It has been gradually tried out. In the John Hay Memorial Library at Brown, rather narrow window-shelves were tried; then wider sloping desks at the Episcopal Theological School; and recently, the wider Salem carrels, where the windows are set quite flush with the exterior of the piers.
There is still an opportunity for experiment and development. Is such a shelf better, fixed or hinged? What would be the simplest form of hinging and fastening? Is it better, in view of its temporary and intermittent use, to have it at desk height, for a standee? How thin can it be, and of what wood, cheapest and least liable to splitting? Might not metal shelves, furnished with the stack, be better, and about as cheap?
As finally improved with these carrels we could bring the whole stack back to the narrowest intervals consistent with moving books, and thus avoid resort to underground stacks and sliding cases, until much later.
[Webster’s International Dictionary gives only the spelling “carol,” but the old records call it “carrell.”]
At Durham, the carrels were 2 feet 9 inches wide. At Gloucester there were twenty carrels, each 4 feet wide, 6 feet 9 inches high, and 19 inches deep.[295]
The modern Salem Public Library carrel is wider than the one at Durham, and about as high and deep as those at Gloucester Cathedral.
Stack Details. Dark Interiors are discussed elsewhere; having the library built around a stack, to be lighted by electricity, open to daylight only by way of the roof, and opening to outer corridors or rooms on each floor. This is mainly an architectural problem, though its administrative aspects would have to be considered by the librarian.
Height. The height of each stack floor is generally set at seven feet to seven and a half. I favor seven and a half, of the two, so that a tall man need not stoop under the deck beams and electric bulbs. In order to get the ground floor of building and stack coterminous, the lower story of the stack must correspond with that of the building, which is not usually higher than ten feet. As it is most convenient to have the basement floors of stack and building also coterminous, the unusual height, for this case only, may be accepted, and the inconveniently high shelves used for some kind of slow or dead books.
It is usual to leave several feet above the top shelves, just under the roof, for ventilation.