American Library Association. General Meeting

Part of your Committee's report is simply supplementary to that of last year, constituting with it a survey of methods used in certain libraries in carrying out two common operations—accessioning and the charging of issue. Last year the selected libraries were asked simply to describe these operations closely, being urged to leave out no detail, no matter how trivial and unimportant. It was thought that no set of questions, however minute, would provide for all such details, and that a questionnaire might result in many omissions and make the operations, as performed by the contributing libraries, appear to be more uniform than is really the case. The event proved, however, the necessity of some sort of a questionnaire, and after a study of last year's results the following was prepared by Mr. George F. Bowerman, of this committee, and sent out by the chairman both to the libraries named in the last report and to certain others. Data have been received from the following institutions:

Public or Circulating Libraries

• Butte, Montana
• Atlanta
• Pittsburgh
• East Orange
• Forbes Library
• Jacksonville, Florida
• Lincoln Library, Springfield
• Los Angeles
• New York
• Pratt Institute
• St. Louis
• Salt Lake City
• Seattle
• Washington

College or University

• Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn.
• Westminster College, Fulton, Mo.
• Harvard
• Kansas
• Syracuse
• Tulane

State Libraries

• Indiana
• Iowa
• New York
• Virginia

Special Library

• John Crerar, Chicago

Society Libraries

• Medical Society of the County of Kings
• New York Society
• New York Bar Association (accession only)

We give below the questions sent out with a summary of the various answers by numbers. The original blanks are on file at A. L. A. headquarters, showing answers in greater detail, together with the names of the answering libraries.

Summary of Reports on Accession Routine

[Harvard University library did not answer each question in detail, as it keeps no accession record in the usual sense. A record is kept each day of the number of volumes and pamphlets received by gift and by purchase, from which statistics are made up at the end of the year. A file of continuation cards for annual reports and similar continued publications and a record of gifts from individuals are useful supplements to the daily record. Bills for books are filed alphabetically under dealer's name each year, and order slips, giving agent, date of order and date of receipt, are preserved.]

(1) When do you accession, before or after cataloging? Before cataloging—14.

(2) Are all books that are cataloged accessioned? Affirmative, 24 (exception, 11).

(3) What method of keeping your accession record do you use?

All use accession book except Los Angeles and Forbes Library, which use bill method, and Washington, D. C., which uses order cards as accession record.

East Orange does not believe accession book essential.

Pittsburgh, which accessions only adult books, is inclined to believe book unnecessary. Their method of treating juveniles is especially interesting.

Seattle notes that their book has fewer items than the A. L. A., and says the use of order cards as accession record is an excellent method.

(4) Which of the following items do you enter in your accession record?

The number following the item indicates the number of libraries reporting its use:—Author, 19; title, 18; publisher, 17; place of publication, 13; date of publication, 18; size, 10; edition, 13; number of volumes, 23; binding, 11; publisher's price, 8; cost, 18; source, 20; date of bill, 10; date of entry, 14.

(5) Do you enter facts about re-binding in the accession record?

Affirmative, 3; negative, 20.

(6) a. Do you use your accession record to obtain statistics of additions?

Affirmative, 19; negative, 5.

b. What items do you include?

Some of these questions were not answered, so it is inferred that the statistics obtained are for total additions only. Following items were reported on:—Class, 7; source, 8; branch, 2; language, 2; circulating or reference, 2; adult and juvenile, 2.

(7) Do you maintain a numerical record of accessions according to classification? Department or branches? Does it cover expenditures for each main class? Department or branches?

Negative, 14; record according to classification, 6; branch or department, 3; separate record of expenditures, 4.

(8) Where do you place accession number?

Page after title page, 6; title page, 3; title page and first page, 1; title page and page 101, 1; book plate and page after title page, 1.

(9) Do you write price and date of bill as well as accession number in the book. Do you write cost of a set in the first volume?

Affirmative, 6; negative, 13 (both questions); cost, 1; date, affirmative, 3; negative, 1; cost in volume 1 of set, 6.

(10) How do you indicate the branch or department to which a book is assigned?

