailed minutes in an upcoming issue of base line.

GODORT - John Stevenson

GODORT had a marathon business meeting Monday night which ended at 11:30 p.m. Major topics at the meeting included the possible disbanding of the Legislation Committee, and whether GODORT should have an official conference hotel at Midwinter. Reserving blocks of rooms for a round table through ALA is possible, but members would incur substantial penalties if reservations were canceled. GODORT may simply advise members to book at a selected hotel early.

There was a successful program, "To Merge or Not to Merge--What Are the Questions?: Integrating Documents Units into Reference or Technical Services" that concerned the integration of Technical, Reference, and other services or keeping the depository library as a "library within a library". Two programs are planned for 2000, one by the International Documents Task Force on international statistics and a program by the State and Local Documents Task Force on urban information, with some GIS aspects.

Donna Koepp, Head of Government Documents and Maps, University of Kansas Library, was given the CIS/GODORT/ALA "Documents to the People" Award. This award is presented to the individual, library, institution, or other noncommercial group that has most effectively encouraged the use of government documents in support of library service, and was awarded to her in recognition of her work on the CIS US Serial Set Index, Part XIV: Index and Carto-Bibliography of Maps, 1789-1969. This work, undertaken at her own initiative, dramatically enhanced access to an entire genre of public documents that have been obscured within the structure of the U.S. Congressional Serial Set.

IFLA - David Allen and Alice Hudson for Pat McGlamery

The upcoming meeting will be held in Bangkok in August. Pat McGlamery and Melissa Lamont will be giving a session using ArcView Explorer for introducing the attendees to GIS. There will also be a paper on the digitization of maps. The past meeting was held in Amsterdam and Alice Hudson gave a paper. The map librarians in Amsterdam and The Hague were very hospitable, with open houses and exhibits at the map libraries of the University of Amsterdam and the Royal Library at The Hague.

Library of Congress Geography and Map Division - Elizabeth Mangan

The position of chief remains vacant, although we are hopeful that there will be a new chief in the next few months. The posting was closed on March 31 and the interviews should occur during the month of June. The staff of the Division will be provided an opportunity to meet the candidates as part of the interview process.

Cataloging

In September the Geography and Map Division hosted a six-day meeting of the Anglo-American Cataloguing Committee for Cartographic Materials. Representatives from all five member countries, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdom and the United States, were present and participated in the meeting. These meetings were held to discuss and finalize the revision of Cartographic Materials: A Manual of Interpretation for AACR2. The second edition of Cartographic Materials will document and explain the changes made to the rules in the 1988 and subsequent revisions. The publication will also be expanded to cover the cataloging of remote-sensing images and electronic or digital cartographic resources.

In March five members of the Cataloging Team, Richard Fox, Shirley Martin, Barbara Story, Helen Talbert, and Rachel Watkins, presented a two-day workshop on cataloging cartographic materials sponsored by the Federal Library and Information Center Committee. The workshop covered descriptive cataloging, subject analysis, and classification of maps, atlases, and electronic cartographic resources. Although the class was limited to 25, the session was so popular that the attendance was expanded to 28 federal librarians and one public librarian.

Integrated Library System

As you probably know the Library is in the process of converting to an integrated library system or ILS. Approximately 800 staff members, including 10 from G&M, are involved with the implementation of Voyager. The scheduled "Day One" for cataloging is August 16th with on-site OPAC access about a week later. The web version of the OPAC will be available in late August or early September.

Significant Acquisitions

During the past year the Division has acquired a number of noteworthy items. The new maps include A New & Exact Mapp of the Island of Jamaica by Bochart & Knollis printed in London for Charles Harper in 1684. This first large scale map of Jamaica was original bound into the Laws of Jamaica, 1684 and contains extensive information on the physical, cultural, and economic landscape of the island, one of the most important of the English colonies in the 17th century. It names and locates plantations and depicts the locations of sugar, indigo, cotton and cacao works.

Robert de Vaugondy's Carte de Canada et des Etats Unis de l'Amerique Septentrionale was produced in Paris by Jean Baptiste Fortin in 1778. Recent study suggests that this map may be the first cartographic work to recognize the independence of the United States. Mary Pedley's study of Robert de Vaugondy notes that Fortin changed the title to include Etats-Unis de l'Amerique Septentrionale "thereby making it one of the first maps (if not the first) to recognize the existence of the United States. Its publication must have followed the signing of the alliance between France and the fledgling United States on 6th February 1778."

