Herrera metadata project - Elaine Patton, 11/21/2013

'60s font! Barely-smiling disembodied face on a STAR!

Today I (finally) got to finish MSS160-b4-f12 and MSS160-b3-f12. No major problems-- couldn't physically confirm whether one item was a scan of a sticker, though it almost certainly is. A pamphlet for Bill Blakley didn't name a particular compiler or publisher, so I left those fields blank, but it was almost certainly created by his campaign team. Little things like that.

 Also, I love old campaign literature because it reminds me of how little politics change in many ways...

Sheet Music Collection Project - Shab Vakil, 11/21/2013

This week (11/21/2013) I managed to input the data for 67 more cards of drawer 3 of the sheet music collection project.  Most of the cards were extremely straightforward, but I did run into another couple of cards where this is spelling discrepancy in the name of the publishing company.  Google did not seem to be helping clarify the correct spelling of the company, so I've highlighted it in yellow to review with the hard copy sheet music upstairs when the time comes.  

Herrera Metadata Project, Michelle Godfrey - Nov. 20, 2013

MSS160-b4-f01

Today, I was able to access the project to continue working on folder 01 and made some corrections to a few items from last week. The only problem I found was that this week the system seemed to be slower than usual updating the records after hitting the 'Publish' button.

Herrera Metadata - Elaine Patton, 11/14/2013

Today I started on MSS160-b4-f12 and struggled with UNT's system on-again, off-again ability to load pages completely. On the plus side, when that happens while trying to save a record, it seems that record does actually get saved, even if the page can't complete its normal refresh cycle, so it could be worse.

Sheet Music Collection Project - Shab Vakil, 11/14/2013

Last week (11/14/2013) I managed to input the data for 65 cards of drawer 3 of the sheet music collection project.  I had no real problems save for a few difficulties cataloging a couple of Italian cards due to Google Translate being down (but Cecilia has since taken care of those cards, thank you Cecilia!)  

Herrera Metadata Project, Michelle Godfrey - Nov. 13, 2013

Today I continued working on MSS160-b4-f01. I only got a few items done before running into problems with the editing system. We could access the records, but were not able to update them. I will try again next week in hopes that the system will function normally.

Sheet Music Collection Project - Emily Perkins, 11/12/13

Today was my first day working on the sheet music collection project, and I inputted the data from 57 cards from drawer 4. I had three composers whose names were spelled differently on two or more cards, and I left these fields highlighted in yellow on the excel spreadsheet so that they can be verified later before MARC records are made. I found the non-popular music cards to be more troublesome than the popular music cards. These classical music cards simply contained more information than the others, and I struggled to find the appropriate fields in which to record the information. Publisher names gave me trouble as well, as many were single words without the words "corp" or "publishing" in their name. I think this may get easier with time though, as I begin to recognize more of these publishers by name, such as "Renwick." My favorite song title of the day was "Shaddap you face," to which I gave the other title (MARC field 246) of "Shut up your face." I'd like to hear that song.

Herrera Metadata Project - Elaine Patton, 11/7/2013

Today I continued to work on MSS160-b4-f11 [and finished it, it turns out!]. Nothing particularly weird encountered (except for a large number of envelopes, which get the most boring titles and descriptions created), though I did come across another couple of Social Security numbers, flagged in the non-displaying notes.

There were, however, several gems-- utter, hilarious gems.

For example, the 2 resumes which volunteered various information like height/weight and physical health (after the name/address heading and before the education & experience parts):

Did that used to be a 'thing' in the '70s/pre-hiring protections?

Then there was the fairly lengthy letter to Herrera explaining the author's daughter had met a man who seemed like a phony (supposedly had attended a number of prestigious universities, claimed to have a number of degrees, planned to become a cardiovascular doctor but spent most of his days "smoking and drinking coffee" in restaurants, claimed to have been a racing driver but owned no car...) and had given Herrera as a reference. She says it's possible Herrera himself is a phony, but there weren't any better options than to contact him. The post-script of the letter casually asks for the driver's license and Social Security numbers of the man in question, if Herrera could procure them.

This one... I don't know what to make of this one, particularly the second half pictured below:

Shab, sheet music collection project

Today I managed to input the data from 68 more cards from drawer 3 of the sheet music collection project.  Most of the cards were very typical information, allowing me to catalog them at a faster rate than usual.  However, I do have a concern I need Cecilia to check on when she has time: Cecilia, I just want to remind you of the card we discussed, the one where there was information on both sides of the card and we weren't sure if it was because there was a duplicate piece of music upstairs, or some other reason (I have highlighted the row in yellow and the piece of music is titled "Symptoms of True Love" by Irmgard Klarmann).  After that card, I discovered another card with a similar problem (information on both sides of the card) but unlike the previous card, the information is almost identical on both sides of the card - the only difference is that the page numbers for each side are different, leading me to think one of the card sides has the wrong number of pages on it, which might be why the other side has the same information (the cataloger was trying to correct a mistake?)  But neither side is scratched out, so the only way to verify will be to check the sheet music upstairs (I've highlighted this row in yellow, too, and the name of the song is "We Were Dancing" by Noel Coward).  Please check these cards whenever you have time.  Thanks!  :)  Otherwise, I have no real problems to report. 

Herrera Metadata - Michelle Godfrey, Nov. 6, 2013

Today I was able to finish MSS160-b4-f03.  

It was nice to be able to resume work with those last few items that had the broken links. I am not sure if other folders in this collection have the same inconsistencies with letters and envelopes. Folder 3 had at least one record that contained both a letter and the corresponding envelope. There was also an undated letter scanned alone without an envelope and then there was another record with just an envelope scanned by itself.

I was also able to continued work in folder 01 and found no problems so far.

Herrera Metadata Project - Michelle Godfrey, Nov 1, 2013

This week I was able to continue work on MSS160-b4-f03 and finish the few even-numbered items that still remained in that folder. I was also able to begin working on f01. Everything went smoothly and I should be able to continue next week as usual.