Recommended read : Hedy's Folly by Richard Rhodes

A famous Hollywood actress and an American composer, predominately active in the first half of the 20th century, are basically responsible for the fact that you can make a cell phone call today. It's so refreshing when you read about the unexpected.

In 1940, Hedy Lamarr and George Antheil invented a secret communication system which was (and is) the basis for many communication technology advances in the last half century, including but not limited to, the cell phone. Lamarr and Antheil created a system that would allow frequency hopping (or spread spectrum). 

Rhodes quotes quite a bit directly from Lamarr and Antheil themselves, as well as Antheil's wife Boski. This is fascinating in that the reader is able to hear it directly from the source. The portions about the patent process were informative as well. Hedy's Folly is not an in depth biography of either subject, rather a biography of what led each to be informed, meet, and develop their invention together. Hedy was influenced early on by her father, who encouraged her to think about how things were made (Hedy, in fact, invented other things). She was also influenced heavily by her first husband, Fritz Mandl, who was a very wealthy munitions manufacturer in Austria. Hedy was naturally exposed to his colleagues and work-life, paid attention, and as a result, most likely learned a lot about weapons-- which would help in her developments with Antheil.

Antheil had other endeavors besides his avant-garde composing: he briefly wrote articles and a column for Esquire magazine, and wrote two books (one about the coming involvement of the US in WWII and the second an autobiography entitled Bad Boy of Music). But, most importantly, George's early musical compositions were mechanically inclined. In one of his most famous symphonies, Ballet Mecanique, he used an airplane propeller, among other things, and tried to synchronize multiple player pianos (pianos that automatically played using pre-programmed music). His experiments with synchronicity would become a fundamental pillar of their invention.

While Hedy found fame during her lifetime, which inevitably waned with age, Antheil found modest fame, often barely scraping by financially. At the time, they did not gain much attention for this influential invention. It's such an inherently interesting story-- it's not to be missed.

Hedy's Folly by Richard Rhodes
Find it in the catalog! (Book)
Find it in the catalog! (eBook)

Awkward Moments with Ted Allen

What's the only thing better than delicious looking food pictures in cookbooks?  That's right, goofy, awkward chef photographs.  Thankfully the chefs keep them coming.  In Ted Allen's defense, I think most of these pictures are supposed to be funny.  Also both of his cookbooks look like they have some yummy recipes inside. 

Awww...yeah!

Pepper spray?  Like I'd be afraid of that; I'm immune!

This is how a man eats a steak!  One bite!

Tome Trivia

I had a reference question recently about the first book printed in the United States, which wasn't too hard to track down: The Whole Booke of Faithfully Translated Psalmes in English Metre, more commonly know as the Bay Psalms Book. It was printed in 1640 and, as the title suggests, is an English translation of scripture. Read more about it, and see a couple of photos, at the Library of Congress American Treasures webpage.


So, now you can throw out this tidbit of information at your next party and impress (?) your friends.

Recommended read: The Watch That Ends The Night

The Watch That Ends The Night: Voices From the Titanic by Allan Wolf
TEEN WOLF
Find it in the catalog!

In The Watch That Ends The Night poet Allan Wolf narrates the tragic maiden voyage of the RMS Titanic through poems in verse. The poems are told from the points of view of the passengers and crew on the ship, from millionaire John Jacob Astor to third class refugee Jamila Nicola-Yarred, from Captain E.J. Smith to assistant telegraphic operator Harold Bride, from shipbuilder Thomas Andrews to postman Oscar Woody. Other voices include nine-year-old Frankie Goldsmith, who hopes to find dragons on the journey, the ship rat ("follow the food"), and even the iceberg:

I am the ice; I am of water made.
That's why it's now of water that I speak:
Watch how the water licks Titanic's hull.
Hear how the water makes her rivets creak.
See how, before her trip even begins,
the water is obsessed with getting in. (p. 43)

This creative approach to writing about the Titanic really intrigued me and made this book a real page-turner. The reader follows the days leading up to the sailing, time at sea, the sinking, and the survivors' time on the Carpathia, the ship that rescued them. Wolf intersperses Titanic's journey with poems from the point of view of undertaker John Snow, as he works to retrieve the bodies from the sea.

This book is well-researched, and I learned new facts about the passengers and particulars about the ship, including morse code. Wolf provides character notes at the back of the book discussing liberties he took with certain people, in addition to translated morse code messages and a helpful bibliography.

I recommend this book to readers who enjoy historical fiction and those interested in the Titanic. The Watch That Ends the Night is an engrossing read that connects the reader to the passengers and crew of the Titanic in a way that other books do not.

Book spine poetry

April is National Poetry Month, and since we are currently in the middle of National Library Week (today is National Library Workers Day), I thought about writing some poems with library books. You read that right-- I was inspired to break out some book spine poetry.

To create book spine poetry all you have to do is wander up and down the rows of shelves and pick out eye-catching titles. Then lay the books out on a table, and you're ready to stack them on top of each other to assemble your poems. Here are the poems I created from books I grabbed from the adult and teen collections:

Cute Author Alert: Jens Lapidus

Jens Lapidus is a Swedish criminal defense lawyer turned author (with a penchant for extra wide ties).  His debut novel, Snabba Cash (Easy Money, for you non-Swedes), was just recently translated into English.  Snabba Cash is the first part of the Stockholm Noir series, which has already spawned two sequels in Sweden.  I haven't had the chance to check out the book yet (beyond the author photo), but his writing has been compared to James Ellroy and Dennis Lehane.  Sounds promising!

Check out Snabba Cash in the catalog!

Side rant:  I'm sure I'm the only person bothered by this.  But the o-slash (Ø) that is in "money" on the cover is not actually a letter used in Swedish.  The o-slash is a Danish, Norwegian thing.  Swedes would use an o-umlaut (Ö), thank you very much.  But whatever, I'm sure the graphic designer just thought it was cute.

New York Public Library's "Mad Men" Reading List

If you are a dedicated fan of AMC's Mad Men (and I'm just going to assume that you are), you know that the characters frequently reference books and films specific to the show's 1960s milieu. One of the more notable examples would be Don Draper's  moving voice-over recitation of a poem by Frank O'Hara in the second season. But even the more casual glimpses of what books the characters are interested in can be revealing. Don's daughter, Sally, reads age-appropriate Nancy Drew mysteries. Bert Cooper, not surprisingly, extols the virtues of Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand's 1100-page love letter to the free market. The ladies of the secretarial pool whisper about Lady Chatterley's Lover, the genuinely racy D.H. Lawrence novel that was the subject of an influential obscenity trial in 1959. These are just a few of the many literary works that have been spotted on Mad Men. And, for that reason, we can thank the fine librarians at the New York Public Library for compiling a fairly extensive list of the books cited throughout the show's run. Needless to say, you can search our catalog for any of the titles that interest you.

The 'Mad Men' Reading List - New York Public Library