Julius Bien's 1858 Preliminary Chart of Charleston Harbor and Its Approaches is signed by Major General S.W. Crawford, a Union officer at Fort Sumter. It is also accompanied by a letter from Crawford, dated 1869, that provides historical background on the Confederate bombing of Fort Sumter. It is possible that Crawford had this unusual 1858 hydrographic chart with him during his duty at Fort Sumter.

An 1837 map of Hawaii entitled Na Mokupuni O Hawaii Nei [The Island of Hawaii] drawn by Kalama which was produced at the printing press at the Lahainaluna missionary school in Hawaii and was intended for instructional use by the Hawaiian students. The map is the Library's earliest example of the rare maps printed at the Lahainaluna Press

Three unique panoramic maps have been added to the collections in the past year. These are the only known copies of Philmont, N.Y., 1881 by an unknown author, H.H. Bailey's Elmira, NY. 1873, and a previously unrecorded panoramic view, Derby, Shelton and East Derby, Conn., 1898 by Landis and Hughes. We also acquired W.G. Fonseca's Winnipeg, 1884 produced in Ottawa which contains twenty-two border vignettes. The only other copy of this view is held in the National Archives of Canada.

The Division also acquired an untitled manuscript map of the southern Caribbean which was probably prepared by the Dutch West India Company in the mid-17th century and three early 19th-century manuscript student maps drawn by Mary Van Schaak in Kinderhook, New York entitled Map of the World with the Most Recent Discoveries, 1811, A Map of the United States and Part of Louisiana, and The World.

A number of additional 19th- and early 20th-century landownership maps and atlases were acquired including the second edition of Jay Gould's Map of Ulster County, New York published by Oliver J. Tillson & P. Henry Brink in 1854; W. Wenig & W. Lorey's Map of Schoharie Co., New York published in Philadelphia by R.P. Smith in 1856; H.P. Handy's Index Map of San Joaquin County, Showing All Tracts of Land, Purchased or Located Upon, in the County to April 1st 1862 printed in San Francisco by Britton & Co. in 1882, which is the first separately printed map of San Joaquin County and is the earliest county landownership map of California in the Library's collections; Imperial Publishing Co.'s Plat Book of Benton County, Arkansas published in Philadelphia in 1903; and, F.A. Davis's New Illustrated Atlas of Westmoreland Co., Pennsylvania published in Philadelphia in 1876.

Our globe collection has also grown through the purchase of The Excelsior (17 cm. in diameter), manufactured by I.S. Wachob & Co. in Scranton, Pennsylvania, around 1870; The Franklin Terrestrial Globe (31 cm. in diameter) produced in Troy, New York by H.R. Nims & Co., between 1869-1885; and, a Persian manuscript celestial globe hand-painted on a solid wooden sphere (13 cm. in diameter) produced around 1650 which was purchased by the Madison Council. This is the only pre-1900 Islamic globe in LC's collections and the only wooden Islamic globe currently held in the United States.

The Madison Council also purchased Atlas General de la Chine, De La Tartarie Chinoise, et Du Tibet by J.B. D'Anville published in Paris, by J.A. Dezauche around 1790 and includes 50 numbered maps and plans, eight of which were not in the 1737 edition of the atlas, and 14 plates of cultural and ethnographic interest, which were also not part of the earlier edition and Louis Charles Desnos's Nle. Carte d'Amerique/Amerique Septrentrionale et Meridionale . . . produced in Paris in 1781 which is a hand-colored engraved wall map on four sheets joined with attached borders, 45 x 42 inches.

Other atlases of note acquired during the year include Petrovich Fedor LŸ tke's Atlas du Voyage autour de Monde de la Corvette Seniavine fait en 1826, 1827, 1828 et 1829 . . . published in St. Petersburg in 1832 which illustrates the 1826-1829 circumnavigation and exploration of the North Pacific (Bering Sea) and Caroline Islands under the command of P.F. LŸ tke; George Bromley's Atlas of the City of Boston: Boston Proper and Roxbury: From Actual Surveys and Official Plans published in Philadelphia by G.W. Bromley and Co. in 1895; and, George W. Bromley's Atlas of the City of Boston: South Boston published in Philadelphia by G.W. Bromley and Co. in 1919.

