LaRue's Views
This digital archives comprises Library Director Jamie LaRue's newspaper columns from January 3, 1996 - August 26, 2010.
In general, they appeared on the dates shown in various Colorado Community Newspapers.
April 23, 1997 - Highlands Ranch Quest for Community
I attended a meeting last week of the Highlands Ranch Development Review Committee. Featured were James Van Hemert of the Douglas County Planning Department, and several people speaking for the Mission Viejo Company, including their consultants, RNL.
April 16, 1997 - Annual Report
This is National Library Week. It's as good a time as any to pass on to Douglas County taxpayers the sort of statistics we gathered for our 1996 annual report to Colorado's State library.
Library patrons. We currently have 83,781 registered borrowers living in Douglas County. That's almost 70% of our 123,000 residents. We have another 5,459 people who live outside the county.
April 9, 1997 - Arbor Day
Shortly after I got out of college but before I found gainful employment, I began to have the most vivid dreams you can imagine. In every one of them, I was called to the desert, a place I had never been.
So I packed my meager belongings into a backpack and bedroll (total weight: 14 pounds), and stuck out my thumb on old Route 66. (This was 20 years ago. I wouldn't recommend it now.)
Two days later, I found myself coming down from the New Mexico mountains into the Sonoran desert at sunrise. I was awed.
April 2, 1997 - Library Website
Among my jobs is to serve as the library district's "web master." What does that mean? I get to decide how our World Wide Web "pages" will look, how they're organized, and generally, what kind of information or links the public will find there.
Our "home page" (whose location is http://douglas.lib.co.us) provides access to four broad kinds of information:
March 19, 1997 - Public input on Oakes Mill Library
My wife and I used to follow old Route 66 from Chicago to Arizona.
It was exciting to see the stretches that were still a vibrant "America's Main Street." There were the distinctive old Phillips 66 gas stations. There were the first motels (a word created from "motor" and "hotel"). There were hundreds of mom-and-pop local eateries.
But about 20 years ago, Route 66 was strangled to death. It was replaced by (in succession) I-55, I-44, and I-40.
March 12, 1997 - First Annual Ayn Rand Beer-fest
It started when a school librarian posted a question on "libnet," an Internet-based bulletin board. A principal had asked her to come up with a list of titles that high school students should read before they go to college.
What books would we recommend?
March 5, 1997 - Send in the Clones
Well, mankind (in the form of Dr. Ian Wilmut, a Scottish embryologist) has cloned a sheep. Cloning, for those of you who don't follow such things, is the replication of an individual member of a species. The famous baby sheep is an exact genetic copy -- the identical twin -- of another, adult sheep.
Straight away, pundits began speculating about the ethics of cloning a human being (although science is still a ways from knowing how to do that).
February 26, 1997 - Nicky Mead and More
I talked to a fellow recently who told me he once attended a funeral and a wedding on the same day. He said it left him feeling ... odd. I think I understand.
Saturday, February 22, I attended the dedication of the Genevieve Nichols Mead Community Room, at the beautiful new Virginia Village Branch of the Denver Public Library.
February 19, 1997 - Philip S. Miller Library Gets New Lighting
I've held a lot of odd jobs in my life. But I realize, looking back, that they have always had something in common. I have almost always worked in beautiful buildings.
One of my first jobs was in an architect's office. I ran errands, did tracings, answered the phone, and ran prints around. I was fascinated by the process of designing buildings.
But, alas, I soon learned that I would never design them myself. Perry, my three-year-old son, can slap 24 piece puzzles together in just a few minutes. I still can't.
February 12, 1997 - What's Hot -- Holds Lists
A couple of weeks ago, News-Press editor Rich Bangs called me to say he was devoting a section of the paper to books and local writers. As a librarian, I enthusiastically approved. (And as a poet, I'll even be submitting a piece or two.)
He also asked the library to contribute a weekly list of "What's Hot." We define that as items that have more than three people waiting to read them. You'll be seeing that listing weekly.
But I thought I should explain a few things about how the library does business.
