1. Today’s Caturday is brought to you by the Music Division of our Library for the Performing Arts. This score for the song “Kitty” appeared in the music supplement of the New York American and Journal exactly 111 years ago today (or, more precisely, on May 18, 1902). The artwork features both a cat (of course) and a mouse in a tuxedo. That’s an obvious win. So happy Caturday! And, by the way, if you’re into music, the Library for the Performing Arts (at Lincoln Center) has two totally FREE exhibitions you should check out today, or soon - American Sabor: Latinos in US Popular Music and 100 Years of Flamenco In NY (check out the NY Times review of Flamenco). 

    Today’s Caturday is brought to you by the Music Division of our Library for the Performing Arts. This score for the song “Kitty” appeared in the music supplement of the New York American and Journal exactly 111 years ago today (or, more precisely, on May 18, 1902). The artwork features both a cat (of course) and a mouse in a tuxedo. That’s an obvious win. So happy Caturday! And, by the way, if you’re into music, the Library for the Performing Arts (at Lincoln Center) has two totally FREE exhibitions you should check out today, or soon - American Sabor: Latinos in US Popular Music and 100 Years of Flamenco In NY (check out the NY Times review of Flamenco). 

  2. Need we say more? Nah, we think this 1899 sheet music from our Library for the Performing Arts pretty much covers it. Don’t forget your mother, and Happy Mother’s Day to all! 

    Need we say more? Nah, we think this 1899 sheet music from our Library for the Performing Arts pretty much covers it. Don’t forget your mother, and Happy Mother’s Day to all! 

  3. Here is an image just purrrfect for a Mother’s Day edition of Caturday - it’s a 1907 Beatrix Potter illustration from our Mid-Manhattan Picture Collection showing a feline mother doing what moms do: taking care of her baby (in this case, Tom Kitten). Happy Mother’s Day (and happy Caturday) to all! By the way, need a last-minute Mother’s Day gift? Check out our Library Shop!

    Here is an image just purrrfect for a Mother’s Day edition of Caturday - it’s a 1907 Beatrix Potter illustration from our Mid-Manhattan Picture Collection showing a feline mother doing what moms do: taking care of her baby (in this case, Tom Kitten). Happy Mother’s Day (and happy Caturday) to all! By the way, need a last-minute Mother’s Day gift? Check out our Library Shop!

  4. Was one of Brooklyn’s finest in Harlem in 1939? This Sid Grossman photo of “Harlem Loiterers” from the Prints Collection at NYPL’s Schomburg Center for Research In Black Culture has created quite a stir since being posted to the Center’s Facebook page the other day. Why? Because the man on the right looks a heck of a lot like Jay-Z (for evidence, check out these photos of Jay-Z when he visited The New York Public Library in 2010). Cue Twilight Zone music, right? Schomburg’s Curator of Digital Collections Sylviane A. Diouf found the photo while researching an exhibition, and said, “I was immediately struck by the similarity to Jay-Z and actually laughed out loud … I still hope somebody will tell us who that young man really was.” So is Jay-Z a time traveler? Is this someone else - anyone know who? What do you think?

    Was one of Brooklyn’s finest in Harlem in 1939? This Sid Grossman photo of “Harlem Loiterers” from the Prints Collection at NYPL’s Schomburg Center for Research In Black Culture has created quite a stir since being posted to the Center’s Facebook page the other day. Why? Because the man on the right looks a heck of a lot like Jay-Z (for evidence, check out these photos of Jay-Z when he visited The New York Public Library in 2010). Cue Twilight Zone music, right? Schomburg’s Curator of Digital Collections Sylviane A. Diouf found the photo while researching an exhibition, and said, “I was immediately struck by the similarity to Jay-Z and actually laughed out loud … I still hope somebody will tell us who that young man really was.”

    So is Jay-Z a time traveler? Is this someone else - anyone know who? What do you think?

