Yes, January is very nice in the new Men of the Stacks 2012 pin-up calendar, but continue flipping through the pages and take an extra look at May. It’s Sol Gómez from the Valencia branch of the Pima County Library.
- January
According to the Men of the Stacks website, the project started a couple of years ago, with the idea to remind folks that librarians are men, cool, and not bad looking … for librarians.
The Men of the Stacks project was first conceived a couple of years ago after learning of the publication of another library-themed calendar. Our first reaction to that calendar? “Well, cool but…where are all the men?” There was another, earlier calendar that featured only male librarians, but we felt it didn’t quite capture the way we saw ourselves. In both cases, either the stereotype was reinforced or it didn’t go far enough in breaking free of it.
Gómez, pictured looking longingly over a book, told the Range that he was approached to do the calender two years ago by friends he serves with on the American Library Association.
“They asked me if I’d be interested in doing a calendar,” Gómez says. “I said I’d do it. All we had to do was the photo shoot.”
While Gómez, is one of the more conservatively dressed librarians in the calendar there is January and a few others you can see in this nice Huffington-Post slide show.
But let’s get back to Gómez. Weekly World Central did a TQ&A with him in 2009 when he was given an I Love My Librarian Award by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and The New York Times. He’s also the father of three and husband to Tucson Unified School District governing board member Adelita Grijalva, who can now proudly boast she’s married to a pin-up model.
Gómez told the Range that so far the calendar has raised about $8,000 and all funds go to the It Gets Better Project, which was selected by everyone involved as benefactor of the calendar’s proceeds. It Gets Better was created last year to encourage LGBT youth who may face harassment and bullying.
This article appears in Oct 6-12, 2011.
The content of the Tucson Weekly is getting sicker by the day. I’ll have to disinfect my news page from this trash rag.
And libraries are funded by tax dollars! Pull the calendar or pull the funding.
Oh good grief, people … lighten up. Rent “Calendar Girls” and see the story behind this innocent and playful fundraising method. If you don’t want a calendar, then don’t buy one.
Hey you Tucsonans up there, ^^
Don’t make me hate you. Lighten up or, here’s a thought, stop reading the Weekly if it’s such an offensive rag. Oh, and definitely stop taking your kids to the library as well as the Catholic church, I guess…
You guys are ridiculous. This project wasn’t finances by tax dollars… and even if it was- it’s an anti-bullying/discrimination campaign. God forbid we do something productive and worthwhile with our tax dollars!!
Have any of you noticed the back pages of the Weekly? They are full of much more salacious images than this. Could it be the sex of the model? It’s OK to show half dressed women, but not a man? Or maybe you’re just bothered because the image excites you a little…
I suspect that most of the commenters here have never entered a library.
Wow, what a bunch on knuckle dragging retards. Are you all kidding me? I’ll bet there’d be none of these negative comments if the calendar was made of images of naked female librarians. How about when your house is on fire, you just don’t call the fire department, cause they do a calendar like this every year, too. And they’re public servents, too, like librarians. Grown people with shit for brains. Congratulations Sol and all the others, and keep up the good work.
One picture does not a calendar make. Although that is a very very nice (January) picture of a book there….
Curious if Nancy Ledeboer is going to discipline this sick man. Pretty sad day for Pima County Library.
Love the article. The double entendre of the image was just perfect. Nice work on the journalism too. Keep it up.
Get a life. Hell, I’m a straight male and the negativity here has persuaded me to buy a calendar. If nothing else will make a great Secret Santa gift for my priest.
I definately would NOT want to read the book that the exhibitionist Gomez is holding to his smelly private parts! Something wrong with this photo…oh yes, it’s in VERY poor taste, and to know that our Public Libraries are condoning this is appalling! I don’t read this rag of a paper, but someone called the office and said something should be done about it…but what? People are increasingly getting more and more stupid and immoral!
Looks like you need a BS, Bachelors in Stupidity, to work for the library these days.
Might be time for the state to supervise the libraries in Tucson. Can’t these local goverment headcases do anything right?