Library News: Exhibits and Events 
American cartoonist Billy DeBeck (1890-1942) created many popular comic strips over the course of a career spanning nearly 40 years. Among his best-known strips are ones that involve characters Barney Google, a loveable ne'er-do-well and afficiando of gambling in various forms, and Spark Plug, Barney Google's blanket-covered racehorse (see the illustration to the right), but perhaps DeBeck's most enduringly popular character is Snuffy Smith, a moonshiner from the backwoods of North Carolina. While working on the Snuffy Smith strips, DeBeck amassed a library of more than 100 volumes of fiction, anthropology and folklore focusing on Appalachia, the Ozarks and the American South. In 1990 VCU Libraries acquired the Billy DeBeck Collection, including this library, from DeBeck's former secretary.
Paul Robertson, research assistant in James Brach Cabell Library Special Collections and Archives and a doctoral student in VCU's Media Art & Text (MATX) program, will give a presentation on Billy DeBeck and his library at 2 p.m. on Thursday, May 23, 2013, in the second-floor Multipurpose Room in James Branch Branch Cabell Library. Robertson will look critically at the nature and extent of DeBeck's research and at the character of Snuffy Smith and DeBeck's intentions for him. The talk will be free and open to the public, and refreshments will be provided. For questions, please call (804) 828-0593.
During the spring semester, a group of students from the Department of Interior Design and the Department of Crafts and Material Studies met in Cabell Library Special Collections and Archives to participate in a collaborative project inspired by Special Collections and Archives itself. The students worked in teams composed of two Interior Design graduate students and one Craft and Material Studies major, and each team selected a particular focus of Special Collections and Archives to serve as the catalyst for a design for a functional LED light fixture. With Cabell Library preparing for the construction of a major new building adjacent and attached to the existing structure, the teams also engaged with the vision for the new building, trying to imagine their completed light fixtures installed inside it and incorporated into the architecture.
The completed light fixtures will be on display on the first floor of Cabell Library from April 26 to May 10 for all patrons and visitors to see. An opening reception will take place on Friday, April 26, from 5 to 7 p.m. Attendees will have the opportunity to meet the designers and to discuss the project. Both the exhibit and the opening reception will be free and open to the public.
Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences opens "Rams Reaching Out," a photography exhibition featuring contest entries about the outreach activities of VCU health sciences students from urban Richmond to rural Southwest Virginia to the faraway shores of West Africa.
All are invited to the reception at the library, 509 N. 12th St. RSVP Thelma Mack, mackta@vcu.edu or 804-828-0017
Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences will host a live simulcast of TEDMED 2013, April 16-19, during regular library hours. The University community is invited to join colleagues to listen to this provocative series of short, inspiring talks, curated by the well-known TED (technology, entertainment, design) conference series, which began in the mid-1980s.
TEDMED focuses on health and medicine. The conference meets at the Kennedy Center in Washington, for a 31/2 day program.
According to organizers, "TEDMED believes that the future of health and medicine will be shaped by vital input from leading medical colleges, teaching hospitals, government agencies and non-profit institutions around the world." In this spirit of collaboration and information sharing, the TEDMED event is broadcast free to these institutions.
This is the first time VCU has participated in TEDMED Live.
- John Maeda, Rhode Island School of Design President: "How can design principles lead to more discovery and better treatment?"
- America Bracho, CEO and President, Latino Health Acesss: "What happens when patients become leaders on the health team?"
- Harvey Fineberg, President, Institute of Medicine: "What is the U.S. health disadvantage?"
- Amy Abernathy, Director, Duke Center for Learning Health Care: "Can patient data have a second life?"
- Sally Okun, VP Advocacy, Policy and Patient Safety, PatientsLikeMe: "Does anyone in healthcare want to be understood?"
- Francis S. Collins, NIH Director: "Can science take the next leap?"
- Susan Desmond-Hellmann, Chancellor, University of California, San Francisco: "Attention stressed-out docs: Can the consumer be the 'cavalry'that rescues you?"
- Elizabeth Marincola, President, Society for Science and the Public: "With open access, who translates medical research?"
- Elazer Edlman, Senior Physician, Harvard-MIT Biomedical Engineering Center: "The Big Bang in Medicine and Engineering - will the knowledge explosion actually hurt innovation across disciplines?"
- Laura Deming, Partner, The Longevity Fund: "How do we make prevention a $1 trillion business?"
- Isaac Kohane, Professor of Pediatrics and Health Sciences Technology, Harvard Medical School: "How can every clinical visit be used to advance medical science?"
All graduates in the MCV Campus class of 2013 are invited to a graduation reception honoring them hosted by Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences, noon to 1 p.m., April 25 in the Special Collections Reading Room. For special accommodations or to RSVP, contact Thelma Mack at mackta@vcu.edu or (804) 828-0017. Congratulations to graduates of the Schools of Medicine, Pharmacy, Dentistry, Nursing and Allied Health as they begin the next stages of their study, research and careers.
Member, Cabell Library Undergraduate Advisory Committee
- Edward L. Ayers, president, University of Richmond, pioneer in the digital humanities
- Amanda French, THATCamp (The Humanities and Technology Camp) coordinator, Center for History and New Media, George Mason University
- Emily Smith, executive director, 1708 Gallery, Richmond, curator and creator of InLight Richmond
- Moderator: Roy D. McKelvey, associate professor, Department of Graphic Design, VCU, co-founder of Loop: AIGA Journal of Interactive Design Education
- Ben Fino-Radin, digital conservator for Rhizome at the New Museum and manager of the Museum of Modern Art Digital Repository
- Francesca Fiorani, associate professor, History of Art and Architecture, UVA, director of Leonardo da Vinci and His Treatise on Painting
- Michael Poston, database applications associate, Folger Shakespeare Library
- Moderator: Joshua Eckhardt, associate professor, Department of English, VCU, and founding, general co-editor of British Virginia
- Jessica Venable, grant analyst, Office of Research, VCU
- David Holland, research and entrepreneurship specialist, School of the Arts, VCU
