Librarians in Montana resign after books returned with bullet holes in them

[thewayne]

*sigh*

Police looked into it and found no reason for concern. A couple of days later, more books were returned with bullets in them. Nope, nothing to worry about here. To paraphrase Douglas Adams, the world is not only sicker than you imagine it to be, it is sicker than you can imagine it to be.

https://flatheadbeacon.com/2022/08/29/library-sees-resignations-following-bullet-riddled-books/

Comments

[thewayne]

I dug around in Alma and learned how to find who had a book checked out.  So now I know that.  I don't think I'll need it for this purpose, but it's useful information.

[moonhare]

One handy use is for determining who took out an audio book last that somehow made it back to the collection minus a disc.

I’ve also had items with two circs and six total renewals (3 per circ) that the second patron claims was damaged when received only to find both checkouts were to that patron…

But I cannot tell what materials a patron has taken out by looking in their record (unless these were returned late, then that appears in other fields) and that irritates folks asking for their history: it’s for their protection!

[thewayne]

Yeah, unfortunately we also don't keep history, so once it's checked in there's no telling who has previously had borrowed it.  We started a project where our student workers are doing a check-in of our entire stacks, and we've come across three books thus far that are uncataloged.  Most likely they were conversion rejects when we migrated from the previous system however many years ago and no one followed up on it.  I'm also hoping to possibly find some books that belong to other branch libraries.