Okay, good morning. Buenos dias. Good morning and welcome to one of the first sessions this morning. As many of you will probably agree, over the last year we have witnessed a fundamental change on the art of writing. And yes, that includes academic writing. Today we are going to share with you examples of our institutions about what we've done to proactively assist students and faculty navigate an increasingly AI powered environment. So we will start with Jolene from Carnegie Mellon University. She will talk to us about Kineas, an AI tool which is fully embedded in the writing process. We will continue with Ben from the University of Maryland. He will talk to us about their collaborative work to create a campus module available to everyone at their campus. Then Leo from the University of New Mexico will share with us the findings of an AI exploration project that they did with a group of library employees. And finally, I will talk about SITE, another AI tool that was built specifically for academic writing and research. We plan to have a few minutes at the end for questions. And with that we'll start with Jolene. Thank you for that introduction. I'm already fired up for this session. Hi everyone, my name is Jolene Paspa and I'm the Director of Library Services at Carnegie Mellon University Libraries and I'm going to talk about Kineas. I'm going to talk a little bit about the background about CMU with a nice winter scene with Hunt Library in the background there. I just wanted to sort of emphasize that CMU is frequently cited as the birthplace of AI and the purpose of this presentation anyway just to say that I think that our landscape is pretty open and receptive to implementing new technologies and experimenting with new technologies. So that's where we came up, our problem space where we were about a year ago. Much like many libraries, we were asking ourselves some questions. So how could we increase pathways for our users to discover and access library resources? I've read the studies that talk about how researchers don't tend to start their research at library web pages which isn't shocking. So what opportunities could we find to meet our users where they're doing that research? And we also wanted to think about ways that we could kind of educate researchers and users to form better search queries and so would there be ways that they could distill their research questions into topical searches for improved search results? Which then leads us to Kineas which is an AI powered recommender tool that's designed to assist in the discovery of relevant research articles and it does that by analyzing any text that you put into it basically. So it comes in a few different flavors. There's a web based version of the tool. But then there are also plugins that integrate with Microsoft Word and Google Docs and that sort of goes back to what I was saying before about meeting users where they are. So if you're reading a paper that you think is really fantastic and you're reading it in Microsoft Word, you could actually see the recommendations to other articles in the tool while you're using Word. So that's a thing that we really like, the flexibility and portability of the tool. So here's a screen shot of what Kineas looks like and so the left hand side is the Microsoft Word version of the plugin and you can see Kineas on the right side there, that little menu that pops up with different journal article recommendations. There's also the topical search or topical recommendations in the middle and then on the right hand side you can see how Kineas at the article level links back to the library link resolver and some of the topics that it suggests for that article level metadata. And because Kineas utilizes AI technology we did end up asking ourselves some questions and thinking about things differently than maybe we would have for the average library database or subscription tool. But spoiler alert, Kineas passed with line colors for us and checked all the boxes but you may be wondering how it arrives at its recommendations. So it does use open Alex for its article recommendations which if you're not familiar is sort of like the open alternative to Google Scholar brought to you by the great folks who are responsible for unsub and unpaywall. So we really liked that it wasn't tied to a particular content provider and so we didn't have to necessarily question whether they would be motivated to direct traffic back to a platform or a publication. So there was a bit of neutrality there. And Kineas was a very young company when we first learned about its existence and we were actually the first institution in the United States to implement the tool. And I think thinking about the product roadmap is really important. This landscape is changing constantly as I'm sure many of you are aware and so at the time we wanted to scrutinize that a little bit more closely but it's also something that I think is an ongoing conversation and something we need to be aware of as time goes on to make sure that the product and the company still kind of align with what we consider to be important to us in making our decisions. And I just wanted to in my final slide just talk a little bit about how we are looking at the impact of the tool and its uptake on campus. And it hasn't been that much time yet so we are still asking ourselves the best way to go about assessing the tool. But some of these are maybe more traditional metrics that you might be used to. But we are also thinking about things like is user retention important in this environment? I don't think that's something that we talk about a lot in a lot of our other library tools. But I can talk about that graph in more detail if you have questions because I admit it's not very easy to read. But we are also encouraged to see that our total number of unique users started to tick up at the beginning of the fall semester. And also traffic to our link resolver started to go up in the fall semester. So we are happy with its adoption on campus thus far. And that's about all I have time for but I'm happy to answer questions. Good morning everyone. Thanks so much Jolin. So I'm going to be talking about the AI and Information Literacy Canvas module that we created at the University of Maryland College Park. So I'll start with a bit of context about my institution and the impetus behind this module. So the University of Maryland College Park is the flagship institution of the University System of Maryland and R1 State School with a sizable student population. I work in the Teaching and Learning Services Unit at the University of Maryland which primarily focuses on first year education across disciplines. Our library instruction includes a focus on source evaluation activities and other information literacy concepts. After the release of chat TPP and the explosion of interest in AI that followed there was a lot of uncertainty around AI among faculty and librarians at Maryland as there was across the country. There were concerns around plagiarism, concerns about what this meant for curricula and education as a whole and specifically what the effect would be on our campus. In addition to this uncertainty we saw illustrated