  5. We’re celebrating Shakespeare’s birthday today with a lovely image depicting his First Folio, which the Library is honored to have in its collection! It’s a great day to enjoy one of his sonnets, read MacBeth (that’s one of our favorites), or delve into the mysterious life of the master author. May your day be “as merry as the day is long.” (Much Ado About Nothing)

    We’re celebrating Shakespeare’s birthday today with a lovely image depicting his First Folio, which the Library is honored to have in its collection! It’s a great day to enjoy one of his sonnets, read MacBeth (that’s one of our favorites), or delve into the mysterious life of the master author. May your day be “as merry as the day is long.” (Much Ado About Nothing)

  6. It’s Caturday, so we thought we’d share this 1890s newspaper poster from our Art and Architecture Collection of a little black cat running away from a loud newspaper boy declaring there’s a new opera house in town. The poster was an advertisement for the Boston Sunday Herald - quite appropriate, considering our thoughts have been with Boston and its people all week. 

    It’s Caturday, so we thought we’d share this 1890s newspaper poster from our Art and Architecture Collection of a little black cat running away from a loud newspaper boy declaring there’s a new opera house in town. The poster was an advertisement for the Boston Sunday Herald - quite appropriate, considering our thoughts have been with Boston and its people all week. 

  7. The folks at JYHS Library made our lives easy today, finding a purrrrrfect picture for our weekly Caturday contribution. Yes, you should use your school library … AND your local neighborhood branch (we’ve got 91 locations)! Here in NYC, we actually work with public schools to supplement materials, so … go libraries!  jyhslibrary: Curiosity and the cat @your school library

    The folks at JYHS Library made our lives easy today, finding a purrrrrfect picture for our weekly Caturday contribution. Yes, you should use your school library … AND your local neighborhood branch (we’ve got 91 locations)! Here in NYC, we actually work with public schools to supplement materials, so … go libraries! 

    jyhslibrary:

    Curiosity and the cat @your school library

    (Source: suricatem)

  8. We were visiting the Maps Division today and spied a book from the fantastically-named Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, published around 1837. The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (also known as SDUK) published several interesting books for the diffusion of knowledge, including one about “Vegetable Substances,” many of which you can find at the Library.

    We were visiting the Maps Division today and spied a book from the fantastically-named Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, published around 1837. The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (also known as SDUK) published several interesting books for the diffusion of knowledge, including one about “Vegetable Substances,” many of which you can find at the Library.

  9. Top o’ the morning to ya, and Happy St. Patrick’s Day! To mark the occasion, here are just a few samples of historic St. Paddy’s Day cards and photos from the varying collections of The New York Public Library. Want to explore more historic artifacts and images? Browse through our Digital Gallery - there’s something for everyone. Enjoy! 

  10. This weekend is St. Patrick’s Day, and there will be much celebrating in New York City (starting today, with the St. Paddy’s Day Parade, which you can watch online and will march right past our landmark 42nd Street building), so for a festive Caturday, we’re sharing this 1885 image by legendary artist Rudolph Caldecott, which depicts a (very odd) celebration. The image - located in our Mid-Manhattan Picture Collection - features a kind of angry looking cat and the fiddle (as in “hey, diddle, diddle”) and several children happily dancing (including the one in the front, who is either very, very tiny, or a doll that’s sort of alive. It’s unclear). Meanwhile, an adult in the background is serving the food and looking on with an expression of, “Yeah. This is normal and happens all the time.” Gotta love it. Happy Caturday!

    This weekend is St. Patrick’s Day, and there will be much celebrating in New York City (starting today, with the St. Paddy’s Day Parade, which you can watch online and will march right past our landmark 42nd Street building), so for a festive Caturday, we’re sharing this 1885 image by legendary artist Rudolph Caldecott, which depicts a (very odd) celebration. The image - located in our Mid-Manhattan Picture Collection - features a kind of angry looking cat and the fiddle (as in “hey, diddle, diddle”) and several children happily dancing (including the one in the front, who is either very, very tiny, or a doll that’s sort of alive. It’s unclear). Meanwhile, an adult in the background is serving the food and looking on with an expression of, “Yeah. This is normal and happens all the time.” Gotta love it. Happy Caturday!