Art, Music & Recreation Books With The Most Holds (October 2024)

Books about performing artists and entertainers usually dominate our most popular books lists. Memoirs by Al Pacino (Sonny Boy) and Lisa Marie Presley (From Here to The Great Unknown) rose to the top of today's list. Other related memoirs include Kelly Bishop's The Third Gilmore Girl, Earth To Moon by Moon Unit Zappa, director Jon Chu's Viewfinder. 

Drawn Testimony offers Jane Rosenberg's unique perspective as a 40 year courtroom sketch artist. What's Next, Melissa Fitzgerald and Marcy McCormack's memoir of The West Wing, provides a behind-the-scenes look at the television show. Emily Nussbaum's Cue The Sun looks at the popular phenomenon of reality TV.

William Finnegan's surfing memoir Barbarian Days has been circulating consistently over the past decade that we have offered the title. Danny Lyon's photo documentation of motorcycle culture, The Bikeriders, first published in 1968 and reprinted in 2014 remains a hot title.

Craft books often figure among our most popular titles, this time including Making Things, 15 Minute Art Watercolour, and Knitting for Olive. Works discussing the creative process like The Long Run and Assembling Tomorrow are also perennially popular.

Daniel Levitin's I Heard There Was a Special Chord explores the global looking at the relationship between music and healing. Paris In Ruins by Sebastian Smee ties the birth of French impression to its larger historical context. Memories of Home by decorator Heidi Caillier is a welcome addition to our interior decoration shelves.

Sonny Boy: A Memoir by Al Pacino (Penguin Press, 2024).

From Here to The Great Unknown: A Memoir by Lisa Marie Presley and Riley Keough (Random House, 2024).

What's Next: A Backstage Pass to The West Wing, Its Cast and Crew, and Its Enduring Legacy of Service by Melissa Fitzgerald & Mary McCormack (Dutton, 2024).

The Third Gilmore Girl: A Memoir by Kelly Bishop, with Lindsay Harrison (Gallery Books 2024).

I Heard There Was A Secret Chord: Music as Medicine by Daniel J. Levitin (W.W. Norton & Company, 2024).

The Bikeriders by Danny Lyon (Aperture, 2014).

Paris In Ruins: Love, War, and The Birth of Impressionism by Sebastian Smee (W.W. Norton & Company, 2024)

Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan (Penguin Press, 2015).

Making Things: Finding Use, Meaning & Satisfaction in Crafting Everyday Objects by Erin Boyle & Rose Pearlman (Hardie Grant North America, 2024).

15 Minute Art Watercolour: Learn to Paint in Six Steps or Less by Jola Sopek (Hardie Grant Books, 2024).

Earth to Moon: A Memoir by Moon Unit Zappa (Dey St., 2024).

The Long Run: A Creative Inquiry by Stacey D'Erasmo (Graywolf Press, 2024).

Drawn Testimony: My Four Decades as A Courtroom Sketch Artist by Jane Rosenberg (Hanover Square Press, 2024).

Cue The Sun: The Invention of Reality TV by Emily Nussbaum (Random House, 2024).

Memories of Home: Interiors by Heidi Caillier (Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., 2023).

Viewfinder: A Memoir of Seeing and Being Seen by Jon M. Chu and Jeremy McCarter (Random House, 2024).

Knitting for Olive: Classic, Timeless Knitting Patterns (Interweave, 2023)

The Selby Comes Home by Todd Selby (Abrams, 2024).

Assembling Tomorrow: A Guide to Designing a Thriving Future by Carissa Carter and Scott Doorley (Ten Speed Press, 2024).

