Look into Your Ancestry

Posted on May 7, 2018April 11, 2018 by Meghan McCorkell

You’ve seen the commercials for Ancestry.com. Now you can access those same databases inside your Pratt Library.

Ancestry® Library Edition delivers billions of records in census data, vital records, directories, photos, and more. It’s an unprecedented online collection of individuals from North America, the United Kingdom, Europe, Australia, and more. Here, you can unlock the story of you with sources like censuses, vital records, immigration records, family histories, military records, court and legal documents, directories, photos, maps, and more. And, with ongoing updates and new content always being added, you’ll keep coming back to discover more.

Popular and recently added collections include:

U.S. collections deliver hundreds of millions of names from sources such as federal and U.S. censuses; birth, death, and marriage records including the Social Security Death Index; and U.S. border crossing and trans-ocean ship records.

Canadian collections provide nearly 60 million records from the Census of Canada, and key vital records, such as the Drouin Collection (1621-1967), which includes nearly 30 million baptism, marriage, and burial records from Quebec.

U.K. collections offer censuses for England, Wales, Isle of Man, Channel Islands, and Scotland, with nearly 200 million records: Births and Baptisms (1834-1906), Marriage Licenses (1521-1869), Deaths and Burials (1834-1934), and Poor Law Records (1840-1938) in London, and more.

Other international collections continue to grow with more than 46 million records from German censuses, vital records, emigration indexes, ship lists, phone directories, and more; Chinese surnames in the large and growing Jiapu Collection of Chinese lineage books; Jewish family history records from Eastern Europe and Russia; and more.

Military collections deliver over 150 million records containing information often not found elsewhere and includes records from the colonial to the Vietnam era.

Multimedia collections deliver millions of files ranging from family and gravestone photos to postcards and newsreels.

Ancestry® Library Edition is only available inside one of your 22 Pratt Library locations.

May Day Library Guide

Posted on May 1, 2018April 19, 2018 by Tracy Dimond

Happy May Day! Celebrate by learning more about the US Labor movement through music, photography, theatre, poetry, literature, and film from the Fine Arts and Humanities departments.

Click on the cover to reserve your copy now.

Labor Music

Prints and Photographs

Humanities: Theatre

Humanities: Poetry

Humanities: Film

Humanities: Literature

Checking out one of the resources? Share it on social media with #atthepratt.

Black Women’s History Month Resources: Part 3

Posted on April 23, 2018April 17, 2018 by Tracy Dimond

In 2014, the state of Georgia and the city of Atlanta declared April as Black Women’s History Month. Pratt Library staff have highlighted related texts in the Humanities Department, Fine Arts and Music Department, and African American Department. Please enjoy the major contributions black women have made to religion, theatre, poetry, writing, political thought, activism, and art. Check out the first and second post for more suggested reading.

Click the cover to reserve your copy now.

Black Feminism

Included here are works by seminal scholars that consider black women’s historical contributions to the feminist movement. Several texts reflect on intersectionality- the theory that race, class, gender, and other social categorization creates overlapping identities that shape black women’s experiences in ways often very different from white women.

BIOGRAPHY/AUTOBIOGRAPHY

Highlighted here are works by and about influential but lesser known black women, including early suffragists, Civil Rights leaders, Black Panthers, and contemporary cultural critics.

ESSAYS

Additional anthologies, essays, and speeches reflecting on race, gender, feminism, and popular culture.

Checking out one of the resources? Share it on social media with #atthepratt.

Pratt Mobile Job Center Wins Power of Libraries Award

Posted on April 17, 2018April 11, 2018 by Meghan McCorkell

Pratt Library Awarded National Honor

The Enoch Pratt Free Library is proud to accept the Power of Libraries Award presented by SirsiDynix for the creation of the Mobile Job Center. The Power of Libraries Award is a national honor awarded to library systems that are helping bring about change in their community.

“We are happy to award the Enoch Pratt Free Library our annual Power of Libraries Award for the work they have done with the Mobile Job Center,” says Eric Keith, Chief Marketing Officer with SirsiDynix. “The social and racial inequalities experienced in Baltimore are immense and the work of Enoch Pratt is truly monumental. When we read about their Mobile Job Center and its success we were truly impressed. They are a genuine expression of the power a library can have in its community.”

Since it hit the road in May of 2017, the Pratt Mobile Job Center has helped nearly ten thousand customers with resumes, cover letters, job searches, interview skills, referrals and more. “In under a year, we’ve already seen the impact the Mobile Job Center is having in Baltimore,” says Pratt Library President & CEO Heidi Daniel. “We’re thankful to BGE and Exelon for their partnership in making the dream of a Mobile Job Center into a reality.”

The Pratt Mobile Job Center is on the road five days a week helping an average of 10 to 11 customers per hour. The state-of-the-art vehicle has regular stops in eight Baltimore communities, as well as special appearances at dozens of job fairs and events across the city.

Black Women’s History Month Resources: Part 2

Posted on April 16, 2018April 11, 2018 by Tracy Dimond

In 2014, the state of Georgia and the city of Atlanta declared April as Black Women’s History Month. Pratt Library staff have highlighted related texts in the Humanities Department, Fine Arts and Music Department, and African American Department. Please enjoy the major contributions black women have made to religion, theatre, poetry, writing, political thought, activism, and art. Check back for one more post this month and check out the first post here.

Click the cover to reserve your copy now.

Music, Theatre, and Film

Featured here are some texts by and about foundational black women musicians, film directors, and playwrights. Household names in the American music pantheon such as Aretha Franklin and Ella Fitzgerald share the list with lesser known legends such as Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Lizzie Douglas (aka Memphis Minnie). Peers in terms of talent, these women have received varying degrees of recognition as they persevered in a male dominated industry.