ANSWERS TO GO with Susan Smith
San Marcos Public Library 625 E. Hopkins St. 512-393-8200
I need to find a Q.novel I just read. I can’t remember the author or title, but it was set in New York City. The main character’s name was Leila. I left something in the book.
When I was deciding A. which of my columns I should use for my final article in the Daily Record, I knew it had to be this one.
It gave me the opportunity to do two of the things that I, and all my colleagues, like most about our work at the library. I got to solve a puzzle and help someone find exactly the book she needed.
While I was sad to see our traditional card catalog with its many drawers replaced in 1994, it’s unlikely I would have been able to use it to quickly identify the right book with only the character’s name and the setting.
A “Leila” keyword search of our online computer catalog brought up a list of novels including the book in question, Garret Freymann-Weyr’s “Stay with Me.”
Our good fortune continued. The patron flipped through this small hardback and found what she’d forgotten to remove before returning the book.
It was an oversize negative. When I congratulated her on finding the old family photo of a toddler, she replied that this wasn’t a family photo.
Her uncle, photographer Stan Stearns, had recently died. When they were sorting through his papers, they found the original negative from a picture he had taken in the sixties.
Stearns had been a UPI reporter stationed at the White House when President Kennedy was assassinated.
The negative was the iconic photograph of threeyear-old John Kennedy, Jr. saluting as his father’s coffin left St. Matthew’s Cathedral for Arlington Cemetery. Stearns was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for this photograph. If you would like to see this historic photo, just type this phrase into Google: Stan Stearns photographer.
The 1964 Pulitzer was won by photographer Robert H. Jackson of the Dallas Times-Herald. He won for his photo of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald as Oswald was being transferred from the Dallas Police headquarters to the county jail.
Librarian Pamela Carlile will take over this column. She’s a fine writer. I look forward to opening my Sunday Daily Record each week to see just what fascinating question she has chosen to answer.
For a while, I’ll be mostly at home, but eventually I hope to run into you at the library, the river, or on one of our beautiful trails.
I’ll have more time to read now. If you read a particularly good book, please email me at the library. They’ll forward your recommendation to me. Or if you have a good question for the column, send Pamela an email. Anything sent to smpl@sanmarcostx.gov will find its way to us.
