Charles R. Anderson

Charles Anderson has been a writer, freelance indexer, reference librarian and library administrator for thirty years. He holds a Master's Degree in Library Science from Florida State University. During his library career he published extensively in the periodical literature and contributed chapters to books on the subject of reference services, indexing software and computer programs. From 1984 to 1999 he edited the column, 'The Exchange' in RQ (later RUSQ), the official journal of the Reference and User Services Division of the American Library Association. His three published books are: "Puzzles and Essays from 'The Exchange:' Tricky Reference Questions," "Reference Librarianship: Notes from the Trenches" (the latter title with co-author Peter Sprenkle) and "Giulio Ulivi," a biography of a little-known but fascinating Italian inventor. He recently published a second novel titled "The Moebius Strip."

He has written at least 500 articles (he lost count around the 400 mark!) for multiple web sites including demandstudios.com brighthub.com, eHow.com and associatedcontent.com as well as encyclopedia articles for Sage Publishing's "Encyclopedia of Time." He writes under the pseudonyms of C. Robert Anderson and Robert Karr besides his own name. Anderson is also a Visual Basic programmer and creator of a business application for professional indexers.

Anderson served with the U.S. Army in Korea and Japan and worked for the U.S. State Department in Rome, Italy. At other times in his life he has been a railroad passenger agent and a laboratory technician.