LibraryThing turns 11

In honor of LT's 11th birthday (today!) I asked staff to tell me their favorite books from when they were 11, and we've compiled our list, and hope you'll add yours here: http://www.librarything.com/list/10969/all/Elevenses.

It was a fun/interesting list to make—we've got quite a range of ages on staff, capturing a couple generations' worth of tween-reading zeitgeist.

The Internet has changed a lot in 11 years—the same year we debuted, so did YouTube, Reddit, and Google Maps. You can see some other fun stuff that happened in computers and the Internet in 2005 here. Many sites and services have come and gone in the intervening time, but we're proud to still be here.

Happy 11th birthday to us, and here's to the next 11 years!

Congratulations! I wish LT many, MANY more years!

It has been a really long time since I was 11 (like 47 years) and I don't recall exactly what my favourite book was back then, so I picked one I've loved since the day I first read it, which I'm fairly sure was before I was 11.

Congratulations LT!!! Happy birthday to you!

Huzzah!

Many Happy Returns!

I can barely remember being 11 -- in 1962! But congrats to LT!

Wow! Congrats on LibraryThing for still going strong 11 years later!

Wow! The Hobbit and Harry Potter on the same list! That is quite a span of years!

Happy Birthday! I love what you do for us. This is the only social media site I visit.

Congratulations on 11 years! I've been here almost 9 of those years. This is my favorite website. I've made many friends, gotten hundreds of book suggestions, and received quite a few ER books too!

It hardly seems as though so much time has gone by. I've been here 10 years! The highlights of my time here were meeting so many of our members (as well as Tim and Abbey) in real life, getting to run the TIOLI challenges, writing down tons of information about books I read, and participating in tutored reads run by @lyzard. It's been so much fun.

Best wishes on your 11th birthday, LT!

Here's to eleventy more, LT!

I've been here for 11 years minus 14 days.

>12 gwernin: Happy (early) thingaversary!

>12 gwernin: How did you stumble onto the site so early?

Happy birthday! I will be catching up with you in 5 years (^^)v

Happy Birthday LT and all the staff who make her. Thanks for all the good times so far!

Happy Birthday! This is my favourite place on the web ... for just so many reasons. Raising a glass (or coffee cup to be precise) to another 11 years! Not long 'til teenage years ... drinking, dating and mood swings to look forward to :-)

>14 bernsad:

I got here a day or two after gwernin; I heard about it on Making Light.

I read about LT and another booksite is some magazine or other, sadly I went to the other site for a year before I tried this one. Still, 10 years here and never looked back! Still my favorite place on the interwebs.

>14 bernsad:

I joined a couple of days before gwernin - I think I heard about LibraryThing via languagehat. It took me a a few days to join, ISTR emailing Tim a few times.

>14 bernsad: I read about LT on line somewhere (Guardian?). After my initial enthusiasm, I didn't use it much for 2 or 3 years, but when I came back I found it much improved and have been here almost daily ever since.

I can't remember where I heard about LT, but when I saw it in 2006 I became a lifetime member in a hot minute. It's still where I spend most of my online time. You crazy peeps!

Happy Birthday to the best site on the internet!

I've been here 10 years and 3 months. I found LT through Google when I was looking for library cataloging software (or web-based system) that was cheap, allowed full bibliographic control, was more than a glorified spreadsheet, and would allow me to have an OPAC like a "real library." LT hit 3 out of 4 at the time, which was why I chose it. Now that TinyCat is here, it hits all my initial requirements as well as having myriad features I didn't even know I wanted but now can't live without.

Been here 10 i/2 years; it's my favorite website! I've had so much fun cataloging my books, and it's been really useful.

Happy anniversary, and here's to many more years!

>24 staffordcastle: I know it's just a simple typo, but I'm sitting here giggling to myself wondering about your 10 real years and part of an imaginary year.

>25 Foretopman:

Love it.

According to my profile I started here March 27th 2007. Three months later my mom bought me a lifetime membership for my birthday. I don't recall who exactly told me about LibraryThing originally, but I know it was a friend. It's so cool to see people who have been here since the beginning! What was it like??

I guess I got on board here awfully early (having that "Tenner" medal and all), with my anniversary date being 11/11/05!

However, I have no CLUE what I was reading (aside from Marvel comics) when I was 11 ...

I first heard of LT through a now-defunct blog called "Library Stuff." I signed up at work, and the first book I entered was Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. I think that's what I was reading at the time.

My 11-year Thingaversary is in 33 days.

I joined in December 2005, after reading about LT in some magazine or online article. If I'd known how much time I was going to spend here, and how essential it was going to be to my reading life, I would have paid more attention.

And I have to give a shout-out to >27 Heather19: , who gifted me a 1-year subscription back when I was a poor college student who couldn't afford a lifetime membership. I eventually got myself into a position to buy a lifetime membership, which would have been cheap at twice the price. I've tried to pass that kindness forward when I can, because it was one of the nicest things a stranger's ever done for me.

