an online reference service

Have a question? Ask an IPL Librarian!

(Use our Contact Us form for questions/suggestions about our site.)

The Ask an IPL Librarian Reference Service will close between academic terms beginning December 20, 2007 at 10 p.m. (EST). We will reopen the service on Monday, January 5, 2008 at Noon (EST). We use this time to work behind the scenes to improve this service. Happy Holidays from all of us at the IPL!

YOU ARE HERE: Home » Special Collections

Original resources developed or hosted by the IPL.

A+ Research & Writing

Need to write a research paper? Want to do an A+ job without going totally NUTS? Here's help! A+ Research & Writing for high school and college students was created by Kathryn L. Schwartz.

Associations on the Net

Guide to web sites of prominent organizations and associations.

The Author Page

Want to know what your favorite author looks like? Read a biography, see a photo, and look at the answers to Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about authors like Avi, Natalie Babbitt, Matt Christopher, and Daniel Pinkwater (plus more!).

Blogs

A selected list of blogs on a range of topics, including how to create your own blog. Subjects include law, books, food, travel, medicine, history, politics, business, and more.

Deaf and Hard of Hearing Resources

Online resources for the deaf and hard of hearing.

Election

A selection of highly useful resources on voting and upcoming elections.

Exhibits

Collection of unique, multimedia presentations. From lighthouse photographs to the classics of Western music, there's something here for everyone!

German Ready Reference Collection

A collection of ready reference materials in German (with German & English descriptions of the resources).

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs), or You Are Not Alone (Maybe)

Answers to some of the IPL's most frequently asked reference questions.

Literary Criticism

The IPL Literary Criticism Collection contains critical and biographical websites about authors and their works that can be browsed by author, by title, or by nationality and literary period.

Museums

Guide to museums and related cultural institutions devoted to offering general and/or specialized exhibitions to the public. Includes links to virtual museums as well as links to the Web pages of physical museums.

Native American Authors

Provides information on Native North American authors with bibliographies of their published works, biographical information, and links to online resources including interviews, online texts and tribal websites.

Pathfinders

IPL Expert Guides intended to help you get started doing research on a particular topic, both online and at your local library.

POTUS

Comprehensive site on the American presidency includes biographies, speeches and writings, election results, odd facts and presidency highlights.

State Library Agency and State Digital Library List

The IPL has collected a list of all state library agency homepages and a list of all digital libraries maintained or supported by states. These are all states in the United States.

Stately Knowledge

Facts and information for kids and adults about the American states, plus where to go to find more.

Web Technologies

Looking for image editors, office software suites or other applications to soup up your social networking activities? The tools you need are probably available for free on the Web. Browse this collection of web-based applications to find innovative and popular examples of Web 2.0 technology, most of which are suitable for even novice users.

What is the IPL?

The Internet Public Library is a public library for the world wide web.
Students from a consortium of colleges and universities with programs in information science develop and maintain the IPL!
Here are some of the partners in the IPL Consortium. A complete list is found on the IPL Consortium page.