information literacy gaps around AI as the spring semester went on. Just like many other institutions, UMD libraries received a large influx of requests for books and articles that did not exist. The result of students and faculty using generative AI to create a bibliography not realizing it was possible for AI to generate non-existent material. So how would we address these issues to a large user population? In partnership with the Teaching and Learning Transformation Center, which is our on-campus pedagogy and teacher training center, we decided to create a module in Canvas, our LMS, that could be integrated into any course across campus via Canvas Commons. We also created a parallel lib guide so any student could access these resources even if their instructor chose not to include it in their course space. So what would this module entail? Through internal conversations we came up with a few goals. First obviously we wanted to address our previously mentioned information literacy gaps. We were seeing that our users were automatically trusting AI output without fact checking and this was showing up in student assignments as well as our ILL requests. We also wanted to move away from the plagiarism issue that had dominated the conversation so far and reframed towards helping students become informed users of new technology. Rather than being scrutinized and under suspicion from instructors, we hope to invite students into a more open learning space to learn about this technology that will become an increasingly critical part of the information systems that they navigate every day. In a similar vein we wanted the project to reach a broad variety of students without alienating them including both AI users and non-AI users. We hope to create a resource that none of these groups would reflexively dismiss. We wanted it to be easily integratable, widely applicable across disciplines and we wanted to focus on practical skills for students not bound to any particular AI tool. We wanted to make it as evergreen as we could so we were focusing on information literacy skills that can be applied to multiple AI tools even as the field rapidly changes. Applying these principles we had to decide what key skills and information to include in the module. We had conversations with faculty members and students compiled frequently asked questions from users and experimented extensively with generative AI tools using them in ways that align with how we've seen first years do research. We were able to use existing resources for online source evaluation and concepts like lateral reading modified for an AI context and we decided to limit the scope to university research to ensure the content was as relevant as possible for our undergraduate users. So with all of that in mind the final module ended up having four sections. The first section was a dive into how AI tools work on a basic level. We have a video explaining mechanics of generative AI and giving some examples of AI tools. We also have another video going into some of the conversations that are being had around bias, labor, and privacy in AI. We include examples of these issues and screenshots of some of our conversations with chat, GPT, and Bing AI. We thought it was important to include these aspects of AI since they are also fundamental parts of how these tools work. In the next section we talk about assessing content for accuracy. This is where we introduced many of the concrete skills that I discussed earlier. We have a roundup of some errors made by text-based AI and we demonstrated some lateral reading exercises with videos showing a full fact check of a response given by chat, GPT, and a quiz giving students a chance to practice the skills on their own. We also had a section on citing correctly going over some of the MLA, APA, and Chicago styles that have started to be set for AI generated content. And finally we had a page about exploring further resources including a roundup of AI tools, the Dolly prompt book, and some other suggestions for ways to experiment with integrating AI tools into your workflow. We're happy to have received a positive response both on campus and from other institutions. Our next step is to do a more in-depth survey of the module and how the module is being used. We'll be updating the module periodically and our next goal is to talk about strategies for analyzing AI content that you yourself haven't generated. I want to give a quick special thanks to my co-authors, Mona Thompson and Daria Yaco as well as the Institute for Trustworthy AI and Law and Society who created the videos I mentioned earlier. If you want to explore the module yourself you can go to bit.ly.com and if you're interested in integrating this into your institution or one of your courses please contact me at bshell1 at umd.edu. Thank you so much and I'm going to turn it over now to Leo. Hello everyone. I'm Leo Lo, Dean of the Libraries at University of New Mexico. So after JetCity came out I was one of those people who just talked nonstop about it to all my people and I just kept talking about I encouraged them to use it. I would tell them I use it all the time. But after a few months of that I have noticed that there's a little bit of enthusiasm, quite a bit of skepticism and just a lot of indifference. So I realized that just telling or encouraging people to use it is just not enough. So I decided to develop a structured program to get people to use it. And we call it the GPT4 exploration program. That's really when GPT4 first came out. So we decided to give them a structure way to learn how to use it and so my talk is not really about a tool but how to get people to use a new tool. So I developed a 12 week program basically with three purposes. One is well let's figure out how to leverage technology to help us do our work and we always been asked to do more with less. That's impossible. Maybe with better technology that could help a little bit. Second thing is to increase the AI literacy level. I think that we just don't know enough and we have a lot of misconceptions on the new technology. So one thing to help with that is to just learn a little bit more about the technology and not just using it but different parts of it. So that's what I want to do with this program and also a little bit of cultural change. We know that we change is coming. Let's get into that kind of mindset. So that's what this program is about. 