Research Before the Internet

 

The other day Roland was looking for a particular flight’s on-time takeoff record, and he found the information. Then he said, “What did we do before the Internet?”

We wouldn’t have bothered trying to discover flight history. It would have been too much work for not enough benefit. But it made me think about doing research in “the old days.”

I try to do most of my background research before I start the first draft. That hasn’t changed over the years. What has changed is where I get that research from. I used to spend days in the library and hope that the best information could either be photocopied or checked out. If it couldn’t, I took notes on 4x6 notecards. Sometimes I would discover a book I wanted to buy, but I couldn’t always afford it. Now I search the Internet, looking mainly for PDFs to download or books I can buy from Amazon since I have more money than I did back in the early days. The main reason I buy a book rather than get it at the library, though, is because I like to mark up my research materials and keep them for subsequent review. Libraries don’t appreciate it when you do that.

My subsequent research process has changed significantly. I used to write the entire first draft while making notes about the additional information I needed to look up, then go to the library to find it. Now I interrupt my first draft to look up information on the Internet before continuing on.

The Internet didn’t change the importance of research, but it did make it easier.

I can live without the Internet.

But I’d rather not.

Reading and Writing on Lighthouse Time

As I mentioned in last week’s post, libraries have played a big role in my life. Because I lived in a small town and the closest city wasn’t very large, the limited selections at my libraries didn’t begin to fill me up. But without those libraries, I would have starved for reading material.

 

I can’t imagine living on an isolated island without even a library to feed my reading obsession. Yet that is just how lighthouse keepers and their families used to live.

 

The first lighthouses were built on private land and subsidized by the individual colonies. The U.S. Lighthouse Establishment was created in 1789, and it took over the responsibility for maintaining the lighthouses. (This responsibility was transferred to the Coast Guard in 1939.)

 

For almost ninety years, those who served were responsible for providing their own books. Then they finally got some relief. The picture shows a replica of a travelling library on display at the White River Light Station Museum on Lake Michigan. According to the sign with the display, “In 1876, the U.S. Lighthouse Establishment created portable libraries to aid in the educational needs of remote lightkeepers, lightship and life saving personnel and their families. These libraries traditionally carried a Bible, European history and travel books, encyclopedias, children’s books, technical information for keepers and contemporary novels of the time period.” The placard also says that there were over 700 libraries in circulation by the early 1900s, so I’m assuming that each location got a full library until it was time to replace it with another one.

 

What made me think about this now? I’ve been re-reading Mind the Light, Katie: The History of Thirty-Three Female Lighthouse Keepers by Mary Louise Clifford and J. Candace Clifford. Some of these women led interesting lives, and I’m going to share them with you this month. While many of them wrote letters and most were required to keep a journal as part of the job, I’m only aware of one who spent her solitary hours writing a book. So I’ll start with Elizabeth Williams.

 

In 1869, Elizabeth’s then husband, Clement Van Riper, accepted an appointment as keeper at Harbor Point Light Station on Beaver Island in Lake Michigan. (It appears to have also been called Whiskey Point Light and St. James Light.) Clement drowned three years later as he attempted to row out to help a floundering ship. In her book A Child of the Sea; and Life Among the Mormons, Elizabeth described her reaction.

 

I was weak from sorrow, but realized that though the life that was dearest to me had gone, yet there were others out in the dark and treacherous waters who needed the rays from the shining light of my tower. Nothing could rouse me but that thought, then all my life and energy was given to the work which now seemed was given me to do.

 

After Clement’s death, Elizabeth was appointed to keep the Harbor Point Light Station. In this, Elizabeth was similar to the majority of female lighthouse keepers, who took over after their husbands died. Unlike most, however, she didn’t stay single. Elizabeth continued to service the Harbor Point Light Station after she married Daniel Williams, who apparently didn’t object to her job.

 

In 1884, Elizabeth was reassigned to Little Traverse Light Station, where her husband photographed the surrounding area and sold his pictures to tourists. This is also where Elizabeth wrote A Child of the Sea; and Life Among the Mormons, dealing mostly with her childhood but ending with a few pages about her lighthouse experiences. It was published in 1905 and is still in print.

 

Elizabeth remained at Little Traverse Light Station until she retired in 1913.

 

Next week’s post will talk about the hard life endured by two other Lake Michigan lighthouse keepers.

