SPECIAL LIBRARIES ASSOCIATION

90TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE 1999

NEWS DIVISION

NEWS LIBRARY TOOLBOX:

YOUR REFERENCE COLLECTION

BIOGRAPHICAL RESOURCES

Prepared by C.B. Hayden

Manager, Research Center & Information Services

ABC News

PERIODICALS

Biography Magazine

This glossy monthly magazine offers several major biographical profiles of people in the news, an occasional historical biography of current interest and many other shorter biographical features. It includes a regular "Where are They Now" feature and its "BioGraph" feature provides a unique graphical representation of a subject’s life each month. Its web site usually offers the full-text of one of the current issue’s major profiles. Indexed in H.W. Wilson’s Biography Index.

Biography Magazine

A & E Television Networks

235 E. 45th St.

New York, NY 10017 USA

Phone: (212)210-9750

http://www.biography.com/magazine/index.html

Monthly, $14.95

(objectivity statement: A&E Television Networks and Biography Magazine are both owned in part by the Walt Disney Company, the parent of ABC News)

The Constantian; Journal of the Constantian Society

This journal of the Constantian Society provides profiles and other information concerning the world’s reigning and non-reigning monarchs. The organization is very pro-monarchy in nature and seeks to promote and defend the theory of monarchy as a superior governmental form. The journal is published on a very irregular basis. The full-text of some of its contents are soon to appear on the Society’s web site. The web site offers other interesting material such as lines of succession and budgetary data for many of the world’s royal families. This oddball newsletter makes a nice companion to the lavishly illustrated and slavishly royalty-smitten periodicals Royalty and Majesty for those who track the world’s royal families.

 

The Constantian

840 Old Washington Road

McMurray, Pennsylvania 15317-3228

(412) 942-5374

http://members.tripod.com/~constantian/index.html

Quarterly, $10.00

Biography Today

Each quarterly issue contains 10-12 profiles of people of general interest. While the profiles are written with junior and high school students in mind the writing is in no way juvenile. In fact, the succinct nature and readability of each profile makes it ideal for journalists in need of a few quick biographical facts when working under deadline. Biography Today makes a great companion to both Wilson’s Current Biography and Gale’s Newsmakers. Additional series offer biographies providing similar biographical profiles of athletes, artists, scientists and world leaders.

Omnigraphics, Inc.

Penobscot Building

Detroit, MI 48226

(313) 961-1340

(800) 234-1340

http://www.omnigraphics.com

One-year subscription, three softbound issues, $54.00

Annual hardbound cumulation, $55.00

Presidents & Prime Ministers

This magazine, which appears six times each year, consists primarily of transcripts of speeches by world leaders. With each speech a short biographical profile is always included. A country index appears in each index. This index makes it easy to locate material in Presidents & Prime Ministers which may not be included in the various indexing services that include this magazine. The magazine’s web site seems to offer most of the editorial content published in hard-copy but is not kept up-to-date. And while its search engine is little more than a browsing tool it is free. Some of the contents of this publication are also available in full-text in a number of online databases.

Presidents & Prime Ministers

799 Roosevelt Road, #6/208

Glen Ellyn, IL 60137

(630) 858-6161

ppm@goinfo.com

http://ppm.goinfo.com

Six issues per year, $22.35

Soviet Biographical Service

Soviet Biographical Service provides biographies of the political, intellectual and cultural leaders of the countries of the former Soviet Union. Each issue provides new biographies of emerging leaders and updates for subjects previously covered. The updates follow the careers of each person in obsessive detail and every entry is carefully cited to both English- and Russian-language sources. Each updated biography also includes a reverse self-index making it simple to get a complete biography of the individual. This is truly a unique resource. Covering everyone from Belarusian ambassadors to Russian figure skaters, SBS can be of great use to anyone who needs to track Russian and post-Soviet personalities who are not well-covered by other resources.

J.L. Scherer

4900 18th Avenue South

Minneapolis, MN 55417

(612) 722-2947

One-year subscription, 4 loose-leaf updates, $100.00

BOOKS

Dictionary of World Biography

This projected 10 volume series provides authoritative biographical profiles of important personages from the ancient world through the 20th Century. It is a revision of the thirty-volume Great Lives from History Series. The entries are almost all written by academic experts and provide both quick facts and a narrative biography for each subject. Its carefully annotated bibliographies distinguish themselves from the bibliographies provided by similar reference series.