Contemporary new acquisitions include Russian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Geography's two volume Resources and Environment World Atlas published in Vienna in 1998; 354 sheets of 1:200,000-scale topographic map series of the former Soviet Union purchased from TopKart in Poland which gives LC complete 1:200,000-scale coverage of the former Soviet Union; Topographical Map of the Continental United States created by Michael Bailey which is a model produced on a computer-driven Laminated Object Manufacturing Machine at the San Diego Supercomputer Center, TeleManufacturing Facility, University of California, San Diego; 1:100,000-scale Soviet/Russian military coverage of China in a total of 5,140 sheets which provides recent topographic coverage of China; and large-scale topographic mapping of Bahrain, 1:25,000 scale ; Greece, 1:50,000 scale; Czech Republic, 1:50,000 scale; Cuba, 1:200,000 scale; Turkey, 1:250,000 scale; Lebanon and Syria 1:200,000 scale; Algeria , 1:50,000; and North Korea, 1:50,000 scale.

National Digital Library for Cartographic Materials

The Library's American Memory website now includes more than 2,200 maps. Recent additions include Mapping the National Parks which includes maps for Acadia, Grand Canyon, Great Smoky Mountains, and Yellowstone National parks, the 1562 map of America by Diego Gutiérrez with a special presentation by John Hébert, and the 1570 Ortelius Theatrum Orbis Terrarum with a special presentation on Ortelius. Approximately 65% of the railroad maps have been scanned and processed and are available on the web and we have added the panoramic maps which were acquired since the publication of the second edition of Panoramic Maps of Cities in the United States and Canada in 1984.

Places in the News, a new feature which allows us to quickly mount cartographic material relevant to current events, was added to the site in April with a 1998 map of Kosovo produced by NIMA and a few days later, the 1993 CIA map of the Balkans was added. Just this month a new collection, Contemporary Maps, was added for current maps showing up-to-date boundaries and place names, thus providing a means of keeping current with geopolitical changes in the world. This collection was inaugurated with the CIA's maps of Hong Kong and Vicinity, 1998, and Political Map of the World, June 1998.

The National Digital Library has purchased a second scanner and a contractor will begin scanning the Civil War maps this summer.

Facsimiles

The Library of Congress has produced an actual-size facsimile of the 1592 map of America by Diego Gutiérrez with an accompanying seven-page detailed description of the map and its significance to European exploration of America. The facsimile was made possible by a generous grant from VITAE Foundation (Brazil) and the support and encouragement of Dr. José Mindlin, São Paulo, Brazil. The facsimile was produced from the digital files created by the Geography and Map Division and was printed by Digicolor, a Center for Geographic Information partner, in Seattle, Washington. The facsimile is available for $28.00, which includes a mailing tube, plus $5 shipping and handling and is available through the Library's gift shop.

Under an agreement with the Library, Digicolor will soon be offering custom facsimiles of a selection of materials from the Library of Congress collections. These reproductions will be available in a variety of sizes, your choice of matting, if desired, and your choice of frame, if desired.

Issues concerning the agreement with the Sanborn Company about fire insurance maps continue to be worked out.

MARBI - Susan Moore

There were two proposals and five discussion papers before MARBI this meeting. Proposal 99-08 would have allowed the addition of a subfield for Uniform Resource Identifiers to several different fields. MARBI approved the addition to the 555 field in the Bibliographic Format and the 583 field in the Bibliographic and Holdings Format. Proposed but not passed was the request to add a URI subfield to fields 76X-78X.

The other proposal requested that subfield k (Call number prefix) and subfield m (Call number suffix) be made repeatable in the 852 field (Location) of the Holdings Format. The proposal passed.

The discussion papers covered a wide variety of topics, including the impact of possible changes to the definition of serials, possible ways of handling "bound with" situations, way of handling anonymous artists that have possibly been identified, coding non-Gregorian dates in the bibliographic format, and another paper on how to handle non-filing characters.

The usual Monday afternoon meeting was dedicated to a joint meeting of CC:DA and MARBI. The two topics of discussion were: 1) the proposed changes to the definition of seriality stemming from the report submitted to CC:DA and 2) the planned preconference on metadata for Chicago. The discussion for both topics was very lively. The preconference on metadata will be a two-day conference and is shaping up to be an excellent program.

NACIS - Dan Seldin

There has been nothing new since Midwinter. The next meeting will be in Williamsburg, VA on October 20-23.

NEMO - David Allen for Pat McGlamery

It was a very good meeting.

WAML - Mary Larsgaard

WAML met at CSU-Long Beach in late April. The next meeting will be hosted by the Colorado School of Mines and will be held in Golden, Colo. The meeting will be held in late October juxtaposed to the meeting of the Geological Society of America, which includes the Geoscience Information Society. Katherine Womble is editing the WAML Information Bulletin.

New Business

There appears to be some confusion as to who is the MAGERT representative to the Rare and Endangered Government Documents.

For Midwinter in San Antonio it was recommended that members stay at the historic Menger Hotel.

The meeting adjourned at 11:10 a.m.