12 weeks with two weeks of introductory prep we asked them to read up on it, think about an individual project to apply this tool for and we asked them to attend and that was a library, like a bootcamp, AI bootcamp for library. So we asked them to do that. And then the next eight weeks we get together and they would document everything they have done and we get together every other week almost like a community of practice to share the progress and lessons learned, challenges and all of that. That was great. We loved that. That got people talking and then the final two weeks we wrapped that up to prepare to kind of share that with the rest of the college and then the university and hopefully the wider audience so people can learn from that experience. So we asked for 10 volunteers. We asked them to tell us what they want to do with the chat GPT or GPT-4 mix of skill level. We wanted to appeal from different areas to different enthusiasm level as well. Some were like this is kind of weird and some are just really into it and there are some individual projects that the user for data plans, one person from the university press use it to synthesize a lot of text for them, cataloging metadata, using AI to generate FAQ versus the human generator FAQ and see how they fare. My assistant loved it using a she has her own assistant to take minutes for her so that was great. So we did a pre-program and post-program a little survey and we asked them about how familiar they are with these AI tools and their kind of self-rated AI literacy level and you can see they're below midpoint at the beginning and after that they all increased all these kind of levels so they increased these over midpoint for those and then we asked them to just share what are some of the challenges, some technical limitations, prompt engineering came up quite a bit knowing how to use it well, how to communicate with these but they all said they gained these skillset during it and they feel more confident using it and this is heartwarming for me because they like the program itself, they rate it pretty high so we're thinking how we can even improve it a little bit for future iterations. These are some of the qualitative comments. This program changed AI from a threat into a collaborator. I gained confidence in using AI to enhance my daily work rather than replace it and the freedom to experiment made AI less intimidating and some of the key learnings, well having hands-on experimentation increased their comfort with AI and prompt practice built critical skills and that's an important thing, a lot of people think that AI will replace critical thinking I think by leveraging how to prompt you can actually teach or increase and enhance your critical thinking skills and tailor projects amplified the engagement. A lot of times at the beginning when I ask, oh use it, they have no idea what to use it for so having some kind of individual projects or something that they want to use the program for actually help them want to use it. But there are also some challenges data privacy was the one thing that would come up every single time when we talk about what can they put in there, what can they upload to these programs. Even though chat GVT or GVT4 has say function to not ask, you know, saying not to use your data but people were not sure. And prompt engineering difficult but essential, they recognize how important that is but also it's not that easy to become really good at it. And also they all recognize that AI lacked subject matter expertise at least at that point so I know people, different companies are working on that so that's kind of my presentation. I have these structured plans to use it. Contact me, I'll share those with you with the structure of this program. So thank you. Thanks Leo. So again, I'm Elias Sok the associate dean for teaching learning and research at Clemson University and a little bit of context background information about Clemson. Clemson University is a public land grant research university in Clemson, South Carolina. It was founded in 1889. Clemson is the second largest university by enrollment. The current enrollment is close to 29,000 students, 80% of them undergraduates. Cooper Library, our main library on good days, we get between 8,000 to 10,000 students in the library. So why did we start with an AI tool and subscription? It was a combination of opportunities and maybe challenges. This year Clemson launched a new strategic plan, Clemson Elevate, with three priorities. The first one to deliver the number one student experience. In the library our mission is to provide services and resources that will meet the needs and expectations of students and faculty. But expectations change. These days, many of our students come with the expectation of a custom experience and just on time assistance. Also, as was mentioned earlier, during the spring semester, we saw an increase in the number of questions regarding references or citations. In many cases references for publications that simply did not exist. So what did we do? Well, we talked to friends and colleagues who were working on similar initiatives. This included informal and roundtable conversations, including some at CNI in Denver in the spring, as well as some Zoom meetings. By the way, that's how we got connected with Jolin. We also talked to a couple of vendors and we asked for demos and later we arranged for a trial over the summer. After a successful summer trial, we recommended to pay for a one-year subscription and we created a research guide, which included information about the tool site and also instructions on how to use it. So for the trial, June 20th, July 20th we got feedback from faculty and graduate students, representing five colleges and 11 departments. In a one-to-five scale, faculty and grad students rated the tool at 4.57. So we started a subscription on September 1st, but because of some accessible requirements in the creation of the research guide, the official launch did not happen until October 1st. The graphic on this slide is a quick comparison between the summer and the overall engagement over the last four months. So while unique user accounts only grew three times from 94 to 270, the assistant queries feature, which is similar to the chat GPT query box, grew almost 19 times from 120 to more than 2,000 queries. Surges and report views also grew two to three times respectively. So what's next? What are we going to do to continue this? Well, we will continue to work on some marketing and promotional activities, especially at the start of the spring semester. We are planning for several presentations. One for the department chairs, a group of 100 or so chairs in a room that I think they would be interested to hear about the benefits of a tool like this. Our team will also present at a Clemson conference in January, titled Teaching in the Age of AI. Finally, and because things will continue to change, for instance, site, the company was recently acquired by research solutions. So we will keep an eye on the future development of AI tools for academic writing and research. And with that, we have about four minutes for questions. Question for the panelists. Devin Savage from Illinois Institute of Technology, I understand you can't see anything up there, so I'm over here. But I actually had a question about Kineas, which I was also very fond of, and we have trialed at my institution as well. But one of the things that I noticed about Kineas is that I think though it draws from open and restricted the number of articles that they actually pull from, based on like English and some other criteria. It sounds funny to say, they're only pulling about 50 million articles to look at, which is great. But it is a fraction of what most of our institutions have access to. I wondered if you had any comments about sort of the scope or the future or any sort of like interaction you've had about that. Great question. And that's something that we did have conversations when