Dictionary of World Biography

Edited by Frank M. Magill

Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers

70 E. Walton St.

Chicago, IL 60611 USA

(312) 587-0131

(800) 850-8102

http://www.fitzroydearborn.com/dicworlbio.htm

Volumes may be purchased individually at $125/£95, or the set at a special pre-publication price of $975/£750

The Presidents

If you can only have one book on the presidents. This is the one that should be in your print collection. This combined with H.W. Wilson’s Facts About the Presidents makes for a compact but powerful presidential biography reference shelf.

The Presidents – A Reference History

Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2nd edition, 1996

Edited by Henry F. Graff

Macmillan Publishing Company,

200 Old Tappan Rd.

Old Tappan, NJ 07675

(800) 428-5331

$125.00

First Ladies Quotation Book

This book, which received little coverage by the book review media, provides carefully cited quotations from every First Lady. The quotations are arranged by broad subject categories. The book’s index provides additional access to the quotations by speaker.

 

First Ladies Quotation Book

By William O. Foss

Barricade Books, 1999

150 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10011

(212)627-7000

http://www.barricadebooks.com/

$16.95

Who’s Who in Space

This encyclopedic biographical directory offers substantive biographical sketches for every U.S. astronaut, Russian/Soviet cosmonaut and all others who have traveled into space. Beyond the biographical material this very-browseable source also includes many chronologies, statistical records and other information related to the lives of those who have left the earth’s atmosphere.

Who’s Who in Space

International Space Station edition

By Michael Cassutt

Macmillan Library Reference, 1999

1633 Broadway

New York, NY 10019

(212) 654-8500

$115.00

The Great Rock Discography

This book offers biographies and band histories for over 1000 rock music performers. For each performer a complete discography is provided which includes every track on each album. The British author includes some performers that are of minor interest in the U.S. but all the major artists are included.

(Note: This resource suggested by Rachel Sapienza, Entertainment Weekly)

The Great Rock Discography, 4th edition

By Martin C. Strong

Times Books/Random House, Inc., 1998

201 E. 50th St.

New York, NY 10022

(212) 848-2436

(800) 726-0600

http://www.randomhouse.com

$32.00

Toxic Fame: Celebrities Speak on Stardom

Over 2,000 quotations from celebrities on the nature of fame and the problems of living a celebrated life. The index identifies quotations by the name of the famed speaker and also identifies quotations about famous personalities.

 

Toxic Fame

By Joey Berlin

Visible Ink Press, 1996

27500 Drake Rd.

Farmington Hills, MI 48331-3535

(248) 699-4253

http://www.gale.com

$19.95

Whos’ Who of Pulitzer Prize Winners

This reference book provides fact-driven biographical profiles of 1175 Pulitzer Prize winners from 1917 through 1998. It is arranged by prize category then by year. Several indexes, a chronology and the book’s clear ( and almost obsessive!) arrangement make it obvious that this is the work of information professionals.

Who’s Who of Pulitzer Prize Winners

By Elizabeth A. Brennan and Elizabeth C. Clarage

Oryx Press, 1999

4041 North Central at Indian School Road

Phoenix, AZ 85012-3397

(602) 265-2651

info@oryxpress.com

http://www.oryxpress.com

(objectivity statement: Elizabeth A. Brennan is an Information Specialist on the staff of the ABC News Research Center)

Almanac of the Federal Judiciary

This loose-leaf services provides basic biographical data for each Federal district judge, bankruptcy judge, magistrate judge, circuit judge and Supreme Court justice . It also offers some unique elements such as bibliographies of judges’ publications, information on any pro bono activities, narrative lists of noteworthy rulings, anonymous evaluations by attorneys and for some prominent judges and Supreme Court justices summaries of media coverage of their rulings and careers.

Almanac of the Federal Judiciary

Aspen Law and Business

7201 McKinney Circle

Frederick, MD 21701

(301) 698-7100

(800) 223-0231

Semi-annual updates, $295.00

Encyclopedia of Television News

While not exclusively a biographical resource, the majority of this book’s content is made up of succinct biographical profiles of many of the major personalities in television news. Most of those included are on-air anchors and correspondents but a significant number of producers and news directors working behind the scenes in television news are also included. The entries are primarily written by scholars from schools of journalism and communications.