Not indicated, or there is no branch, 14; stamped or indicated in accession book, 5; books stamped or marked, 5; separate accession book for each branch, 3; order card and book stamped, 2.

(11) In case of replacements do you keep a record of the accession number which has been replaced or do you regard replacement as if it were an added entry or duplicate, disregarding old number entirely?

Replacement is regarded as an added entry or duplicate, and no record kept of the old number, 16; New number given to replacement but make note of the number replaced, 6; Old number used, 3.

Butte, Mont., reports:

"We enter each new copy in the shelf list as copy 2-3, etc., keeping a record of each book."

New York City Bar Association reports:

"Do not use numbers, but dates. A book added to replace is not counted for the annual statistics."

(12) Do you note in the accession record when a book is withdrawn, or do you keep a withdrawal book?

Note in accession record, 9; note on shelf list, 4; note in accession book and keep withdrawal book, 3; have withdrawal book, 2; have no withdrawals, 2; files book cards, 1; keeps record on cards, 1; keeps cards withdrawn from public catalog, 1; not noted at all, 2.

New York City Bar Association reports:

"We keep all books except in very rare cases. The only notes made are in catalogs and in statistical record."

Summary of Reports on Charging Systems

The most interesting thing brought out by this investigation is the fact that it has taken your committee two years to ascertain and tabulate the simple facts regarding methods of procedure, in a very limited number of institutions, in the performance of only two of the many operations that go to make up their current work. From this it may be imagined how long and difficult a task it would be to carry out a really comprehensive survey of all the work of all kinds of libraries as currently performed. And yet such a survey would appear to be a necessary preliminary to a study of the subject whose aims should be definite suggestions toward the improvement of this work in the direction of greater efficiency. It would seem, at present, a task beyond this committee's powers, although we may be prepared to take general advisory charge of such a work if others can be induced to undertake the details. Possibly some of the library schools may regard this as profitable employment for their students.

In the next place we are struck with the complete negative that our results place upon the general impression that the various details of modern library work are becoming—possibly even have already become—thoroughly standardized. No one thinks, of course, that everyone does everything alike; but we are apt to believe that there are now a few generally approved ways of doing each thing, and that each library selects from these the one that suits its own conditions and limitations. On the contrary, we seem to be in an era of free experiment. Nothing in the two sets of operations that we have studied—not even the existence and value of the operations themselves—would appear to be regarded as sacred. Everyone has his own methods and is apparently satisfied, either with them, or with his own ways of departing from them and groping after something better.

We cannot regard this as altogether desirable. Doubtless no one most efficient way of doing any of these things can be settled upon, so long as conditions differ, but we cannot believe that differences so fundamental and complexities so varied as those revealed in this report are due merely to differing conditions, and that each is the best in the place where it is practised. We must conclude, therefore, that many of our libraries are doing these particular things, and by inference others also, in wasteful, inefficient ways.

Having made a survey of the facts, the next step would be to inquire concerning all variations from a method selected as the simplest in each case—possibly accessioning as practised at Pratt Institute Free Library or the Public Library of the District of Columbia and the charging system at Pittsburgh or at East Orange, New Jersey. The cost of these variations in time and money and the skill necessary in carrying them out, should be ascertained and the practical value of each, if it has any, should be found. It may then be possible to select, for a library of a given type, a standard method of procedure, which will be, all things considered, the most efficient for it.

In regard to cost, the report of the sectional committee on the cost of cataloging, to be made at this conference, will doubtless throw some interesting light on the problem.

Questionnaires

The use of the questionnaire by this committee may require some justification in the light of the growing feeling among librarians that the multiplicity of such demands upon their time is becoming a nuisance; and possibly some general recommendations on the use of library questionnaires may be in order.

We feel that the value of the questionnaire, and the way in which it should be received, regarded and disposed of, depend primarily on the purpose for which it is intended and also largely on the skill and tact of the questioner. We distinguish three main classes of library questionnaires: (1) Those intended to gather data for the information of librarians in general; (2) those intended for the use of single libraries; (3) those intended for the information of individuals. Those of the first class, it seems to us, it is the duty of all librarians to answer, as far as possible. They include questions sent out by A. L. A. or state association committees and those put by individual libraries or librarians with a promise to publish the results or to put them into shape that will make them available to the public, provided, of course, the information sought appears likely to be of value when tabulated.