A happy belated birthday, and many more!

Happy Birthday LT!

I heard about LT when Shelfari was dismantled and again when LeafMarks departed. I needed a place to keep record of my books and kindle editions. I am hoping when I get all 8000 books entered I will finally gain some control on what I haven't read yet. Only time will tell.

The only reason I remember 11 (56 years ago), I was at my piano teacher's house, waiting for my sister's lesson to complete and mine to begin and I was reading Little Women and it was the first time I cried while reading a book.

(I only took piano for 1 year; my sister and mom confirm the year) isn't it fun how books take you back to events/dates you might not otherwise recall.

>18 lorax:, >20 andyl:, & >21 gwernin:, thanks for the responses, I'm enjoying everyone's story of discovery. Like >23 casvelyn: I found LT via a Google search for cataloguing software.

I am a youngster, I guess, as a member.; just coming up on eight years. But looking at the book list, I am in deep geezerhood. I was wa-a-ay past eleven when most of those books were published.

I was quite surprised to find two of Ian Fleming's James Bond books on the list (From Russia With Love & Dr. No). Really? At age 11? I think I read my first Bonder at about age twenty.

How do I add my book (Black Tiger at LeMans) to this list? I have tried but get nothing when I put it in the search block. It is in my library.

>34 thejazzmonger:

If you can't find it using search, you can always add a title manually. Scroll down to the bottom of the list of available search sources, and there's a link for Manual Entry. I think the only required information is Author and Title, but fill in as much as you like.

>35 elenchus: I think he has added it ("It is in my library"), but Search doesn't find it in the lightbox. "(How do I add my book (Black Tiger at LeMans) to this list?"

I mean how do I get onto this list (Elevenses) everybody else's favorite?

If you're referring to the list Tim mentioned in >1 lorannen:, I'd think that was only staff suggestions on the list.

Aha! I didn't realize there were so many on the staff.

>38 Lyndatrue:,>39 thejazzmonger: any one can add to the list! On the right of the list page is a green icon and it says- add a book to the list. Click this and then enter the title of your book. Scroll down the list that will pop up and click on your book. Then cancel/close the pop up.
You can add several books.

>34 thejazzmonger: I read James Bond in the 7th grade -- I was 11-12 then! (1963-64)

>38 Lyndatrue: If you read that more closely, you'll see that she writes "we've compiled our list, and hope you'll add yours here".

>39 thejazzmonger: try searching Black Tiger under the 'add work to the list' ; I found your book a way down the list.

I'm delighted to see that someone added Half Magic by Edward Eager - that was a special favorite of mine at that age.

I had totally forgotten about the Misty books by Marguerite Henry. Those were good days...

>40 raidergirl3: >42 anglemark: (and others, most likely). Mea culpa.

I haven't read the list, nor added to it, and I should have read the original post more carefully. At age eleven I was reading adult books (of the mathematical and philosophical bent), for the most part, and cannot imagine that anything i was reading at the time would have been remotely useful to put on that list.

On the other hand, as I'd said, I haven't actually looked at the list.

>45 Lyndatrue: I read James Bond, John le Carre and Moby Dick at 11 or 12. And Pinter plays. All in the 7th grade. I didn't read Little Women until high school. So, not many of us really fit into little boxes of when.

At 11, during the summer of 1956, I used the library of the Society of Four Arts in Palm Beach, Florida. I was introduced to the Doctor Doolittle series and Little House on the Prairie. I then read later books by Hugh Lofting and Laura Ingalls Wilder that summer. This library also has incunabula, which I was allowed to discover and look at. When I wasn't reading, I learned how to climb palm trees (the sloping type, not the stately Royal palms) and went to the beach. Palm Beach was a temporary summer only residence while my dad, a Navy Pilot, flew the Dew Line out of Argentia, Newfoundland.

Can't believe I missed my own thingaversary yesterday!

>48 lorax:

My 11th was yesterday, too.

I can't remember what I was reading when I was eleven except for spending hours with The Book of Knowledge encyclopedia, especially the astronomy articles and the many stories it contained.

I LOVED A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain and Harriet the Spy. Also the Dr. Doolittle books.

My mother was a bit upset that I had picked The Devil's Advocate from the bookcase, but with a long school vacation and no public library, I had to read whatever I could get.

>48 lorax: & >49 hailelib: Happy Thingaversary! Hope you both have plans of book purchases to celebrate? Or at least some quiet hours set aside to tweak your library either physical or the catalog here. :)

At 11 I was probably reading Biggles and the Three Investigators: I may also have got started on Tolkien, or that may have been a little bit later.

I also started reading "real" - as in, written for adults - history books at about that age.

Happy Birthday, LT 🎉 💃

Let's see, what was I reading in 1956? As eclectic as ever: The Three Musketeers, Berlin Diary and Kristin Lavrensdatter.