Previous lists:

Most requested Art, Music & Recreation Center books (Dewey 700s) - March 2023

The Top Fifteen Most Requested Books in the Art, Music and Recreation Center, March 2022

The Most Requested Art, Music and Recreation Center books in November 2017

The Most Requested Art, Music & Recreation Center Books in January 2017

The Most Requested Art, Music & Recreation Center Books - December 2015

The 25 Art, Music and Recreation Center Books with the Most Hold in April 2015

The Most Requested Art, Music and Recreation Center books in 2013

The Most Requested Art, Music and Recreation Center books in May 2013

The Wonderful World of Brother Buzz

We've written earlier about Ralph Chessé's first foray into bringing marionettes into television, the 1951 children's program Willie and the Baron. While it received accolades, it ceased after about six months due to a lack of funding.

Financial support came his way the following year. Chessé recalled in his memoir, "I was approached by a group of ladies who were very much interested in promoting kindness toward animals." This was the Oakland's Latham Foundation for Humane Education who had presented the Adventures of Brother Buzz on KLX radio in 1937 and 1938.

According to Chessé's recollection, the Foundation approached him in the spring of 1952 and by the fall of 1952 he had assembled a number of marionette animals and went on the air. However, look at the San Francisco Chronicle of March 5, 1952 already shows Brother Buzz as part of the broadcast schedule.

Advertisement for KPIX, Channel 5 (source: San Francisco Examiner June 4, 1952)

A later advertisement noted that the program was created for children aged 3 to 10, describing it as "Fascinating lessons from insect life in these charming marionettes, with Brother Buzz as the bee."

It's difficult for us to imagine today that in 1952 near all early television was broadcast live and there was a limited amount of syndicated programming. Chessé had to bring his puppet theater and fellow marionnettists into the KPIX studios at 2655 Van Ness Avenue once a week to film on Wednesday afternoons.

Brother Buzz and Busy Bee  (image source: Chessé Arts Limited website in Archive.org)

The show continued to be written by Dolores Wilkins Kent, president of the Latham Foundation. Charlotte Morris produced the show for KPIX. 

In the early seasons Ralph Chessé's son Dion voiced Brother Buzz; Lettie Connell Schubert voiced Miss Busy Bee. Later on Bruce Chessé's took over for his brother and Virginia Arnett followed by Marian Derby took over for Lettie Connell. Ralph Chessé voiced most of the animal guests on the program.

While The Wonderful World of Brother Buzz only broadcast for fifteen minutes a week, each episode required significant creative labor on Chessé's part. He had to continuously imagine, design and make every new marionette characters. Throughout his long career he eventually created over a thousand puppets. 

Gilbert Fox and Mr. Rabbit (image source: Latham Letter Winter 2014)

When a syndicated show displaced Brother Buzz from KPIX in 1960, Chessé and his team continued the program on KTVU. This coincided a change in production team to a Hollywood based firm who according to Chessé were less interested in marionettes. Nevertheless, they made arrangements to get the show syndicated nationally. The show's end was foreshadowed in 1963 when the station began to broadcast the program from videotape. It was then paired with nature documentary shorts. 

The show broadcast through 1969, although it's possible that as soon as 1966 the marionettes were replaced by animated characters.

Filming of The Wonderful World of Brother Buzz at KPIX-TV (image source: Latham Letter June 2015)

The Wonderful World of Brother Buzz was longest running children's television show in Bay Area history. The show received continuous fan mail. By the mid-1960s, the Brother Buzz Club boasted more than 45,000 Bay Area members.

Remember these are the closing days of the exhibit Ralph Chessé: A San Francisco Century in the Main Library's Jewett Gallery. The exhibit continues through August 18, 2024.

Bibliography:

Chessé, Ralph, The Marionette Actor (George Mason University Press, 1987).

Comer, Kellie and Kathy Foley, "Ralph Chessé," Puppetry International, (n. 51) 2022. in: https://research.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=df2e6cf1-ec9a-36c4-b5c9-ceefc6c950fb

Holt, Tim, "Conversation With a Puppeteer," San Francisco Chronicle April 28, 1974.

"Latham Celebrates: A Year in Our Life and A Little Bity of History," Latham Letter (Winter 2004).