we were looking at the tool and going down the route of having a trial and thinking about how can we identify gaps in the coverage in what Kineas is recommending. And like you said, it's only 50 million articles. How do you even begin to approach that problem space? But I do think it's important for us, especially since we aren't focused in one academic area, we're trying to be as broad in terms of coverage as we can possibly be. So I think that that's, and I don't know if I have an answer for whether, I think that there was an update recently where they added more articles to their index. So that's encouraging. And it's my understanding that the technology is such that they can be pretty agile and what they can add to their index and to the tool, which is also encouraging. So I think it's just a space that we're trying to keep an eye on and think about when we're designing our assessment how can we ask these questions in a way that's effective and kind of getting at the root of what we're interested in. So thanks for asking that. That was really helpful. My question is for Leo. So Leo, I was wondering a couple of things. Did you provide subscriptions for staff? Or did you tell them which tools to use? Yes, we did provide that and we asked them to use GPT4. That was the most popular one at that time. But however, we encountered quite a bit of issues with the subscription. Apparently they didn't like us using one P card for multiple accounts. So I guess they wanted to charge us for the enterprise version. But anyways, so that was an issue that we couldn't really figure out how to deal with. Somebody got kicked off for a while and all that. So that's something to pay attention to. And then a quick follow up question. So in my institution, I've been trying to get my colleagues to embrace exploring these tools. And several of them are adamant that they do not want to do that until they can be assured that it's completely private and they're also very concerned about helping any company that is perpetuating bias, using biased training sets, copyright violations. I was wondering if you had staff who were similarly apprehensive about using these tools and what you've been able to do, if anything to, or how you've negotiated those conversations. Yeah, that's a tough question. So we do have those mindset as well. And I think it's a common mindset for a lot of us to want to weigh into something that's perfect to use it. And things may never get to that point. Look at the internet, right? So what I try to tell them is we at right now, rules are being set at the national level, business level, any level for me, they haven't been set. So we have actually a voice, some kind of influence in that. And the only way to be able to do that is to learn more about it. And so that we can say something with informed kind of thinking. And the only way to learn that is like try it out in those six situations for example, right? So that's what I would say to them. Thank you. Good morning. One quick question for all four of you, I think. Do you have a sense of which academic departments for faculty, or which majors for students, or most likely to use your resources for AI? For the summer trial that we did at Clemson more than 50% came from STEM disciplines. Now, this is it was over the summer, so primarily grad students, right? We are eager to learn about the type of demographic that we might be able to get for the fall semester. And that's coming. So I'll say that information science was the discipline that we saw the biggest uptake in. We saw a lot of people downloading from STEM disciplines, but we did see some from the English department as well probably because of the focus on information literacy which was a concept that they were more comfortable with and that kind of angle on it. But yeah, we really want to encourage people even from these non-STEM focused disciplines to kind of just get hands on the tool and just, you know, get some experience using it because just ignoring it is not a safe strategy. Thank you. And I'll just say from Carnegie Mellon's perspective, we don't know who exactly at least in terms of Kenya's who's using the tool, but we do have a list of names. And so we could cross-reference that data at some point to try to, you know, put that picture together a little bit to understand it. But I do think that in many ways I imagined undergrads would be our sort of primary demographic that we'd be targeting with the tool because it's sort of designed to help them search differently, search better. But then if you have been searching for your entire career and finding the same results, then I could see, you know, later career professional or faculty member having success using tools like that for more of the serendipitous discovery that it's supposed to help with. So I could see, you know, I could see it being broadly useful across the board for us. I don't have any data, but it seems like it's more at the individual levels than unit or department levels. So it seems like it's the mindset of individual faculty rather than that department. And you had a varying range of mindsets. You mentioned skepticism to enthusiasm. That's right. So within even that discipline, that could be a range as well. So it's really on the individuals, I think, at this point. And you had 10 people. That's just my college, but I'm leading the university, so I can see it from different disciplines as well. And the data that we got from the trial at Clemson was based on the feedback that they completed voluntarily because site doesn't keep track of any of that. So like the 1,000 users right now there's no way for us to keep track of who they are. I think we're about over time. So thank you everyone. Enjoy the rest of the day.


Radio Theatre, tonight a program of mystery with Vincent Price as your host. Here's a preview. Look what I brought you. Mushrooms, darling, a whole basket full of them all gathered within the last hour, and they should be cooked and eaten within the next. Oh, not again. Let me see. Darling, those are not mushrooms, they're toadstools. The Sears Radio Theatre will begin after this message from your local station. This is John Ritter. Did you know that one out of every five people has a hidden medical condition ranging from allergies to penicillin and other medication to heart problems, diabetes and epilepsy, just to name a few? If you have a hidden medical condition, you should join the Medic Alert System of Emergency Medical Identification and wear the Medic Alert emblem on your wrist or as a necklace. This could prove to be a lifesaver in an emergency. On the back of the emblem is an identification number plus a phone number which can be called collect 24 hours a day from anywhere in the world to provide your computerized medical data to qualified personnel within seconds. A wallet card is also provided to members annually. Remember, a Medic Alert emblem will speak for you in an emergency if you can. Starting April 1st, it's Medic Alert Week across the country. Support the volunteers in your community or write Medic Alert, Medic Alert, Turlock, California 95380. That's Medic Alert, Turlock, California 95380. This has been some price. Back