A Day in the Life: Michelle Harmon

This account was written for the MidAtlantic News Research Conference on July 18-19, 1997.

Michelle Harmon			
Chief Librarian				
Post and Courier				
Charleston, SC  

	(I started this job six weeks ago, with no newspaper background
but a strong reference background. It's difficult to assess what a typical day
is. Since my arrival the library has gotten Internet access and the
reporters and editors are slowly starting to use us for more than just
access to the paper's archive.) 

	It's Thursday, July 10. I arrive at about 7:45 am. I am the first
to arrive (out of a staff of three), so I collect the library's copies of
our early and final editions from the mail room. I begin reading my
e-mail. Soon, Lathornia, our photo librarian arrives and puts our papers
on the racks and begins archiving today's photos. Pam, our third staff
member, arrives around 9 am and she and I divide today's paper for
electronic enhancement. Today all three of us will be filing stories all
day long because we publish six additional sections with regional news
on Thursdays. 
	At about 9:45 one of our reporters asks me for help finding
statistics on SAT scores for SC. A brief check of our print materials shows too
much of a lag in compilation of this data. I start searching out State
dept. of Education's web site. This, too, is not as current as I would
like, so I resort to the telephone to try to get  the data. The person
with whom I need to speak is not available and will call me back.
Between filing stories into the archive, Pam and I take turns amswering
reference queries by phone from the public.We do some limited research,
but also make referrals to the public library.
	At 11:00 I attend the morning news meeting, where the day's paper
is critiqued and tomorrow's stories are discussed. I offer input, when I
can, on how the library can assist in research. At 11:30, the meeting is
adjourned, and I go back to enhancing. 
	After lunch, an editor asks me to get background information on
"Creative Loafing" which has just purchased a local entertainment
weekly. I dial into a the public library's catalog, which also offers
full text periodicals (EBSCO masterfile 1500). I locate and print out
several relevant articles. I find Creative Loafing's Website and print
out parts of it. I call the reference desk at the public library and get
them to search American Business Disk for me for financial data on the
company. We have Internet access but have not purchased any CD-Roms or
remote access to databases. So far I am relying on my knowledge of
databases I can get into free. 
	I deliver the information to the editor and get back to filing
stories.
I am asked to assist with some research for a story coming out this
weekend about costs in the Citadel case. An editor has a list of last
names of attorneys, abbreviations for firm names, and fees, and wants
the full firm names and attorneys' first names. Our Martindale-Hubbell
is a 1993 edition, but I do what I can between it and their web site to
fill in the blanks. 
	I try to catch up on some bills that have piled up over the last
few days and then I attend the 4:30 budget meeting so I can suggest
information resources. When the meeting is over, I check in with Pam,
back in the library, to see how today's enhancing progressed. There is a
little leftover but we will save it and finish it up tomorrow.
	It's about 5:00 and we head home.



A Day in the Life
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Last Updated: 09/16/02
Amy Disch
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