Newton, Dwight. "Kids and Commercials," San Francisco Chronicle August 6, 1972

O'Flaherty, Terence. "Television and Radio," San Francisco Chronicle April 16, 1953

"A Page from Our History Book: The Wonderful World of Brother Buzz," Latham Letter Winter 2015.

Wasserman, John L., "Buzz Pulled Some Strings and Has Gone National," San Francisco Chronicle February 16, 1964.

Early Television Marionettes of Ralph Chessé

The San Francisco Public Library has been pleased to present Ralph Chessé: A San Francisco Century from May 16 through August 18, 2024 in the Jewett Gallery. As the exhibit shows, Chessé was a man of many talents who achieved success as a painter, lithographer, actor, director, playwright and marionettist.

He was also a pioneer of children's television programming most famous for his nationally distributed puppet show, The Wonderful World of Brother Buzz, that was on the air from 1952 to 1973. A year before, he had already stepped into the world of children's television a program called Willie and the Baron.

source: San Francisco Chronicle July 10, 1951

Alternating with Chris [Cut Cartoons] at 6 p.m. each Monday and Wednesday is WILLI AND THE BARON, a new program straight from the world of fable and fancy, featuring marionette Baron Woodly.

This 15 minute program aired live on KGO twice a week for six months. 

Willie and The Baron (image source: The Marionette Actor)

The show was sometimes also called Willie and the Baron or Baron Woodley and Friends. (The Baron's name was also spelled Woodly at times).

In his short memoir, The Marionette Actor, Chessé writes about the creative conditions in early television. Programming was scarce and its content difficult to pay for. He noted that the interview format became popular owing to its production simplicity. He auditioned a television program idea that would be a "marionette spoof" of the standard news interview, but his idea was not well-received. He tweaked it a bit using the interview format to change the subjects to characters from familiar nursery rhymes and folk stories. Thus, Willie and the Baron was conceived.

Chessé voiced Baron Woodley. His son Dion voice Willie who Chessé described as a "stooge office boy." Lettie Connell played all the women's voice. Even within that limitation the possibilities were vast. He described the challenge preparing a new set of marionettes for each show. He also had to conceive and write two scripts a week for the show presented live. When it first aired it was listed on the daily schedule as "Impossible Interview" or "Impossible Interviews."

Dwight Newton, writing for the San Francisco Chronicle, was very enthusiastic about the show.

The "Baron" is a quaint, old world, pixie-like character with a big nose and horn rimmed glasses. He conducts "impossible interviews" with famed figures of history and fiction, assisted by "Willi," a wide-eyed busybody with bushy hair and big ears.

Into their mouths Chesse puts delightful dialogue. Into their movements he injects a sprightly and fascinating charm. But thin, no wonder! Mr. Chesse, who has been making and manipulating marionettes here for more than a quarter of a century, has a national reputation.

Recent "impossible interviews" have been with Rip Van Winkle, Ali Baba, the Long Stanger and his horse Chigger, and Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp.

Newton concludes by exclaiming that "Willie and Baron" is "conducted with charm and sincerity and high, good humor and good taste--a welcome and worthwhile contribution to local television."

While the intrinsic value of the show was evident, it did not contribute enough value to the bottom line for KGO and they cancelled the program after 6 months.

Musical Bear from Willie and the Baron (image source: Chessé Arts Limited website in Archive.org)

The Mad Hatter from Willie and the Baron (image source: Chessé Arts Limited website in Archive.org)

During this time, Chessé also created television commercials employing his marionettes for beer and Calso Water. He did soon find a reliable sponsor for his next marionette program, The Wonderful World of Brother Buzz, that allowed it to thrive for several years.

"Impossible Interview" at 6 PM, KGO-TV, Channel 7

Television Listing, July 11, 1951 (source: San Francisco Examiner)

Bibliography:

Chessé, Ralph, The Marionette Actor (George Mason University Press, 1987).

Franklin, Bob, "Show Time," San Francisco Chronicle July 10, 1951.

