Notices by John Overholt (overholt@glammr.us)

I am delighted that we've been able to digitize our copy of Galileo's Dialogue on the Two World Systems, with its iconic Stefano della Bella frontispiece showing Copernicus schooling Aristotle and Ptolemy. https://nrs.lib.harvard.edu/urn-3:fhcl.hough:105459115

I am old enough to remember being warned that you can't trust Wikipedia and now it is the very last thing I still trust to accurately reflect a consensus reality.

In that sad phase of Monsterdon where the stream is like “Ok, good work everybody” but I’ve still got 6 minutes left because of all the Tubi ads. #Monsterdon

Why is the nonsense phrase “vegetative electron microscopy” turning up in fake scientific papers? Add two-column formatting to the list of things AI doesn’t understand. https://retractionwatch.com/2025/02/10/vegetative-electron-microscopy-fingerprint-paper-mill/
Via @Researchbuzz

A timely reminder of the difference between a house organ and independent journalism.

Next week, the earliest cookbook by an African American author will be issued in a new edition, drawn from the only known copy, in the collection of the Clements Library at the University of Michigan. https://www.lib.umich.edu/about-us/news/more-just-recipes
#BlackHistoryMonth #Libraries

Provenance research gets unexpectedly spicy.

Harvard’s Library Innovation Lab has made available a 16TB archive preserving the government data sets on data.gov in a purge-free environment. https://lil.law.harvard.edu/blog/2025/02/06/announcing-data-gov-archive/

Feeling snazzy today in a brand new tweed jacket and silk pocket square combo.

This must be some kind of record for the most incongruous tonal shift within a single paragraph. https://uwmspeccoll.tumblr.com/post/774304757094481920/steamy-saturday

The accountbook of perhaps the greatest observational astronomer of the 18th century, Charles Messier, recording in a neat, tiny hand every financial transaction over a period of years, but with a wealth of intriguing biographical detail as well.
#NewAcq #NewAcquisition

Every week the Tumblr from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee special collections does a post on wood engraved illustrations, and they are always gorgeous. https://uwmspeccoll.tumblr.com/tagged/Wood%20Engraving%20Wednesday

The first opera composed by a Black American will be staged from the only known manuscript, found in the Harvard Theatre Collection at Houghton. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/28/arts/music/edmond-dede-morgiane-opera.html?unlocked_article_code=1.sk4.Z_Fn.H8At-v2YK--2

After some years accessible only through a subscription database, more than 300 medieval manuscripts comprising the library of 17th century scholar Isaac Vossius are now freely available. https://www.library.universiteitleiden.nl/news/2025/01/more-than-300-medieval-manuscripts-from-the-bibliotheca-vossiana-now-available-in-open-access

If you stop by the Houghton lobby this spring I have two mini-exhibitions on view; two newly acquired translations of the autobiography of the transgender pioneer the Chevaliere d’Eon, and two 16th century books that brought Islamic science to Europe.

The John Overholt promise to you: I will always post about personalized printing souvenirs from the frozen Thames. https://blogs.libraries.indiana.edu/lilly/2025/01/23/a-most-faire-frost-frost-fairs-of-the-river-thames/

“Harvard University has laid off its staff in the Harvard Slavery Remembrance Program, the unit of its $100 million Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery initiative tasked with identifying the direct descendants of those enslaved by Harvard affiliates.” https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/1/24/harvard-disbands-slavery-remembrance-program/

I just got out of a curator’s tour of the Morgan’s fabulous exhibition on Belle da Costa Greene. As a librarian I am deeply envious of her amazing card catalog. https://www.themorgan.org/exhibitions/belle-da-costa-greene

Coverage of Rivers & Roads: The Art of Getting There, a new exhibition from our neighbors at the Harvard Map Collection. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2025/01/how-maps-and-cyclists-paved-the-way-for-roads-harvard-archives-paris/

@jessamyn We have a blanket HL policy that we claim no additional rights in public domain material that we digitize. (I won’t say you’ll never find something in our maze of systems that says otherwise, but the policy overrides that.) https://library.harvard.edu/policy-access-digital-reproductions-works-public-domain