Say it ain't so, Joe!

December 9, 2005 11:50 AM

Books return home. Librarians do a little dance. Back in 1919, Collyer's Eye was the first newspaper to report the details of the Chicago Black Sox scandal. This year, as the Sox neared the end of their 88-year pennant drought, bound volumes containing one of the few remaining copies of the newspaper disappeared from the library of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. This week, thanks to an apparent attack of conscience on the part of the thief, they mysteriously reappeared on a desk inside the University's main reference room. Libraries aren't always this lucky.
posted by MsMolly (6 comments total)

I'm surprised the library hadn't thrown them out itself.
posted by languagehat at 12:35 PM on December 9, 2005

one of the funniest things I ever heard in my simple life is when I talked to a guy doing tactical drills at the rifle range, when he was asked by other shooters 'What do you do, exactly?' he told them he 'Works for a library...in collections. We haven't lost a book since '82'
posted by das_2099 at 1:23 PM on December 9, 2005

Thanks for the link. I'd never heard of the Black Sox scandal before this. Very interesing.
posted by handshake at 2:42 PM on December 9, 2005

Happy news for the uiuc library which I mostly love, despite my constant complaining. (self-link!)

One note: there are cameras in the Ref. Room, as I recall . . .
posted by washburn at 5:35 PM on December 9, 2005

handshake: Check out Eight Men Out (film) and (book). and another chronology.

Just a reminder that the Sox were never found guilty except by Kenesaw Mountain Landis. Jackson belongs in the HOF.

I'm betting a staff person had the books.
posted by ?! at 7:40 PM on December 9, 2005

Jackson belongs in the HOF.

Amen to that.
posted by languagehat at 5:59 AM on December 10, 2005