McPharlin, Paul and Marjorie Batcheler McPharlin, The Puppet Theatre in America: A History, 1524-1948, with a Supplement: Puppets in America since 1948 (Plays, Inc., 1969).

Newton, Dwight, "Day and Night with Radio and Television," San Francisco Chronicle August 4, 1951

Most checked out 2018 titles in the Art, Music & Recreation Center

The most popular 2018 books in the Art, Music & Recreation are an eclectic mix that show a diversity of subject matter and reading interests.

The top book of the year is a biography of the Bay Area's own Robin Williams.  A more surprising title is Why Art? by Eleanor Davis, an illustrated exploration of creativity and the creative process.  It's less of a surprise that actress Sally Field's memoir In Pieces has quite a readership, but All The Answers, a graphic memoir about the author, Michael Kupperman's father is not an obvious favorite.

The sheet music from film soundtracks is frequently popular and the songs from The Greatest Showman are currently in demand.  Our borrowers also find photographer Berenice Abbott's life story compelling. Astral Weeks commemorates the 50th anniversary of Van Morrison's legendary album, placing it within the context of its times.

Embroidery seems like the hot craft these days; Fashion Embroidery combines this art with the elegance of high fashion.  All The Pieces Matter is an oral history of The Wire, a powerful television drama from the early 2000s.  There is obviously local interest in Nathan Turner's I Love California, a book that mixes interior decoration, entertaining and recipes covering the length and breadth of the state.

Of course, there are more recent books that have not had time build up a large number of circulations.  (A couple of books from later in the year that are doing well include Mary Beard's new title How Do We Look and Ninth Street Women, a study of five important book overlooked New York artists of the Abstract Expressionism movement). This cross-section of titles is not exactly a best-seller list but it does reflect a range of our public's interests

1. Robin by Dave Itzkoff (Henry Holt and Company, 2018).

2. Why Art? by Eleanor Davis (Fantagraphics Books, 2018).

3. In Pieces: A Memoir by Sally Field (Grand Central Publishing, 2018).

4. All The Answers by Michael Kupperman (Gallery 13, 2018).

5. The Greatest Showman: Music from The Motion Picture Soundtrack / original songs by Benj Pasek & Justin Paul (Hal Leonard Corporation, 2018)

6. Berenice Abbott: A Life in Photography by Julia Van Haaften. (W.W. Norton & Company, 2018).

7. Astral Weeks: A Secret History of 1968 by Ryan H. Walsh (Penguin Press, 2018).

8. Fashion Embroidery: Embroidery Techniques and Inspiration for Haute-Couture Clothing by Jessica Jane Pile (Batsford, 2018).

9. All the Pieces Matter: The Inside Story of The Wire by Jonathan Abrams (Crown Archetype, 2018).

10. Nathan Turner's I Love California: Live, Eat, and Entertain the West Coast Way with Kerstin Czarra (Abrams, 2018).

Later titles:

How Do We Look?: The Body, the Divine, and the Question of Civilization by Mary Beard (Liveright Publishing Corporation, 2018).

Ninth Street Women: Lee Krasner, Elaine de Kooning, Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell, and Helen Frankenthaler: Five Painters and the Movement that Changed Modern Art by Mary Gabriel (Little, Brown and Company, 2018).

The Most Popular Art, Music and Recreation Center books, May 2018

Highest Circulating Books March 2015

Highest Circulating Books June 2014

Highest Circulating Books June 2013

Highest Circulating Books June 2011

Because this list reflects the cumulation of an entire years circulation it does not include 2018 titles that have not had enough time to circulate as highly.  Unsurprisingly, the top three titles on the list were among the books with the largest number of holds placed in November 2017.

Given the excitement over the Golden State Warriors, it's no surprise that Golden: The Miraculous Rise of Steph Curry is ending up the hands of a lot of our readers.  Memoirs by entertainers and comedians continue to be circulate well represented here with books by Tiffany Hadish, Kevin Hart, Gucci Mane, John Hodgman and Eddie Izzard.