 

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For more information on Elizabeth Williams at Harbor Point and Little Traverse Light Stations, see pages 71-74 of Mind the Light, Katie and/or check out the following websites:

http://www.terrypepper.com/lights/michigan/beaverharbor.htm/beaverharbor.htm

 

http://www.lakeeffectliving.com/Dec12/Lighthouses-Beaver_Island_Lights.html

 

http://terrypepper.com/lights/michigan/littletraverse/littletraverse.htm

 

Check these websites for more information on the history of lighthouses in the U.S.
 

http://www.nps.gov/maritime/handbook/part2.pdf
 

http://www.lhdigest.com/history.cfm
 

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One word of caution. While Mind the Light, Katie appears to be well researched, it contains a number of internal inconsistancies that probably resulted from poor proofreading. For that reason, the material in each of my posts is supported by at least one additional source.

Summer at the Library

I recently saw the list of 2013 summer activities in DeTour Village, Michigan, where I grew up. The list includes a summer speaker series and family movie nights, both at the library. The library didn't have summer activities when I was growing up. In fact, I'm not sure it was even open in the summer.

The only library in town was the school library, which I notice is now called the DeTour Area School and Public Library. Adults may have been welcomed when I lived there (many years ago), but I never thought of it as a public library. The closest one of those was 60 miles away at Sault Saint Marie, Michigan. We went every two weeks and I checked out the maximum number of books allowed. Even when supplemented with the books in the school library, I always ran out of reading material long before our next trip.

I have fond memories of libraries. When I was a child, they were the source of the books I hungered for. Later, when I was out on my own and living on a small income, libraries helped me feed my habit without spending money I needed for other things.

When my children were young, weekly trips to the library supplemented my growing stock of children's books, and summer programs kept Caroline and John entertained and motivated. Caroline still frequents the library to keep her reading habit affordable.

Of course, things are changing. More and more people--children included--are reading electronic books, but most libraries are keeping up with the times. Caroline frequently borrows electronic books from her small-town library.

Libraries have adapted in other ways, too. They offer computer use and Internet access to people who don't have those resources at home and to people who are travelling away from home.

Then there are the standard services that have stayed the same over the years. Traditional book lending. Quiet areas where people can study and work. Small rooms for group projects. Conference rooms for educational and non-profit activities.

And all those summer programs to keep children excited about reading while they are out of school.

What would we do without libraries? I hope I never find out.

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The picture shows the Lake County Public Library branch in Munster, Indiana.

Reading Out the Library

Before you can be a great writer, you have to be a great reader.

I spent most of my growing up years in a small town in the Eastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan (or the U-P, as we called it). DeTour's school library was equally small, and I quickly read every fiction book in it. Over and over and over.

Every other Saturday we drove to Sault St. Marie, Michigan (the Soo) and went to the library there. That library let you check out only six books at a time, and I had them all read within the first few days. And, as with the school library, I soon read out the Soo library. Again and again and again.

Since books cost money, I didn't own many. My personal library consisted mainly of juvenile paperbacks purchased at school through the Scholastic Book Club. I did, however, have subscriptions to American Girl, the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, and a weekly British magazine called Judy.

I made good use of whatever opportunities I had to read something new. In visits to my cousin, I read through her collection of Cherry Ames books (think Nancy Drew as a student nurse). When visiting my grandparents, I devoured the books my mother read during her younger years.

Then I reached junior high and discovered Mama's books from her high school and college years. The back of our house had an enclosed porch that my parents used for storage. But shelves covered one wall, and Grace Livingston Hill, George Elliot, Charles Dickens, and William Shakespeare lived there. For me, those books were diamonds and rubies and sapphires that I mined while curled up in one corner of the room on an old couch. I also read a few of my father's books, but his taste ran to non-fiction and theology, and mine didn't.

I've always been a murder mystery fan, and I must own every Agatha Christie book ever published. Then when I became an adult I rediscovered middle-school novels. For a while, I claimed that I was reading them for my children's sake, but I still enjoy them as an empty nester. Classics by the likes of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Louisa May Alcott, Lucy Maude Montgomery, and C.S. Lewis, and more recent books by authors such as Rick Riordan and Richard Peck and, of course, J.K. Rowling.

So many books and so little time . . .

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Who are your favorite authors?