 

Encyclopedia of Television News

Edited by Michael D. Murray

Oryx Press, 1999

4041 North Central at Indian School Road

Phoenix, AZ 85012-3397

(602) 265-2651

info@oryxpress.com

http://www.oryxpress.com

BIOGRAPHICAL DATABASES

 

Wilson Biographies Plus

This online biographical resource provides profiles of almost 50,000 individuals. In addition to all the material from the print source Current Biography almost every other biographical directory published by H.W. Wilson is also included. Newly added are links from each profile to the full-text and abstracts of biographical information from many of the Wilson databases such as Readers’ Guide Abstracts Full Text. Illustrations and portraits are currently being added into the database.

Wilson Biographies Plus

H.W. Wilson

950 University Avenue

Bronx, NY 10452-9978

(800) 367-6770

http://www.hwwilson.com/biosplus.htm

$1295.00 per year (intranet pricing by negotiation)

The following H.W. Wilson sources are currently included in Wilson Biographies Plus:

African American Women: A Biographical Dictionary

American Authors 1600-1900

American Composers Today

American Reformers

American Songwriters

British Authors Before 1800

British Authors of the 19th Century

Composers of Today, 2nd Edition

Composers of Yesterday

Composers Since 1900

Composers Since 1900 1st, Supplement

Computer Pioneers

Current Biography 1940-1982 (43 vols.)

Current Biography 1983-1998 (16 vols.)

Dictionary of Woman Artists-Volume 1: A-I

Dictionary of Woman Artists-Volume 2: J-Z

Encyclopedia of American Poetry: The Nineteenth Century

Encyclopedia of Latin American Literature

Encyclopedia of Mexico-Volume 1: A-L

Encyclopedia of Mexico-Volume 2: M-Z

Encyclopedia of Television-Volume 1: A-F

Encyclopedia of Television-Volume 2: G-P

Encyclopedia of Television-Volume 3: Q-Z

Encyclopedia of the Essay

European Authors 1000-1900

European Composers of Today

European Immigrant Women in the United States: A Biographical Dictionary

Fifth Book of Junior Authors and Illustrators

Fourth Book of Junior Authors and Illustrators

Great Composers 1300-1900

Greek and Latin Authors

Handbook of American Women's History

Hollywood Songsters: A Biographical Dictionary

Inventors and Discoverers Junior Book of Authors, 1st Ed.

Junior Book of Authors, 2nd Ed.

Library of International Biographies

Library of North American Biographies

Living Musicians

Living Musicians 1st Supplement

Military Leaders

More Junior Authors

Musicians Since 1900

Native American Women: A Biographical Dictionary

Nobel Prize Winners

Nobel Prize Winners Supplement 1987-1991

Nobel Prize Winners Supplement 1992-1996

North American Women Artists of the Twentieth Century: A Biographical

North American Women Artists of the Twentieth Century: A Biographical

Popular American Composers

Reader's Guide to Russian Literature

Seventh Book of Junior Authors and Illustrators

Sixth Book of Junior Authors and Illustrators

Spanish American Authors

The Supreme Court Justices: A Biographical Dictionary

Third Book of Junior Authors

Who's Who in British History-Volume 1: A-H

Who's Who in British History-Volume 2: I-Z

Women Writers of Great Britain and Europe

World Artists 1950-1980

World Artists 1980-1990

World Authors 1900-1950 (4 vols.)

World Authors 1950-1970

World Authors 1970-1975

World Authors 1975-1980

World Authors 1980-1985

World Authors 1985-1990

World Film Directors Vol. 1

World Film Directors Vol. 2

World Musicians

Biography Resource Center

This major new biographical web site is the first joint product to be generated by the merger of Gale Research and IAC. In its first release it provides more than 215,000 biographical entries from 44 Gale and St. James Press sources, covering more than 150,000 people. In addition, full-text biographical material from 250 periodicals is included in the database. In the next release additions will include all 800,000 biographies from the Marquis Who’s Who series, material from other Gale resources and links to over 10,000 biographical web sites.

The Gale Group

P.O. Box 9187

Farmington Hills, MI 48333-9187

(800) 877-GALE

galeord@gale.com

http://www.gale.com

(contact Gale Group for pricing)

 

The following Gale and St. James Press sources are currently included in Biography Resource Center:

Almanac of Famous People. 6th ed. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

American Decades CD-ROM. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Authors and Artists for Young Adults. Vols. 7-26. Detroit: Gale Research, 1992-99.