The musical Hamilton appears twice -- both the accompanying book with the libretto and a score of the songs arranged for easy piano.  Along the lines of easy piano, the piano instruction manual Adult Piano Adventures.  This interest in musical self-learning in our community is also evident in the popularity of Music Theory for Dummies and Jake Shimabukuro Teaches Ukulele Lessons.

There are a few older titles on the list.  Molly's Game: From Hollywood's Elite to Wall Street's Billionaire Boys Club, My High-stakes Adventure In the World of Underground Poker became a successful movie.  Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud has become a classic on the subject.

Happy reading!


Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah (Spiegel & Grau, 2016).

Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson (Simon & Schuster, 2017).

Reckless Daughter: A Portrait of Joni Mitchell by David Yaffe (Sarah Crichton Books, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017).

Golden: The Miraculous Rise of Steph Curry by Marcus Thompson II (Touchstone, 2017).

The Last Black Unicorn by Tiffany Haddish (Gallery Books, 2017).

I Can't Make This Up: Life Lessons by Kevin Hart with Neil Strauss (37 Ink; Atria, 2017).

Hamilton: The Revolution: Being the Complete Libretto Of the Broadway Musical, With a True Account of Its Creation, and Concise Remarks on Hip-hop, the Power Of Stories, And the New America by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jeremy McCarter (Grand Central Publishing, 2016).

The Autobiography of Gucci Mane (Simon & Schuster, 2017).

Music Theory For Dummies by Michael Pilhofer, MM and Holly Day (John Wiley & Sons, 2015).

Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud (Paradox Press, 1999).

The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, The Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made by Greg Sestero & Tom Bissell (Simon & Schuster, 2013).

Molly's Game: From Hollywood's Elite to Wall Street's Billionaire Boys Club, My High-stakes Adventure In the World of Underground Poker by Molly Bloom (It Books, 2014).

A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction by Christopher Alexander, Sara Ishikawa, Murray Silverstein, with Max Jacobson, Ingrid Fiksdahl-King, Shlomo Angel (Oxford University Press, 1977).

Rock Climbing: Mastering Basic Skills by Craig Luebben (Mountaineer Books, 2014).

Jake Shimabukuro teaches ukulele lessons (Hal Leonard, 2017).

Vacationland: True Stories From Painful Beaches by John Hodgman (Viking, 2017).

Believe Me: A Memoir of Love, Death, and Jazz Chickens by Eddie Izzard (Blue Rider Press, 2017).

Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool: A True Love Story by Peter Turner (Picador, 2017).

Adult Piano Adventures: A Comprehensive Piano Course: All-in-one Lesson Book: Solos, Technique, Theory. 1 by Nancy and Randall Faber (Faber Piano Adventures, 2010).

Hamilton: An American musical; Easy Piano Selections / book, music and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hal Leonard, 2015).

The Most Requested Art, Music and Recreation Center books in January 2017

The top three titles on our current list match well with the nonfiction bestsellers listed in last Sunday's Chronicle.  In the Bay Area, Born a Crime ranks at number 6 and The Princess Diarist ranks at number 4.  Bruce Springsteen's memoir ranks number 3 nation-wide.

Books on hollywood, show business and entertainment in general often do well on the lists of holds.  Memoirs by Anna Kendrick, Lauren Graham, Megyn Kelly as well as the oral history of the Daily Show are all very popular.  In past lists rock and pop music memoirs have also faired well, but only Born to Run and Robbie Robertson's Testimony place on this list.

One slightly surprising title is Walking Through Walls by Marina Abramović.  While Abramović has achieved great renown in performance art circles, she seems out of place among the celebrities of this list.  But, I think the book's popularity reflects San Francisco's readers who have also shown favor towards two books about fine art - How To See by David Salle and a History of Pictures by David Hockney.

Sex sells - even sex from 80 years as Mary Astor's Purple Diary shows.  And anything with the Murakami touch will do well with our readers as can be seen with his book of conversations about music with Seiji Ozawa.