in the good old days, it was such fun. One automatically joined, so to speak, a small and very exclusive club in which all the members standing above the common herd in a sort of secret splendor never even guessed who the other members might be. Of course, one had to get away with it, and that was where the excitement lay because in those days, my friends, there was the awful specter of the hangman to contend with with his hempen noose and his wooden trapdoor by the very thought is enough to curdle a gentleman's blood. There was the choice of method to mull over a gun, a knife, a length of cord, perhaps, or poison. And there was the really quite arduous selection of a suitable victim because just any passerby plainly wouldn't do at all. Also, of course, it all had to be neat and tidy and quiet and unobtrusive. And it had to remain forever a ghastly secret. Oh, George, please don't slam the door like that. I have a cake in the oven. Oh, I'm sorry, darling. You make it sound as though there might be some connection between the cake in the oven and the kitchen door. I've told you before a dozen times. If you slam the door, the cake will go flat.  Yeah, well, I really am sorry, darling. You really should know that by now. I can't for the life of me think why you never pay the slightest attention to what I tell you. Yes, darling. Married for 22 years, only the first of which was a happy one. And George, oh, the dear man, has decided to join that very exclusive club we spoke of. The crucial problem is finding a suitable victim. I have a feeling that George Havery has already found her very close at hand. And that's only the beginning of our story. A new adventure in radio listening. Five nights of exceptional entertainment every week brought to you in Elliott Lewis' production of The Sears Radio Theatre. Our story, Mushrooms Darling by Alan Kayu. Our star, Ben Wright. The Sears Radio Theatre is brought to you by Sears Roblox & Company, where value is your byword. Sears, where America shops for value. What's the best way to save on new clothes? Sew them. 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And poor George fell head over heels in love with her the first time they met quite a while ago now. But then George is the kind of man who'll fall into anything. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First of all, let's find out just how it goes between George and Bella these days. Darling, don't trample mud all over my nice clean kitchen. Please. How often do I have to tell you that? Darling, I am wiping my feet.  It's freezing this evening. Well, it's not really freezing, darling. It's just brisk and invigorating. And the wood pile is getting terribly low. If you'd spend more time cutting up logs instead of pottering around in the forest all day.  And look what I brought you. Mushrooms, darling, a whole basket full of them all gathered within the last hour and they should be cooked and eaten within the next. Oh, not again. Let me see. Those are not mushrooms. They're toadstools. You're supposed to be an expert in these matters. I am an expert and this is a particularly delicious species of mushroom. It's absolutely delicious. And it's called honey agarit. Well, don't sound so hurt about it. All right, I accept it. They're edible, even if they don't look it. And if it'll make you happy, we'll have them for dinner tomorrow. No, no. Tonight. The honey agarits lose their flavor in just a few hours and really, they must be eaten very soon after they're picked. Now, if the stove's really hot, I'll cook them for you now before the bloom is off them. Darling, it's Thursday. Thursday. And you know very well. Every Thursday evening, I play wist with the North Downs Ladies Club. And tonight, it's Mrs. Wellington's turn to host us and she lives all the way over in Hayward's Heath. I'll be home very late, probably not till 1 or 2 in the morning. But your dinner's in the oven. I warmed up the leftovers for you. Thursday. Yes, yes. I should have noticed you've done your hair. So put those disgusting toads tools down and come and start the car for me. Yes, darling. George, so don't wait up for me. All right, darling. I drive carefully. I always drive carefully, George. You know that very well. Yes, darling. And remember what I always have to tell you.  Yes, darling. And don't forget to put the cat out. No, darling. 192, please. Thank you. It's longer tonight. She's gone all the way to Hayward's. Five or six whole hours together. I can't wait to hold you in my arms again. We'll be alone, undisturbed, safe together. Just the two of us in the silence of the night. Oh, George. Yes, oh, yes. Yes, as soon as you can, my love. I'll be waiting. I've already put the bed warmer in between the sheets. My love. It's dressing me up in pretty things from the Sunny Bunch collection. It's feminine in these dresses and separates. I can choose from frilly, colorful dresses, bouncy skirts, pants, and just the right coordinating tops. Sizes 7 to 14 in easy care fabric that's machine washable. Whether I'm going to a birthday party or just school, my Sunny Bunch clothes make me feel special. You are special. Thanks, Mom. Available at most larger Sears retail stores. I've been working with furniture for 25 years, so I know about quality, and that's why I recommend a Sears Benchmade Sofa for your family. There's a heavy-duty hardwood frame braced to withstand stress. The coil spring construction gives long-lasting comfort, and you can choose from fabrics and attractive solids or bright prints, all treated with Scotch Guard brand fabric protector. Compare the quality of a Sears Benchmade with other fine sofas, and you'll be surprised. Styling, durability, and comfort. Benchmade. A great place to relax. Now at most Sears retail stores. I'm sure I didn't. I'm a very good driver, even if I am a woman. Could I see your driving license, please, Madam? My driving license? Dear me, I don't have it. In fact, I don't even know where it might be. I haven't seen it for positively years. But I'm Mrs. George Havery from Valcom Forest. Well, Mrs. Havery, you'd best turn around and go right back home again. And hope that you get there before your left hand rear wheel falls off. You've got a terrible rear-end wobble, Mrs. Havery. Oh, that. I've had a rear-end wobble for quite some time now. My husband was going to get it fixed, but he's terribly forgetful.  Well, if you're sure, Mrs. Havery, and you know you've only got one headlamp. Oh, no, not again. I thought it was all rather dim. Would you kindly thump it for me, Constable? Ah, well, there it is. No, that should be all right now. Oh, yes, so much better. Thank you, Constable. Shall I put another log on the fire? Oh, yes, yes. Oh, I love to lie beside you and stare into the flames. I love you so dearly, George. Yes, I know it. And you know how much I love you. You know, the French have a way of putting it. Je t'aime à la folie. I love you to the point of foolishness. Foolishness? No, George, it's not the right word. Well, an old man and a young girl, yes. Foolish is only possible word. George, are you trying to tell me something? Yes. Did you tell your wife about us? No. Oh, George, you promised me you would. You promised me we'd be married soon. And all I want out of life is to be with you for... forever. Oh, George. Well, now, there, there, there. Now, you mustn't cry, man. I'm sorry. It's just... I decided that Bella would never give me a divorce, even if I were to tell her.  