Business Leader Profiles for Students. Detroit: Gale Research, 1999.

The Cold War 1945-1991. 3 vols. Detroit: Gale Research, 1993.

Contemporary Artists. 4th ed. Detroit: St. James Press, 1996.

Contemporary Authors. Vols. 1-167. Detroit: Gale Research, 1962-99.

Contemporary Black Biography. Vols. 1-20. Detroit: Gale Research, 1992-99.

Contemporary Designers. 3rd ed. Detroit: St. James Press, 1999.

Contemporary Fashion. Detroit: St. James Press, 1995.

Contemporary Heroes and Heroines. Bk. 1. Detroit: Gale Research, 1990; Bk. 2. Detroit: Gale Research, 1992; Bk. 3. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Contemporary Musicians. Vols. 1-23. Detroit: Gale Research, 1989-99.

Contemporary Newsmakers. Detroit: Gale Research, 1985-87.

Contemporary Photographers. 3rd ed. Detroit: St. James Press, 1996.

Contemporary Theatre, Film and Television. Vols. 1-20. Detroit: Gale Research, 1984-99.

Current Leaders of Nations. Detroit: Gale Research, 1990-99.

Dictionary of Hispanic Biography. Detroit: Gale Research, 1996.

Directory of American Scholars. 9th ed. Detroit: The Gale Group, 1999.

Encyclopedia of World Biography. 2nd ed., 17 vols. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998; Vol. 18, 1998

Explorers and Discoverers of the World. Detroit: Gale Research, 1993.

Great Women in Sports. Detroit: Visible Ink Press, 1996.

Historic World Leaders. 5 vols. Detroit: Gale Research, 1994.

International Dictionary of Art and Artists. 2 vols. Detroit: St. James Press, 1990.

International Dictionary of Ballet. 2 vols. Detroit: St. James Press, 1993.

International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers. 3rd ed., 4 vols. Detroit: St. James Press, 1996.

International Dictionary of Modern Dance. Detroit: St. James Press, 1998.

International Dictionary of Theatre. 3 vols. Detroit: St. James Press, 1992-96.

Major Authors and Illustrators for Children and Young Adults. 6 vols. Detroit: Gale Research, 1993; Supplement. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Newsmakers. Detroit: Gale Research, 1985-99.

Notable Asian Americans. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.

Notable Black American Men. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Notable Black American Scientists. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Notable Black American Women. Bk. 1. Detroit: Gale Research, 1992; Bk. 2. Detroit: Gale Research, 1996.

Notable Hispanic American Women. Bk. 1. Detroit: Gale Research, 1993; Bk. 2. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Notable Mathematicians. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Notable Native Americans. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.

Notable Twentieth-Century Scientists. 4 vols. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.

Notable Twentieth-Century Scientists. Supplement. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Religious Leaders of America. 2nd ed. Detroit: The Gale Group, 1999.

Sports Stars. Series 1-4. Detroit: U*X*L, 1994-98.

St. James Guide to Black Artists. Detroit: St. James Press, 1997.

St. James Guide to Native North American Artists. Detroit: St. James Press, 1998.

Who's Who Among African Americans. 11th ed. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.

Who's Who in the Theatre. 17th ed. Detroit: Gale Research, 1981.

World of Invention. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale Group, 1999.

World of Scientific Discovery. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale Group, 1999.

Writers Directory. 14th ed. Detroit: St. James Press, 1999.

World News Connection

World News Connection from the National Technical Information Service offers extensive web-based access to thousands of translated and English-language non-U.S. news sources. Its content is provided by the Foreign Broadcast Information Service. As a biographical resource WNC is often the first place to provide information on emerging government and opposition leaders in all areas of the world.

 

National Technical Information Service Technology Administration

U.S. Department of Commerce

Springfield, VA 22161

(703) 605-6000

http://wnc.fedworld.gov/

A variety of pricing options are available from one-week ‘passes’ to enterprise-wide site licenses

C.B. Hayden

Manager, Research Center & Information Services

ABC News

47 West 66th Street

New York, NY 10023

(212) 456-4769

haydenc@abc.com