If these books excite you as well, you may have get in line to read them.  Thankfully, the majority of the titles are also available in eBook formats.

Happy reading.


1. Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah (Spiegel & Grau, 2016).

2. The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher (Blue Rider Press, 2016).

3. Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen (Simon & Schuster, 2016).

4. Scrappy Little Nobody by Anna Kendrick (Touchstone, 2016).

5. Talking as Fast as I Can: From Gilmore Girls to Gilmore Girls, (And Everything In Between) by Lauren Graham (Ballantine Books, 2016).

6. Settle For More by Megyn Kelly (Harper, 2016)

7. The Daily Show (The Book): An Oral History As Told By Jon Stewart, The Correspondents, Staff and Guests by Chris Smith (Grand Central Publishing, 2016).

8. The Godfather Notebook by Francis Ford Coppola (Regan Arts, 2016).

9. Kathy Griffin's Celebrity Run-Ins: My A-Z Index by Kathy Griffin (Flatiron Books, 2016).

10. Mary Astor's Purple Diary: The Great American Sex Scandal of 1936 by Edward Sorel (Liveright Publishing Corporation, 2016).

11. Testimony by Robbie Robertson (Crown Archetype, 2016).

12. Superficial: More Adventures From the Andy Cohen Diaries by Andy Cohen (Henry Holt and Company, 2016).

13. The Magnolia Story by Chip & Joanna Gaines, with Mark Dagostino (W Publishing, , 2016).

14. Walk Through Walls: A Memoir by Marina Abramović, with James Kaplan (Crown Archetype, 2016).

15. How To See: Looking, Talking, and Thinking About Art by David Salle (W.W. Norton & Company, 2016)

16. Absolutely On Music: Conversations by Haruki Murakami with Seiji Ozawa, translated from the Japanese by Jay Rubin (Alfred A. Knopf, 2016).

17. Celebrate Everything!: Fun Ideas to Bring Your Parties To Life, written and illustrated by Darcy Miller (William Morrow, 2016).

18. Harry Potter: The Artifact Vault, written by Jody Revenson (Harper Design, 2016).

19. A History of Pictures: From the Cave to the Computer Screen by David Hockney & Martin Gayford (Abrams, 2016).

20. Wonderland: How Play Made the Modern World by Steven Johnson (Riverhead Books, 2016).

Highest Circulating Art, Music and Recreation Center books 2013-4

Memoirs, biographies and interviews make up the vast majority of the top 20 circulating books in the subjects of Art, Music and Recreation this fiscal year.  Three titles are holdovers from the top circulating titles of 2012-2013 - Bossypants (number 1 last year), Waging Heavy Peace (number 7 last year) and Rita Moreno (number 22 last year).

There are only two titles without a biographical component.  Difficult Men is behind the scenes survey of the changes in television dramas since the 1990s.  One title that has defied the trend toward celebrity worship on this list is Knitting Yarns, a collection of writing about knitting and the community of knitters.

The top twenty highest circulating books of the past year:


Simple Dreams: A Musical Memoir by Linda Ronstadt (Simon & Schuster, 2013).

Ava Gardner: The Secret Conversations by Peter Evans and Ava Gardner (Simon & Schuster, 2013).

Bossypants by Tina Fey (Little, Brown and Co., 2011).

Unsinkable: A Memoir by Debbie Reynolds (William Morrow, 2013).

Rita Moreno: A Memoir (Celebra, 2013).

Wild Tales : A Rock & Roll Life by Graham Nash (Crown Archetype, 2013).

Still Foolin' 'Em: Where I've Been, Where I'm Going, and Where the Hell are My Keys? by Billy Crystal (Henry Holt and Company, 2013)

Mo' Meta Blues: The World According to Questlove by Ahmir Questlove Thompson and Ben Greenman (Grand Central Publishing, 2013).

Difficult Men: Behind the Scenes of a Creative Revolution: From the Sopranos and the Wire to Mad Men and Breaking Bad by Brett Martin (The Penguin Press, 2013).

