General Interest
http://www.nps.gov/history/nr/travel/
It's a long and winding road from Indianapolis to Little Rock (and all the stops between), but if one is hoping to learn about the very diverse cultural traditions and history across the United States, the National Register Travel Itineraries are a stellar way to do so. Currently, the site contains over three dozen itineraries which highlight different geographic regions or important themes in American history. Visitors can browse the itineraries alphabetically or by state. Each tour contains a list of the sites covered, accompanied by a map, photographs, and usually a list of additional external sites and readings. While all of the itineraries are well-done, visitors should definitely start by looking over the Indian Mounds of Mississippi tour and the tour of World War II sites in the San Francisco Bay area. [KMG]
If you can't remember a particular aria from Gounod's "Faust" or a certain detail from the song contest at Wartburg, this site dedicated to opera may be just the ticket. Created and maintained by Rick Bogart, a research scientist at Stanford, the site provides access to libretti, source texts, performance histories, synopses, discographies, and so on. The site also contains an opera information directory, which features an opera composer index containing 4800 entries. Moving on, those who might be new to the wonders of opera will appreciate the "Opera For Everyone" CD's, which are offered here at no charge. Visitors can use the music here to learn about four classic operas, including "La Traviata" and "Madama Butterfly". The site is rounded out by a list of operas requiring six or fewer singers and a calendar of operatic commemorations. [KMG]
http://www.cems.ox.ac.uk/citizenmilton/
The influence of John Milton's writing remains quite powerful, and his ideas about citizenship remain quite relevant. While many may be only vaguely familiar with "Paradise Lost", certainly they have read snippets of the work paraphrased in other places, such as "Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven". To celebrate the 400th anniversary of his birth, the Bodleian Library at Oxford University created this digital exhibition to complement their in situ exhibition. Curated by Sharon Achinstein, the site takes users on a tour of Milton's life through well-written narrative passages that are interspersed with digitized documents taken from the Bodleian's prodigious holdings. All told, there are fourteen different sections covering the "pastoral" Milton, freedom of the press, and Milton's relationship with the Bodleian Library. Overall, it's a splendid site and one that might make some visitors pick up a copy of "Paradise Lost" for the second (or first) time. [KMG]
http://www.physiologyinfo.org/
What is physiology exactly? It's a good question, and one that is answered quite thoroughly on this website provided by The American Physiology Society (APS). The homepage starts things off with a basic introduction to physiology, complete with a pronunciation guide for the actual word. Moving on, the site contains four primary sections: "What is Physiology?", "Current Research", "Milestones in Physiology" and "Research Issues". The first section expands on the site's introduction by offering information on the questions physiologist ask, along with links to some online experiments culled from physiologists around the world. The "Current Research" section offers white papers from the APS, links to relevant journals, and abstracts from recently published physiology papers. Visitors will also want to look over the "Milestones in Physiology" area, as they can browse the timeline of physiology and also read 46 classic research articles taken from the American Journal of Physiology archives. [KMG]
http://fnic.nal.usda.gov/nal_display/index.php?info_center=4&tax_level=1
Nutrition is very important, and coming across high-quality websites on the subject is a real treat. The United States Department of Agriculture created the Food and Nutrition Information Center (FNIC) in 1971, and their work is designed to provide a broad range of resources of nutrition for health professionals, educators, government personnel, and consumers. As with many of the USDA's sites, visitors can perform a full search using the embedded search engine, or use the "I Want To..." area to look up calories or nutrients in a food or ask a question of their resource specialists. First-time visitors should also look at their "Spotlights" section, which includes a special food pyramid for pregnant and nursing moms, the "Healthy Meals" resource system for child nutrition professionals, and food safety information. For those who know more or less what they are looking for, they can take advantage of the subject headings on the left-hand side of the homepage. Here they will find resources on weight and obesity, dietary supplements, dietary guidance, and food labeling. [KMG]
WGBH has been broadcasting out of Boston for decades, and they recently decided to create a site that would afford users access to some of their unique and historically important content. Currently, the site contains over 1500 different resources, including video excerpts, resource management tools, and searchable transcripts. Visitors can get acquainted with the site by browsing through the "Top Picks" on the homepage. Recent features have included an interview with Emmy award-winning poet Lucille Clifton and a snippet of Ros Barron's dramatic movement work, "Margritte sur la Plage". After this excursion, visitors can search the site's contents, or click on thematic sections such as "Business", "Social Science, "Arts", and "Massachusetts". The site is rounded out by an area where new users can sign up to create and maintain their own personalized list of resources drawn from the site. [KMG]
Operating under the motto of "Trust Us", ibiblio is a collaboration of the School of Information and Library Science and the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Ibiblio is billed as one of the largest "collections of collections" on the Internet, as it contains links to sites that deal with arts and recreation, geography, history, natural science, and philosophy, along with other subjects. First-time visitors can look over their FAQ section, read their collection policy, and then take a look at their "Recent Additions" area. Moving on, visitors can also look at their collection criteria, and even submit a collection for their consideration. Along with their very impressive collections, they also have a wide range of RSS feeds which users can sign up for. [KMG]
http://campana.cooperhewitt.org/
This web exhibition features more than thirty objects dating from the 16th to the 20th centuries, selected from the permanent collection of the Cooper-Hewitt Museum by Fernando and Humberto Campana, founders of Estúdio Campana in São Paulo, Brazil (an international furniture design studio). Objects in the show include book illustrations, jewelry, furniture, and wallpaper designs, on a theme developed by the Campana Brothers, that they call "Manufacturing Emotions". Online visitors are invited to browse the collection using tags provided by the brothers as an alternative way of organizing the objects in the collection. These unique tags include terms such as entwining, morphing nature, quizzical delicacy, and creating texture. Objects found by clicking on the entwining category range from a glass bowl by William Lequier made in 1984, to a set of bracelets and a necklace made of red-dyed horsehair, from around 1830.
[DS]
