Don't be a Scrooge!

"At the ominous word 'liberality', Scrooge frowned, and
shook his head, and handed the credentials back." -- A Christmas Carol

On Black Friday last year, I posted the many ways you could donate to The Library. The ways haven't changed, though the various wishlists have had additions of subtractions. I mentioned in another post that after several years of having it on the wishlist, we were the lucky recipients of a lap top. We also had several individuals step forward in the past year to adopt books (we showed off the re-furbished History of Insurance in Philadelphia at this week's Annual Meeting). In case you wanted to donate to a charity as you shopped on amazon, or you wanted to make sure to get a donation in to one of your favorite charities before the end of the year, we thought we'd publish the three main ways to donate in one easy to find place!

The Annual Fund is where general monetary donations throughout the year go. The money is spent on up-keep of the library as well as focusing on one or two projects for the year. Companies and individuals who donate to the annual fund get their name published in our newsletter (we're a non-profit so your donation may also be eligible for a tax deduction -- we're not tax experts though). This year, a portion of the money went toward cleaning the library and putting finishing touches on rooms that had been damaged in the flood. If you take any classes from the library, you'll notice the basement classrooms have been spruced up!

Another way of supporting the library and its collection is through the "Adopt A Book Program" which provides for preservation of our historical publications and documents. The money donated goes toward a specific item --you can read some background about the books and look at them online in their tattered state to pick which one you want to adopt. We make sure a personalized book plate is put in the front of books, when requested, so users know whose generosity ensured future use of the material. The book plate can be donated in honor of someone in case you want to buy it as a gift for someone else. Your recipient can come into the library any time they want and admire the book-binder's handiwork and their name emblazoned on the inside cover.

Finally, the library has an Amazon Wishlist. While you're completing your other shopping on amazon, you can click over and skim the list. If anything catches your fancy, you can simply add it to your cart with the rest of your purchase and Amazon should know to send it to us. You'll notice there are items on the list for general office upkeep. We're currently using the 2004 version of Quicken and would love to upgrade to a more recent version. As you would expect, the rest of the list is filled out with books. Many of these books have been requested by patrons or are for very specialized areas of insurance interest but aren't in our budget. If you find something that falls within your particular area of interest, we'd love it if you'd donate it to our library so we could share it with many more people.

We are very grateful for all the ways in which our membership supports us, without your generosity we would not be able to offer the services we do!

Onward & Upward

Sandra Glaser Parrillo, 2011 Insurance Professional of the Year Award Winner

Donald F. Vose, President of the Board of Trustees for The Insurance Library Association of Boston

I'm afraid this blog languished while we worked on the Education Fair in September and the Insurance Professional of the Year Event in October. November is suddenly upon us and we're shocked at how quickly our annual meeting is approaching.

I mentioned last year that after The Insurance Professional of the Year Award Ceremony it often feels like a new year around here (perhaps it's no coincidence that our event occurs in the same season as Rosh Hashanah). So I'm sure you'll pardon us as we reflect a little.

A lot has happened in the last year:

1. We've worked harder on maintaining our website and blog. We've started a LinkedIn profile for the library and we're exploring ways to make our library even more available electronically.

2. We've added more items to our adopt a book program, and to our wishlist (and we finally got the laptop we'd put on there several years ago!).

3. We held our first ever Education Fair (with a lot of support), and had our 10th Insurance Professional of the Year Award Ceremony (which included a lot of firsts as well).

4. We put on our first ever (though, not last) silent auction during the social hour at The Award Ceremony -- thanks to a lot of support for that, we raised about $6,300 for the library!

Some staff changes include:

1. Our Director, Jean Lucey, changing her schedule to working three days a week.

2. Our "other" Jean, Jean Osborne, increasing her hours to three days a week (we don't ever want to be short a Jean).

3. Meagan completing another two CPCU tests on her way toward earning the designation.

It really does feel like a whirlwind, but we are glad that you were here for the ride!

The Whole Pie

The Massachusetts Attorney General publishes a Report on Professional Solicitations for Charities annually. This year's report has caused a stir (at least in the Boston Globe) since it reports that charities received only 43% of the money that was raised; the rest went to the professional fundraisers.

Last year New York's Attorney General brought a case against four professional fundraising telemarketers who employed deceptive and unfair tactics. These deceptive tactics included in some cases lying about how much of the money the charity would receive. It turned out, on average, these professional fundraisers were keeping 76% of the money they raised.

All is not lost though, there are various ways that one can determine the amount a charity will receive. Sometimes this information is right on the charity's website. You can also ask for the information from the telemarketer in writing. Finally, checking to see if the fundraiser is a member of the Association of Fundraising Professionals can help. This association has a code of ethics to which they ascribe.

Another way to determine generally how much of the money you give to a charity goes toward furthering their mission is to check a website like Charity Navigator. It will give you and idea of the charity's organizational efficiency, organizational capacity as well as an income statement usually including how much the ceo is paid.

We thought that this might be a timely post considering the recent series of Boston Globe articles on the topic. We want to assure you that our library does not use professional fundraisers. As we mentioned in a past post, we are a non-profit and there are a number of ways that you can donate to the library before the end of the year. The most direct way is probably through our annual fund, which you can donate to by clicking here.