Shirley Jones: A Memoir by Shirley Jones with Wendy Leigh (Gallery Books, 2013).

I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp: An Autobiography by Richard Hell (Ecco, 2013).

Knitting Yarns: Writers on Knitting, edited and with an introduction by Ann Hood (W.W. Norton & Company, 2014).

Waging Heavy Peace: A Hippie Dream by Neil Young (Blue Rider Press, 2012).

A Story Lately Told: Coming of Age in Ireland, London, and New York by Anjelica Huston (Scribner, 2013).

Light & Shade: Conversations with Jimmy Page by Brad Tolinski (Crown, 2012).

Nothin' to Lose: The Making of KISS (1972-1975) by Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons, & Ken Sharp (It Books, 2013).

Mozart by Paul Johnson (Viking, 2013).

What If...: A Lifetime of Questions, Speculations, Reasonable Guesses, and a Few Things I Know For Sure by Shirley MacLaine (Atria Books, 2013).

Johnny Carson by Henry Bushkin (An Eamon Dolan Book, 2013).

Jim Henson: The Biography by Brian Jay Jones (Ballantine Books, 2013).

International Television and Video Almanac

The International Television and Video Almanac has an amazing amount of information tucked within its pages. It is one of the few public sources of industry statistics including viewing habits, market areas, and cable penetration. The Nielsen ratings for the top primetime programs are provided every year as well as the year's top home video sales. Because of this source has published annually for more than fifty years it allows comparisons and viewing of trends across a wide span of television history. (The San Francisco Public Library has a complete collection of the Almanac starting with the first edition in 1956).

Each volume opens with the year in review in the television and video industry mentioning the year's major trends and issues. For example, the 2008 volume devotes attention to Youtube and its legal issues. It was sued by Viacom for showing pirated material and also reached agreements with NBC and CBS and is trying to make deals with other companies.

The Biography section lists living actors, directors, executives, producers providing a career resume plus their film and television credits. This is followed by a bare-bones obituary listing of names and death dates providing a necrology for those who passed away during the previous year.

The next section on primetime programming is divided into three chapters. Television series are listed alphabetically by network. Information given includes how old the series is, the production company, executive producers, air date, and hosts or actors. The past year's Television Movies and Mini-Series are listed alphabetically by title in the following chapter. A five year range of older television movie and miniseries concludes this section.

Under the category of Stations and Ownership, television stations are listed alphabetically by state, then alphabetically with each market. Licensee, group owner, and contact information, as well as general and operating managers and other administration may also be listed. There is then a listing of all network affiliates as well as overviews of the top television ownership groups.

The next chapter concerns networks, producers and distributors. The Corporate Histories of the networks tie up facts that may have eluded the occasional television viewer. For instance, the CW was born in 2006 when Warner Brothers and CBS Corporation announced they would replace the WB and UPN networks: the “C” standing for CBS, UPN’s owner and “W” for Warner Brothers. Following this are listings of network executives in individual corporate divisions. The section on Cable, Satellite and Interactive give divisions and executives in the same format.

Whatever the production need one may have, the section on production services can probably help. It provides a directory of public relations firms, animation companies, casting directors, entertainment lawyers, film stock, costume and prop rentals, special effects and more. There is even a category for “breakaway” glass--a material that shatters easily, but is much safer than “real” glass.

The International Television and Video Almanac also provides listings of professional and government agencies including city and state film commissions, as well as contact information for the Federal Communications Commission and the Screen Actors Guild.

The last section highlights the World Market. Although the entries for Canada and the United Kingdom are rather detailed, for the rest of the world there is only an overview of broadcast, cable and satellite stations and networks.

If this entry has seemed overly long, it is only because International Television and Video Almanac packs so much information into its 1,000+ pages. The current edition is found at the Art, Music and Recreation Center reference desk while earlier editions may be requested at the Fourth Floor page desk.