How-to

Have you been watching “Who do you think you are?” and wondering about your own family history? Search census records and family histories right from your home. From our homepage click on HeritageQuest in the left column and use your 13-digit Pember Library barcode to access  unique primary sources, local and family histories, and finding aids that truly help people fill the gaps in their personal histories.

Other records in HeritageQuest are:

• PERSI, a comprehensive subject index covering genealogy and local history periodicals since 1800
• Freedman’s Bank, records from African American depositors
• Revolutionary War Pension Applications Collection, selected records from family Bibles, personal letters, battle accounts, and more
• U.S. Serial Set, selected memorials, petitions and private relief actions of the U.S. Congress

Here is a quick 2-minute video to get you started on Heritage Quest.

HeritageQuest is sponsored by the Friends of the Pember Library.

Each page of your Patron Account shows the total number of items you have currently checked out from the library. In addition, you can view a list of the materials you currently have checked out, and renew items if your library provides this option. Occasionally, you may not be able to renew items because there is a problem with your account. For example, your account may be blocked to verify information, you may owe the library money, you may have too many overdue items checked out, or you may have too many disputed or lost items. Sometimes renewals are blocked for certain items even when there is no problem with your account. For example, an item may satisfy another patron’s hold request, or it has already been renewed the maximum number of times allowed. Library policy determines if an item can be renewed.

View and renew checked-out items

Follow these steps to see information about the items you have checked out from the library, and to renew items.

1. Click Patron Account on the menu bar, and log in.

2. Click Items Out on the Patron Account submenu to display the list of your current checked-out items.

Tip:
You can click a title in the list to search for the title in the library catalog and see full information about the title in the search results.

The Items Out page displays the format, call number, the item’s library branch, due date, and number of renewals left for each checked-out item.

3. To sort the list, click the arrow in the Sort by box and select a sorting order. You can sort by Assigned Branch, Call Number, Due Date, Format, Renewals Left, or Title.

4. To view details about an item, click next to the item you want to view.

More information about the item is displayed.

5. Click Back to return to the Items Out page.

6. To renew one or more items, do one of the following actions:

• Select the check box by the title for each request that you want to renew, and click Renew selected items.

• Click Renew all items to renew all the items.

Note:
Some items may be limited to a specific number of renewals. This number displays in the Renewals left column.

A message informs you which items have been renewed, and whether any renewals have been blocked. If you receive a message that a renewal has been blocked, and you have further questions about your account or the item, contact a library staff member.

7. Click Back to return to the My Record page, or click Log Out to quit Patron Access functions and protect your privacy.

We have “Consumer Reports” magazine available at the Pember for you to check out. But  did you know that you can access it online at home when you need some buying guide info? I need to buy a new vacuum cleaner and I am able to look at the ratings online at home!

Follow the steps here to get to the information you need to make an informed choice when you need to buy something.

• Go to the Pember homepage
• In the left column click on Research: Magazines, Journals, Newspapers & Websites
• Near  the top click on MAGAZINES, JOURNALS & NEWSPAPERS
• Select Academic OneFile provided by NOVEL, this brings you to InfoTrac NovelNY. There are  currently 41,551,466 articles in a date range 1980-2011 updated as recently as February 19, 2011.
• Enter your library card number. There are several ways to search. To get to a specific title, browse by publication, type in the title you are looking for and choose your title. (I searched for “Consumer Reports”) There are ways to limit your search.
• In the left column here, you can search within the publication. (I entered “vacuum cleaner” and limited to full text articles. I got 41 hits; many of these are citations or abstracts but for what I want, March 2009 has an article: Vacuums: we found CR Best Buys for as little as $170. ) So for now, I am looking for either a Hoover WindTunnel Anniversary Edition U6485-900 or a Kenmore Progressive.

WARNING: newer articles won’t always be available through this resource.

Sometimes you learn new things just by accident. I have been using the computer or online card catalog for the Pember since about 1994. It has changed several times during those years. I tried to look up some books a couple of weeks ago for a library theme and got way too many hits to comfortably sift through so I looked at advanced settings (which is “Open Search Options” under the search boxes).

I can narrow down my search by specific library, target audience, material types, collections, languages, and publication date. I knew all that, but there’s a small box at the bottom right that I had missed before: “miscellaneous options.” You can display 10, 20, 30, 50, or 100 results per page! This can give you one or two pages of search results rather than 10 or 20. I’m aware that there are the same number of results but it feels easier to look at one page of 100 rather than ten pages of ten.

We have the ability to generate overdue notices, hold notices and ‘almost due’ notices by email.

If you would like to get this service, please give your current email address at the circulation desk next time you check out and we will set this up for you. Hold notices are generated overnight and will be delivered to your email by morning. ‘Almost due’ notices come three days before your item is due. Overdue notices are sent when your item is two weeks past due.