More Holiday Fire Talk

We were sort of a killjoy when it came to Thanksgiving. We're back to talk about Chanukah which starts this week (sundown on the 1st if I read my calendar right). You're probably thinking we'll harp on how dangerous frying food is, or how having 9 candles burning near wrapping paper is a definite no-no. You'd be wrong though. What we have to talk about today is only tangentially related to Chanukah.

Recently I was looking at the definition of fire in an insurance glossary (Rupp's Insurance and Risk Management Glossary, 2nd edition for those of you who don't follow the link). I thought it was very interesting that the glossary differentiated between friendly fire and hostile fire especially since I had really only heard the term friendly fire in regard to war.

In insurance terms, Chanukah candles would epitomize friendly fire. They are set intentionally for beneficial purposes and (it is hoped) remain within their intended confines. Insurance does not cover friendly fire unless it spreads to unintended materials (in other words, becomes hostile).

If you are yearning for more information on fire definitions, you'd probably like to know that most fires caused by modern Chanukah celebrations would be considered "class a fires," fires involving solid combustibles and best put out using water or class a fire extinguishers. Had the oil lamp at the original Chanukah spread beyond the proper confines, it would have been a "class b fire," a type of fire involving flammable liquids (oil) and requiring carbon dioxide or a class b fire extinguisher to put out.

My foray into the insurance glossary section of our collection led me to an 1886 book called Harris's Technical Fire Insurance Dictionary. As you may know, our library began in 1887 as a fire insurance library (we didn't add casualty insurance to our collection until 1920 and it wasn't until the 1970s that we broadened our collection to include life and health insurance). This means, that the book was part of our very early collection housed in this room:

(taken from the 1923 edition of The Insurance Index)

And carefully watched over by a librarian following these rules:

A larger version of this can be found by following this link.

Harris's Technical Fire Insurance Dictionary has many interesting entries. The preface states:

This book, comprising in a condensed form many notes and observations made by the Author during a long and very busy experience as Surveyor, Inspector and Branch Secretary, has been written mainly with the view of drawing attention of Fire Insurance Officials and Agents to important points connected with matters of survey, and general practice and to the many dangers arising not only during processes of manufacture, but also from the crowded character of risks; from spontaneous combustion; and from other sources too numerous to mention.

Yes, all of that is one sentence, and also the first paragraph of the preface! I love that it includes this phrase: "comprising in a condensed form. . ." leaving me to wonder what a fully expanded form would look like.

My favorite entry in the book though, is the following:

FIRES, Refreshments at: Bills for expenses of this kind require very careful scrutiny, and in no case should they be paid when refreshments have been given away indiscriminately, or without proper authority. In no case where publicans throw open their houses should any payment be authorised by the Agent. See also FIRES, Assistance At.

If you are as charmed by this book as I am or there's someone on your holiday list who you think might be taken with it, feel free to contact us about the possibility of adopting the book as part of our "adopt a book" program. While the book is not in terrible shape, it could use some loving care to bring it back to its former glory.

Black Friday

While I am one of those "shop through the year for holiday gifts" people, I admit I also get up to face the throngs on Black Friday. I would hate to be six days into those 8 crazy nights or stuck on December 23rd (yes, I celebrate both holidays) praying to the postal gods that the shipment will make it in the (st.) nick of time time.

Because today is such a huge shopping day for so many people, I thought it would be an appropriate time to let you know how you could remember the library while doing your holiday shopping. We have three main options for gifts to the library.

The Annual Fund is where general monetary donations throughout the year go. The money is spent on up-keep of the library as well as focusing on one or two projects for the year. Companies and individuals who donate to the annual fund get their name published in our newsletter (we're a non-profit so your donation may also be eligible for a tax deduction -- we're not tax experts though). This spring, the library had a flood so a good portion of the Annual Fund money was spent helping us recover.

Another way of supporting the library and its collection is through the "Adopt A Book Program" which provides for preservation of our historical publications and documents. The money donated goes toward a specific item --you can read some background about the books and look at them online in their tattered state to pick which one you want to adopt. We make sure a personalized book plate is put in the front, so users know whose generosity ensured future use of the material. The book plate can be donated in honor of someone in case you want to buy it as a gift for someone else. Your recipient can come into the library any time they want and admire the book-binder's handiwork and their name emblazoned on the inside cover.

Finally, the library has an Amazon Wishlist. While you're completing your other shopping on amazon, you can click over and skim the list. If anything catches your fancy, you can simply add it to your cart with the rest of your purchase and Amazon should know to send it to us. You'll notice there are items on the list for general office upkeep. We're currently using the 2004 version of Quicken and would love to upgrade to the 2011 version. We also have a laptop computer on the list. Our instructors muddle along on our current one which hasn't been replaced in a number of years and no longer has a working CD-Rom drive. As you would expect, the rest of the list is filled out with books. Many of these books have been requested by patrons or are for very specialized areas of insurance interest but aren't in our budget. If you find something that falls within your particular area of interest, we'd love it if you'd donate it to our library so we could share it with many more people.

We appreciate the many ways in which individuals and companies show their support for the library and hope that this information makes that support easier.