You know, that's the kind of woman she is. Then it's all over between us. No. The idea occurs to you so readily. Can you doubt that it occurred to me quite a long time ago? My only problem always was that her first thought is for me, not for her, we'll say, death from natural causes. Animals are not, not poisonous. I eat them all the time. Well, there's wolfbane, which some people call monk's hood, and it looks like horseradish, but it's deadly poisonous. And castor seeds just as bad. The leaves of tomatoes, well, they're nearly always fatal if ingested, but, you see, nearly always isn't certain enough.  Wanted to suffer. But there's one plant that's perfect. It's a kind of mushroom that looks somewhat like the ordinary field mushrooms that you buy at the greengrocers or collect in the woods. Its technical name is amanita falloides. Poison is so strong.  And will you be able to find one of these... Amanitas? When you need it? You see, that's exactly the crux of the whole matter. What a bright young girl you are to hit on it. No. One could never be sure of finding one at just the right time. See, they spring up overnight, the rain comes, and then they're gone. But I was very, very clever. I found three of them a while back out in the forest under the oak trees, and I dug them up very carefully and transplanted them into pots and hid them in the cellar where conditions are absolutely ideal for their long and healthy life. I collected some manure from the road, put a little in the bottom of each pot, and that will keep them snug and warm and well-fed against the time they need it. You've never seen my cellar, have you? No, I haven't. This cottage was built in the 15th century. They really knew how to build cellars in those days. It's arched in stone, and it's a feeling to it, a feeling of, you know, it's spooky or good word. Here, come, I'll show you. Mind the steps, they're very worn. Wait, let me light the lamp. There. So down to my arm. Can you see? It's behind the bench. No one but me ever comes down here, but still. Okay, hold the lamp for me. I've got it. Three of them growing happily in the darkness, in the silence. My darling. Hold me tight. Yes, tighter, tighter. Or respect for someone about three little parts of poison. Right beside them. And after this message from your local station. Sensation at the back of your neck. You're listening to CBS Radio Mystery Fair. I'm E.G. Marshall, your host for these hour-long dramas of suspense, adventure, and the macabre. Heard seven times a week on most of these stations. Here's a sample of what we mean. What is happening? Crazy, you do hear a drum? Yes. We've got to get out of this house. I don't know what it is, but we've got to get out. Something about that picture. Come on, Georgia, hurry. Listen here for CBS Radio Mystery Theatre seven times a week on most of these CBS radio network stations. Business as usual. I was leaning against a phone booth on the Lower East Side waiting for a call that would guarantee my next meal. Little did I know, my next job would arrive on foot. I'm Sam Hart. A few minutes later, some guy staggers up to me. Hey, mister, can you give me a hand? Feels like my chest is about to cave in. He was sweating, breathing heavily, and clutching his chest. I reached for the phone. I knew I'd come face-to-face with a big one again. I need an ambulance here on the double. Another day, another job. Another round with the big ones. Seems like they're trying to knock off every other guy I see. Do you know the signals of a heart attack? If not, remember this. Sweating, nausea, shortness of breath, a pain in the center of your chest that may last two minutes or more. If you have any of these signals, call the emergency medical service immediately. Contact your American Heart Association for more information. They're fighting for your life. Now how a mushroom can look lonely, but they do. Angels of death. You see the spores on the top? The annulus on the stem?  Don't even touch. And once in a while, people still pick them and eat them. And, well, the guy? This is the fungus that gave the field mushroom its bad name. It's the fungus that's going to bring happiness to both of us forever more. It's because, well, it's not always easy to find a way out of that trap one can so easily fall into when one says those trite little words I do. I've always said, have you ever noticed, with great enthusiasm, usually accompanied by a rather sickly sort of smile. But George is not the kind of man to let the weeds grow under his feet. Oh, no, indeed he is not. Having decided on a certain course of action, he is losing no time at all in getting it done. And what we have now is your average couple in your average little country cottage settling down to your not quite average dinner. George, darling, you're not eating anything. No, I know, darling. My tummy is playing up dreadfully tonight. Then why don't you take a spoonful of baking soda and half a glass of water? No, I just did. All I'm going to have dinner is a stalk or two of celery and perhaps some of the lettuce. Oh, but you really must have some of the mushrooms. They're absolutely delicious, as they should indeed. I fried them in lots, simply lots of margarine with just a smidgen of lemon juice. You cooked my mushrooms in margarine? Well, of course. Butters so terribly expensive these days. A 10 pound block of butter is 12 shillings now. And I simply will not sit still for that kind of highway robbery. That's exactly what I told the dairymen. And I always meant to ask you, are mushrooms fattening? Oh, no, no, absolutely not. Well, I don't really mind if they are anyway. I bought a new dress in the village this morning. The stripes run horizontally, and I honestly don't care anymore. No, I noticed that. I found a new kind of corset in the village, a great deal of whale bone in it. And it's really quite marvellous. It holds everything in place.  And everything can just fall out again. Yes, yes, I noticed that too. What a delicious aroma there is to your mushrooms.  Yes, isn't it? Well, next time. There's one very special species there that I'm particularly proud of. Yes, and I never saw so many different varieties all at once. George Darling, you really have excelled yourself this time. Yes, well, it's a mixture of mochellas and leptiotras and the marvellous Lactarius deliciosis and a few others. You know George Darling, I'm absolutely sure you won't mind in the least if I tell you. As a husband, you're no great shakes. But as a gardener, there's no one to equal you. Oh, what a nice thing to say. The other night, Mrs. Wellington said, pottering around in the forest looking for wild plants to eat is the first sign of approaching senility. But I defended you, George. I just wouldn't listen to her. Yes, yes, of course. The mushrooms, Darling. Oh yes, they smell marvellous. Yes, and they taste even better. There's one particular species there to the left of your plate right beside the Brussels sprouts. The one with the pretty little spots on top and the annulus on the stem.  