On November 4, 1900, these reports were referred by the library board to a committee of three, one of whom was the Associate Librarian, Mrs. Dixson. The committee reported on March 16, 1901 (see University record March 22, 1901) in favor of maintaining the departmental system, but recommended the centralization as far as possible at one point in a central building of the administration of the libraries, and of the books of the university not in use in the departments. After much discussion of the report and a later modification of it, it was decided to refer the matter to a commission consisting of professors and trustees appointed for the purpose of making a thorough study of the entire problem. The outcome of the work of this commission was a decision to place in buildings connecting with the general library the following departmental or group libraries: Philosophy, History and Social Sciences, Classics, Modern Languages, Oriental Languages, the Divinity School, the Law School. That further, the departmental libraries of Chemistry, Physics, Geology, and the Biological sciences, be retained in the department buildings of these departments, it being understood that these departments may place such books as they desire in the general library building. The library of Mathematics and Astronomy should be associated with the library of Physics.
Time will not permit any detailed consideration of the report of the commission. It was approved by the Congregation, August 28th, 1902, and adopted by the Board of trustees September 12th of the same year. It is the plan laid down in this report that has in the main been followed in the location and erection of the Harper Memorial library, dedicated on June 11, 1912, and which it is also proposed to follow in the separate buildings to be provided for the Historical Group, Philosophy, Modern Languages and Classics. When completed this plan will bring the Humanities, with the exception of Geography into buildings adjoining the General Library, connected with it or with one another by bridges.
Since the adoption of the report nearly ten years have elapsed during which there has been some progress in the direction of centralization, at any rate of management and control of libraries. A somewhat uniform system of rules and regulations was adopted in 1911. In the same year a common system of catalogs and classification was finally approved.
The catalogs will include:
(1) A dictionary catalog for the public in the general library, duplicated in part in the catalog department (Official catalog).
(2) Classed catalog for the public in the general library, duplicated in part in the catalog department (Shelf-list on cards).
(3) Author catalog and shelflist on cards for the departmental libraries located in buildings not connecting with the general library.
(4) Author catalog only for departmental libraries located in the general library, or in buildings connecting with it.
N. B. Catalogs in the departmental libraries will not according to the present plan include analyticals or other added entries which may be provided in the dictionary and classed catalogs of the general library.
Even with the limitations here indicated the catalog plan as outlined may seem a little ambitious and likely to prove expensive and difficult to maintain. In view of the present situation, as well as the outlook for the future, even assuming that departments which in 1900 favored a departmental system should be indisposed to change their attitude, it seemed nevertheless the safest plan to adopt. The general library aims to build up a strong central reference collection. This collection should be classified and cataloged so as to yield the best possible results. Merged with the catalog of the general library will be one covering all the departmental libraries. It would, of course, be desirable to provide every departmental library with as exhaustive a catalog as the one proposed for the general library. The expense however, even in this day of printed cards would, I fear, be practically prohibitive. Moreover, it is doubtful if many of the departments would find the expected relief in an elaborate author and subject catalog of their collections as they stand. This last statement may seem to require some further substantiation, and I shall in the following endeavor to present the necessary proofs and illustrations.
It is no doubt true that heads of departments and their associates frequently take a personal pride in their departmental library and feel a certain responsibility for its growth and development. I have known cases where a department would resent any suggestion that a part of its books might to good advantage be transferred to the general library or to another department in exchange for material in these libraries bearing more directly on the special line of study which the department is supposed to represent. The fact remains, nevertheless, that these libraries frequently show in their development a lack of that strong coordinating influence so essential to systematic growth. A detailed examination of their collections soon reveals the fact that books have been ordered principally with reference to their use in connection with courses given in a department, no one apparently questioning the right of one department to poach on the premises of another or on that of the general library. There has resulted, therefore, a situation which cannot be remedied by any catalog, no matter how exhaustive or how perfect. This leads me to go a step further and to venture the assertion that the lack of a strong central library can not be compensated by merely bringing together related departmental libraries into the same or adjoining buildings. It is even doubtful if it would be worth while to prepare an exhaustive union catalog of such libraries without considerable migration of books from one department to another.
A few illustrations taken at random from the books which have come under my observation during the past month or two in connection with the recataloging, will, I think, bear me out in this statement.
General works on science are in a number of libraries, mainly in Geology, Biology, and the general library, but also in a number of other departmental libraries.