A simple loan record on 3 by 5 inch cards specially ruled and of which illustrations are shown, should be kept under the name of the man to whom the periodical is sent, and also under the name of the periodical, in order that the librarian can tell on a moment's notice where any issue of a periodical is and also what each man has charged against him. Books and other library material may be charged in the same manner.
Business men in general, so experience proves, exercise no particular responsibility either to return material or to replace it, for the business organization has no rules for lending, and the responsibility of knowing what material is out of the library, where it is, and that it is brought back or replaced, falls upon the librarian. The business librarian with his loan record as a guide tactfully asks if the business man is finished with the material, and if so, collects it; in some cases the collection is made without asking, when a visit to a man's office clearly shows that the material is side-tracked and dusty. This is one of the most tedious duties which falls to the business librarian's lot, but one of the most important ones, for the function of the librarian is to get material used freely, and not hoarded.
Business men who always get what they want from their library on a moment's notice do not appreciate the time and patience such service requires on the part of their librarian, for no genius is involved in the case of the librarian who always has ready on the shelves what is needed. Often a business man who literally wants material on a minute's notice, is the one who is most careless in cooperating with the librarian by returning material, and who does not want to stop a moment to have a loan record made. Sometimes a business man gets in a hurry for library material, which the librarian says he already has, but which he insists is not in his office, whereupon the librarian goes to his office, and pleasantly and often humorously unearths it from the bottom of the pile of material on his desk or table.
In the matter of the loaning of material the business librarian certainly has to be characterized by the words "long suffering," for he must make no excuses and deliver material in spite of the delinquencies of others. If some one at this point protests that it is unfair to the business librarian, the answer is, that the business man has a right to do as he pleases with his own, and that the business librarian exists to save a busy man from the error of his ways, for it must be remembered always that the business library is organized to give service to men of affairs, burdened with large responsibilities. All business men are not careless in returning material, and certainly minor employes have no right to be, but it will have to be admitted that business men, who never think of taking the trouble to return material are in the majority.
A corner of bound periodicals in the library of H. M. Byllesby & Company, Chicago. The worth while periodicals devoted to any one industry are comparatively few and bound volumes do not take up so much space as might be imagined. A three foot shelf will hold six or seven years of one periodical.
The Binding and Filing of Periodicals
After the current periodicals have made their last tour of the offices they come back to the library to be filed for future use. What disposition shall be made of them? Shall important articles be clipped and filed and the remainder of the periodical thrown away, or shall a complete file be kept for six months or a year and then thrown away, or shall files be kept complete and bound for permanent books of reference? The latter method represents the best library practice for the following reasons. No business organization or business librarian is prophetical enough to foresee exactly what information will be useful to keep in a business library for future use, when one considers the variety of valuable material found each week in the periodicals, which cover the activities of a certain line of business. Complete files of bound periodicals constitute one of the most valuable reference aids that any business library can possess. Clipping valuable periodicals might in some instances be compared to cutting out an article from a valuable encyclopedia.
One of the values of having periodicals bound is that they do not get lost or misplaced or carried off so readily, as a separate number or a clipping would. Bound volumes do not take up so much space as might at first thought be imagined, for a three-foot shelf will hold the bound volumes of the larger size periodicals for a six or seven years period, and the number of worth while periodicals devoted to any one industry (excluding of course the annual volumes of societies) are comparatively few, and twelve to fifteen sets would be the maximum for any one business library.
The replacing immediately of a lost or mutilated periodical is one of the important duties of the business librarian, for it is reasonably sure that the lost or mutilated number has something of real importance in it, else it would not have been so treated by any member of the organization; it is also important to replace it as soon as possible, because often back numbers are difficult to obtain.