You mean this one? That one. You know, it looks rather poisonous. Darling, how can anything look poisonous? What's it called? Well, it's called a bointen wonder. And I have to pop it into my mouth whole? Yes. Like this? 9-2, please. Thank you. Yes, thank you. Yes, 1-9-2. Thank you. Two days. Let's be wise now. Get me the county hospital. It's an emergency. People who carry so much of what a poirin with them. Medical science is now beginning to postulate that overweight has a very definite influence on the heart. It's really quite possible, ridiculous, though it may seem. Did you have a history of heart trouble? Oh, no, no, Dr. Wilson. In fact, she was examined only two or three years ago when the life insurance came up for renewal. No, they said her heart was very strong. Then perhaps something she ate? How could that be? We were eating a very simple country dinner. It was boiled beef with Brussels sprouts, potatoes, mushrooms and an ordinary garden salad. Ah-ha! Horse radish? And a kitty who lived at Mont Report Chestnut Avenue just down the lane from here. She picked some wild horse radish for her salad. Only it wasn't horse radish at all. It was Wolfbane. They look almost exactly alike. Only Wolfbane is deadly poisonous. Poor thing she was still in the prime of life. Only 80 years old and fit to the fiddle. No, no, no horse radish. She was a poor, poor... I'd never like to be on autopsy, I'm afraid. Yes, yes, I suppose so. It means we have to carve her up. Essential, don't you know, that we find out just what it was she died of? Yes, yes, of course. Oh, dear Lord. Well, it's not a nice thought, I will admit. But we can sole ourselves with a thought, the very essential thought. We don't feel it, you know. No, I don't suppose they do. Um... Doctor, would I be informed, do you think of the result of the autopsy? I mean, could I perhaps, um, get a copy of the coroner's report? Oh, the simplest thing in the world, my dear Mr. Havera. I'm quite sure you'll be the first to know. But in any case, it will be filed away with the clerk of the court, and it's available to anyone who wants to see it. Anyone at all. Nice it is to see ladies filling these oh-so-important posts nowadays. Ah, no, sir, I'm... I'm secretary to the clerk of the court. Can I help you? Well, then perhaps I should see the clerk himself. Well, I'm afraid he's having his tea now, sir. But if I can be of any assistance. Oh, there was an inquest this morning on a certain Mrs. George Havera. George Havera? Oh, yes. I wonder if you would be good enough to tell me what the verdict was? Well, I think it was, sir... Now, let me see. Ah, yes. A verdict of accidental death. Yes, accidental death. It seemed that she gathered some mushrooms in the woods and ate them, and they were poisonous. Oh, how sad. Ah, yes, it is indeed, Mr. Ralph. Uh, Tobias. How do you do, Mr. Tobias? My name is Miss Woods, Nadine Woods. My home is really in London, but I have digs down the road here. Just a bed-sit with Mrs. Fruitt. In London? I'm from London? All in nicest people come from London, don't they? They do indeed. And Mrs. Bella Havera, it is, I presume, what one might call, final? Oh, yes, of course. Accidental death. Excuse me. The Honourable Justice wants us typed up immediately, Nadine. And he's in a terrible mood today. You better get it finished off an hour ago. Oh, he's always in a terrible mood. Well, you've been most kind, my dear young lady. I thank you, and I bid you good afternoon. Carja? Oh, what a nice old man. His name's Mr. Tobias. How long do your pantyhose last? Do you want the answer in minutes or hours? You should try Sears Endurables, the pantyhose that lasted an average of 18 days of normal wear in a test with 400 women. The women in our test wore Endurables day after day after day and as a group averaged 18 days. A patented process makes them strong so they last and sheer so they look great. No pantyhose lasts forever. How long do your pantyhose last? Endurables at larger Sears retail stores. Hey look, in here, inside this stylish man's dress shirt. I'm a Sears value dress shirt label, just popping with pride because Sears value dress shirts are sure to be popular for a number of reasons. They have fashion spread collars coming classic patterns and solids and short sleeves. You'll appreciate the perma-pressed polyester or polyester cotton blends for easy care plus at low value prices, what a buy. Just look for me, the value dress shirt label at Sears Bend store where style, sense and satisfaction combine to label me right for you. He is growing pretty big these days. We've got family members in nine different states and Sears sure comes in handy. We can select gifts at the Sears near us then bring them along on visits to our daughter in Seattle and my brother in Miami and if what we bought isn't just right for them they go to the Sears near them and exchange it. That's Sears. In their stores or through the catalog Sears is where America shops. Price again and here's the concluding act of mushrooms down. What a nice old man. His name is Mr Tobias. Mr Tobias a nice old man? Well, I'll say this for him. Once an idea came to Mr Tobias and he followed it all the way down the garden path. That night he broke into George's cottage stealthily, quietly and really quite skillfully though I'm sure that wasn't a very nice thing to do. George, George, wake up. Oh, excuse my lover. George, please downstairs. Oh no. Yes. No my love, we don't have burglars in Borkham only in places like London. It's something, a plate or something full. No, the cat, past your prime and getting to be quite short-sighted you know, always knocking plates after dressing. Oh, she likes to sleep there, my precious. Right beside the bread bin. Smell of the bread is a great comfort. Now go back to sleep my love. No burglars I assure you. Why in heaven's name? Who would want to break into a peaceful little cottage like this in Borkham? Oh, sweetheart, no. It's just not done. I thought it'd been really most satisfying and yet George's perfect crime was beginning to show lamentable signs of coming apart at the seams. Delightful, just delightful. A whole new future ahead of us. You miss me then. Well, you see the house is quite warm after all. Give me your coat, my love. How long I might have to wait? Would you mind telling me, sir, what the devil you were doing in my house? I don't think I like the idea of strangers bringing in uninvited and making themselves at home. My name is Tobias and I'm not a stranger, sir, but a neighbor. A neighbor? Yes, I live in the little cottage on the top of the knoll, the one with the green shutters that overlooks both the edge of the forest and your own abode, Mr. Hamery.  What else? George, not quite without reason. A death is so much a part of my own life that I thought it would be only courtesy of me to call and pay my respects. Oh, well, uh, uh, it's kind of you, I'm sure. I, uh, I thank you and, uh, bid you goodnight.  