Web site lets users browse library shelves

You know by now that I’m a great fan of URSUS, the online catalog for Bangor Public Library, Maine State Library and all of the University of Maine campuses. It’s a great planning tool for what-to-check and where-it-is when you want to do some research at one of these libraries.

So many times I’ve repeated the numbers that constitute the Web address, but very recently I found that there is a much simpler online address. It’s just ursus.maine.edu

(No www, no http.)

Look up resources by title, by author, by subject or – my favorite, by one or more keywords.

It’s also possible to look up books by their call number, but honestly, I don’t carry many of those around in my head. Sure, we know that the 929s are the family histories and the 974s are local histories – both of which are very handy to know if you’re visiting a library that’s new to you. (Bangor Public Library, as we know, has New England books in both categories in the Bangor Room, third floor.)

What I noticed the other day – during the snowstorm that kept many of us from wandering too far – was that in using URSUS on my computer, it’s possible practically to “browse” library shelves by clicking on the call numbers.

For instance, look up “A Leighton Genealogy: Descendants of Thomas Leighton of Dover, New Hampshire,” compiled by Perley M. Leighton, based in part on data collected by Julia Leighton Cornman.

This two-volume set is available at both Bangor Public Library and Maine State Library, though the call numbers are a little different.

Click on the call number that matches up with your library, and it will bring up a list of call numbers with your book in the middle of the list, more or less. Then you can click on a call number nearby it, and see what the book is – and double-check to make sure it really is a book in the same library.

For instance, next to Perley Leighton’s “Leighton Genealogy,” we find “A Genealogical Sketch of a Dover, N.H., Branch of the Leighton Family,” by Walter L. Leighton, 1940.

A few books to the other side is Mildred Dow Levensalor’s “Genealogy of My Extended Family: Clarks, Carters, Barkers, Bloods, Brawns, Dows, Drinkwaters, Goodings, Goulds, Lamsons, Mitchells, Mudgetts, Spauldings, Sturtevants, Townes and Many Others,” 1996.

And next to that, Charles E. Leverett’s “A Memoir Biographical and Genealogical, of Sir John Leverett, Knt., Governor of Massachusetts, 1673-79; of Hon. John Leverett, F.R.S., Judge of the Supreme Court, and President of Harvard College; and of the Family Generally,” 1856.

Thinking of Canada, we could look at Rainer L. Hempel’s “New Voices on the Shores: Early Pennsylvania German Settlements in New Brunswick.” It’s a 971 book, so it’s out in the regular stacks, not with the New England materials in the Bangor Room.

Listed next to that book by call number is George B. MacBeath’s “The Story of Restigouche: Covering the Indian, French, and English Periods of the Restigouche Area,” 1954.

And then two books by William Francis Ganong: “The History of Miscou and Shippegan” and “The History of Caraquet and Pokemouche.” Both are reprinted from Acadiensis in 1907.

And what, exactly, is “Acadiensis”? It’s two publications.

The first version, “devoted to the interests of the Maritime Provinces of Canada,” was edited by David Russell Jack, 1901-1908. According to URSUS, Bangor Public Library has all eight bound volumes. The University of Maine’s Fogler Library in Orono has it on microfilm.

The current version, begun in 1971, is a journal of regional history.

Libraries that have the run of it include Fogler Library in Orono, University of Maine at Fort Kent, University of Maine at Machias and University of Southern Maine in Gorham. The University of Maine at Presque Isle has an index for 1971-1991.

For information on the contents of current and recent issues, check the Web site at www.lib.unb.ca/Texts/Acadiensis/home.htm

For example, the fall 2006 issue included Roger Marsters’ “The Battle of Grand Pr?”: The Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada and the Commemoration of Acadian History.”

Send genealogy queries to Family Ties, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor, ME 04402; or e-mail queries to familyti@bangordailynews.net.