Questionnaires of the second class will generally be answered, not so much as a matter of public duty as of personal courtesy. They include requests from one librarian to another about details of administration for guidance in making improvements or alterations in method. A librarian feels usually that it is good policy, if nothing more, to comply with such requests so far as his rules permit, for he may at any time desire to make a similar request on his own part. It is suggested, however, that whenever possible such data as these should be asked in a way, and from a sufficient number of libraries, to warrant throwing the results into a form that will make them generally available.

The third category includes most of the questionnaires that excite the ire of librarians and cause a feeling that questions of all kinds are nuisances demanding abatement. They come from students writing theses, from assistants preparing papers for local clubs, from individuals obsessed with curiosity, from reporters, from persons of various degrees of irresponsibility. There is no reason why any attention at all should be paid to these and we recommend librarians to return to them merely a stereotyped form of polite acknowledgement and refusal.

It is hoped that the Headquarters of the Association may become more and more the clearing house for systematized information of this kind, saving thereby much wasteful duplication of material and effort. We recommend that the originators of legitimate questionnaires send to Headquarters before making up their list of questions, to see how many can be answered in this way.

Much of the feeling against questionnaires is due to lack of good judgment on the part of the framers. It is obviously unfair to ask another librarian to answer questions that could be answered from the resources of the questioning library, even if the latter would require a little more time and trouble. A large proportion of the items in questionnaires of all three grades specified above are of this character. If it is desired that all the answers shall appear in the same form on one sheet, answers obtainable in the questioning library may be written in before sending out the list, and the attention of the correspondent may be called to this fact. In any case a statement should accompany the questionnaire that the information asked cannot be obtained by any other means at the asker's disposal.

In some cases questions are asked that require the collection of unusual data regarding the current work of the library. The answers to such questions can evidently not be given, even if the library is willing and anxious to undertake at once the additional work of collection, until the expiration of the period for which the figures are asked—generally one year. The usual method seems to be to send out such questions to a large number of libraries in the hope that a few will be able to answer them at once. A better way would be to send out to a large number of libraries a statement of the desired data, asking those willing to undertake their collection to notify the asker. At the expiration of the period of collection the sender of the questions would then have accurate data and he would not expect them before the end of this period—whether one year or less.

It would seem to be unnecessary to remind those who receive and answer questionnaires that returned blanks should bear the name of the library to which they refer, were it not for the fact that this is so often omitted. In one recent case the name was given simply as "Carnegie library," with no address.

Briefly set forth, the recommendations of this committee, regarding the use of library questionnaires, are, then, as follows:

(1) That questionnaires should always be for the information of librarians in general, or for improving the service of one library in particular, preferably the former.

(2) That no questions should be included that can be answered in the questioning library or at A. L. A. Headquarters.

(3) That questions requiring the collection of current data over a specified period of time be asked proportionately in advance of the report desired, in cases where the data are not such as are usually recorded.

(4) That those who answer questionnaires be careful to include the name and address of their library.

Labor Saving Devices

It is a commonplace of library history that librarianship has contributed the card catalog idea to commercial life. The library in turn is indebted to commercial life for many labor-saving devices. Very likely a few of the largest libraries utilize all available labor-saving devices to the utmost. Your committee is, however, of the opinion that the medium size and smaller libraries might reduce the cost of administration through the more general use of mechanical appliances. We recommend that at a coming meeting of the Association there be held an exhibition of all available competing labor-saving devices adapted to library use. The assembled demonstration of such devices should prove most instructive to the members of the association and would itself be a time-saving device. Such an exhibition could probably not be advantageously assembled except in a large city. Your committee therefore recommends that either it or a special committee be authorized to arrange for such an exhibition and demonstration.

All of which is respectfully submitted.

ARTHUR E. BOSTWICK, Chairman.
GEORGE F. BOWERMAN,
JOHN S. CLEAVINGER,
Committee on Administration.