Hark! What doth I hear out yonder? Or: What are those bells?

Those bells you speak of that chime a lovely song at 12:30 p.m. and 5 p.m. every day (and for some special occasions such as weddings) come from the electric carillon in the base of Boatwright Tower. A carillon is played by pressing keys and using foot pedals, similar to an organ. The original carillons use levers to hit bells either as individual notes or chords, several notes at the same time. Electric carillons don't have any real bells in them but instead imitate bell sounds.

The carillon in Boatwright Tower used to play a note at 8:30 a.m. every day starting when the library opened in 1955. It then played a note at one-hour intervals until 5 p.m., when it would play Baptist hymns. (For those of you who dont know, the University of Richmond used to be a Baptist school.)

Lightning struck the carillon in 1978 or 1979 but it was not repaired until 1982, according to the Richmond Web site. Biology professor Willie Reems took charge of taking care of the carillon until a few years ago when he retired and handed the duty to John Hoogakker, associate vice president of facilities. Hoogakker got the music department involved and now Joanne Kong, director of accompaniment, picks and plays the songs that serenade us as we walk around the 20th-most-beautiful campus in the United States (I would say it's prettier than that. No offense Princeton Review.) The songs are recorded on the carillon and are replaced four times per year.

And because that's really all there is to say about the carillon, I am now going to talk about the library and how awesome it is, if you know how to use it.

As a journalism major, I have had only a few times where I have had to do research that required old library books. Most of my assignments have consisted of current events, therefore I was relatively ignorant of all the library catalogue has to offer. But even if you already know what you're doing, read this anyway. You never know.

While working on a project that required research on the telegraph, I was frustrated that we didn't have any books specifically about the telegraph. There were a few books with chapters on the subject, but no books on everything you never thought you'd need to know about the telegraph. But then there was the information desk to the rescue.

Jim Gwin, head of collections development for the library, helped me by simply clicking a box and selecting "Subject Heading Browse" from the drop-down menu and . . . voila, books on the telegraph. You may have met Gwin if your professor dedicated a class day to learning how to use the library.

The point of all this is not simply to use whatever menu selection, etc., but to ask questions. All I had to do was walk up to the desk and ask, and my research was on its way. I even have a pass to check out a book from Virginia Commonwealth University's library because it's missing from our library.

Which brings me to another point: Return your library books, people, and don't steal them. That's just plain disrespectful, as is writing on books that don't belong to you.

End quasi-rant here.

Contact staff writer Stephanie Rice at stephanie.rice@richmond.edu