Every once in a while I put together some interesting websites for colleagues, most aren’t essential to everyday life in a library, but interesting and fun most times. Here’s several:
ThreeStooges.net [Real Player]
http://threestooges.net/default.asp
There are two types of people in this world: those who love the Three Stooges and those who cannot stand them. The latter group will probably want to avoid this site, but for Stooges aficionados out there, this site is a great place to visit. Developed by Robert Davidson, this Web site is a cornucopia of sounds, Stooge shorts, transcripts, and videographies all related to the Stooges’ long performing career. From their vaudeville beginnings, the Stooges became a household name through their short films. Later, they then experienced a type of renaissance as the shorts made their way to television syndication in the 1950s. The site contains lists of the Stooges fabled physical comedy routines, a filmography, production crew listings, and monitor screen wallpaper that users can download for their own use. Additionally, visitors can find over twenty complete Stooge shorts to watch here, including the much-loved “Disorder in the Court,” “Three Little Beers,” and “Calling all Curs.” Overall, this site is a great deal of fun and rather addictive.
Musicals101.com
http://www.musicals101.com/
Around for close to two hundred years in one form or another, musicals are much loved by many professional and amateur companies who tread the boards. Authored and maintained by John Kenrick, an expert on musical theater history (and a personal assistant to six Tony-winning producers), the site contains close to 900 Web pages of information about the history, development, and current traditions of musical theater. Persons seeking basic information about the history of the art form will want to read the essay “What is a Musical?” Each historical section is divided into smaller sub-sections, so users can move to each section quickly. One of the best sections on the site is devoted to Mr. Kenrick’s reviews of cast recordings, current and past productions, and those recordings that should be avoided. Finally, Mr. Kenrick also offers brief “courses” online dealing with some of the great names of musical theater, such as George M. Cohan and Ethel Merman.
The Lester S. Levy Collection of Sheet Music
http://levysheetmusic.mse.jhu.edu/
An alumnus of Johns Hopkins University, Lester S. Levy had a profound love of music and, in 1976, presented his collection of over 29,000 pieces of sheet music to the Milton S. Eisenhower Library at his alma mater. Spanning from 1780 to 1980, the collection is especially strong in music related to military conflicts, the circus, and minstrels. The staff at the Eisenhower Library have devoted a great deal of time to digitizing the entire collection, placing it online for the general public to view and enjoy. Visitors may browse through the collection by subject headings, such as patriotic songs, transportation, juvenile, or artists. Additionally, visitors may perform a detailed search of the entire online database by title, subject, place of publication, composer, or the first line of composition. On the site, visitors may also choose to read a brief biographical essay about the late Mr. Levy and take a look at a detailed explanation of how to best use the collection.
Lewis Carroll Home Page
http://www.lewiscarroll.org/carroll.html
Born Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, Lewis Carroll began his writing career writing lines of verse and is best remembered today as the author of Jabberwocky and, of course, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. For students and persons looking for any number of links about Carroll’s life, his works, and teaching aids and materials to be used in conjunction with his writings, this Web site should provide ample resources. The Carroll Studies section is a good place to begin, as it contains links to a number of brief biographical sketches, annotated bibliographies, and critical analyses and musings on his different works, including a piece by Joyce Carol Oates and her admiration for Alice in Wonderland. Another intriguing section of the site is devoted to the use of math, logic, and puzzles that is a pervasive element in much of his writings, most notably Alice in Wonderland. The site is rounded out by a number of links dealing with Lewis Carroll in a variety of languages, including Czech, Danish, Esperanto, Estonian, French, Italian, and Polish.
These are a few of my favourite things 
MarkB