We have so much to talk about. No, this is my house, Mr. Tobias. I will sit down when I choose to do so and not before. Would you mind telling me how you got in here? I'm quite sure both doors were locked. Indeed they were. I found a window open as I did last night. Oh, my dear young lady, not a burglar, burgly steal. I'm not a thief. I was merely browsing. I think the time has come, Mr. Tobias, for me to insist that you leave this house at once. You're not welcome here. No, I didn't really think I would be ashamed, such ashamed, particularly since we have so much in common. I find it hard to think of anything we might have in common. Two things. One, an interest. The other, what shall I call it? Yes, an obsession. That's the word, exactly. I also find it hard to put up with you any longer. The interest we share is in the study of fungi, or of, shall we say... Of course, my knowledge of the subject is not nearly as comprehensive as your own, although I can distinguish quite easily between a field mushroom and, say, an amanita fallowides. I quite fail to see the purpose of your chatter, and frankly, it doesn't interest me. Good night, Mr. Tobias.  That was established at the colonist inquest. An accident. Did you pick the wrong mushroom? From your cellar, perhaps. That's where I was browsing last night. I found three pots of amanita there, being carefully nurtured with me. I say commendable expertise, and I know how they got there. I watched you through my spyglass, digging them up from under the oak trees where the forest begins, and I thought to myself, good heavens, that's George Havery. He must know how deadly they are. He's a long-established expert in this field.  And your very young and beautiful mistress hurries to your bed only hours after the corpse is disposed of and to add up. Has it ever occurred to you it so often happens that the police can't solve a murder simply because they don't have the necessary evidence? And that, in turn, is because it so often happens that nobody bothers to tell them where the...  No, let me handle this. All right, Mr. Tobias, you don't exactly look like a policeman. How kind of you to say so. But if you are one, then make your charges in the proper quarter and when the time comes, I will dispose of them. And by the time that time comes you will also have found the time to dispose of the evidence down there. No, no, I'm afraid I cannot permit that, Mr. Havery. Well, we'll see about that. Stop. In my house. A revolver is a very necessary adjunct to my profession. I'm quite expert with it, I assure you, and I'm quite prepared to use it.  Under the circumstances, that would be a very foolish thing to do. Now, just to incapacitate you, so close the door and sit down. Then I don't understand what it might be that you can possibly want. Well, we can't have you grouping about in obfuscation, can we? Will you answer me a question? Perhaps. Why did you not destroy that terribly incriminating evidence down in your cellar the moment it had served its purpose? It's a question that's worried me for a long time. No comment, and you can quote me. You left those amanitas down in the cellar growing so handily and so well because it occurred to you that you might want to use them again. Oh, what errant nonsense. No, no, no. Here we are. I beg of you. Mission of the ultimate majesty. The taking of life for its own sake. Oh, there's a tremendous feeling of triumph, is there not? An almost narcotic sense of gratification. I felt it myself after I killed my first victim and it stays with you, you know. It really does. Seeking more and still more fuel for the fire of the most stimulating sensation in the whole gamut of man's emotions. Oh, he's mad. You can hit him over the head and steal his pocketbook. You can seduce his wife away from him. You can ruin him in the stock market. And all these things are a sense of power. And we are...  Yes, yes, my first. Oh, that was a lot. I've killed 11 people. And each time that ultimate majesty gets stronger and stronger, it's become an obsession. It's very frustrating. May I use your phone? My brother, please don't move, Mr. Haveri. Sit just where you are. Remember, my revolver, enough to get me the police station. I believe the number is... Balcom 3. This is Mr. Tobias. I'm calling from Mr. George Haveri's house on Elderbury Lake. Would you send a constable over, please? There's been a murder myself. Another victim. As you dazzling savings and crystal glass chandeliers save $30 on a five-light chandelier, now $59.99. Glass-encased arms, hurricane shades, prisms that dance among beaded drapes create this glass confection. You save $40 on Sears' eight-light chandelier, now $79.99. Here, antique cast bronze extends gracefully to sparkling crystal glass drops. Remember, just $59.99 and $79.99. Available in most larger Sears retail stores, sale ends March 24. Prices and dates may vary in Alaska and Hawaii. Put together a whole wardrobe with the classic collection separates at Sears. Now you can buy the pants to a suit, the vest to a suit, and the jacket to a suit separately. So every well-tailored piece of the outfit you buy is geared to your size and build. You can create a more casual look with solid-color blazers and patterned slacks. Or patterned sport coats and solid-color slacks. The colors coordinate to let you mix and match. Now that's style, sense, and satisfaction. The classic collection at most larger Sears retail stores. Join millions of Americans and shop the easy way with a Sears credit card. All you do to apply is call toll-free<PHONE_NUMBER>. It's your entry to shopping convenience and quality merchandise. Your card will be accepted at over 3,600 Sears stores across the nation. And you can choose from over 100,000 Sears products and services. Even use it for your catalog orders. In the store or over the phone, just say charge it. Call<PHONE_NUMBER>. New Jersey residents call<PHONE_NUMBER> for your Sears credit card. Throwback and company, where our policy is satisfaction guaranteed or your money back. Sears, where America shops for value. Mushrooms Darling was written by Alan Caillou, produced and directed by Elliot Lewis. Your host was Vincent Price. Our star was Ben Wright. Also heard were Betty Harford, Ivor Barry, Diana Chesney, Valerie Cooney, Richard Peele, Marvin Miller. The music for Sears Radio Theater was composed and conducted by Nelson Riddle. Art Gilmore speaking. The Elliot Lewis production of Sears Radio Theater is a presentation of CDI. Here's a tip from your better business bureau. Are you looking for a nursing home? Well, here are a few tips. Start by getting a list of the licensed facilities in your area from your local health department. Find out whether they are certified to receive Medicare and Medicaid payments. Also, talk to your friends and talk to your neighbors who've placed a family member in a home. You see, it's important to visit a nursing home to check the facilities and the services. For example, food handling, patient care, in-service staff training, housekeeping, and patient activities. Now, before you sign an admission agreement, you read it carefully including the fine print and ask a lot of questions about what's included in the price. A number of nursing homes charge extra for such items as wheelchairs, air mattresses, and personal laundry. A tip from your better business bureau.