Tuesday, February 3, 2009

A New Favorite Reference Question

The patron had a paper with a picture and some information: it's the second largest memorial in the nation, it's a veteran's memorial, it was begun in 1925 and dedicated by FDR on June 14, 1936, and has 16 doric columns that are 39 feet high and weigh 98 tons each. It's round and looks a bit like the Jefferson Memorial. What is it? It's the George Rogers Clark Memorial, that's what it is! I found the info not in one of the day-by-day books, the almanacs, or the FDR info in Biography Resource Center. I looked all those places before heading to Google. After a couple of failed searches I hit on memorials doric "39 feet" as the winning search strategy. It's not a veteran's memorial, though it commemorates an American Revolution battle, and it got the green light in 1928 rather than 1925. But those columns are 39 feet high, thank goodness. I love this question, and I love that I was able to answer it. (The poor patron had been searching the internet himself for hours on end, which made victory even sweeter.)

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