Title: Melvil Dewey
Content:  Immediately after receiving his undergraduate degree he was hired to manage Amherst's library and reclassify its collections. Dewey worked out a new scheme that superimposed a system of decimal numbers on a structure of knowledge first outlined by Sir Francis Bacon. For his decision to use a decimal system he may have been inspired by two library systems that he includes in the acknowledgements in the first publication of his system in 1876. In that preface, and in the following thirteen editions, Dewey cites the card system of Italian publisher Natale Battezzati as "the most fruitful source of ideas". Dewey copyrighted the system in 1876. This system has proved to be enormously influential; though many American libraries have since adopted the classification scheme of the Library of Congress, Dewey's system remains in widespread use.
Title: Dewey Decimal Classification
Content:   The Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC), colloquially the Dewey Decimal System, is a proprietary library classification system which allows new books to be added to a library in their appropriate location based on subject. It was first published in the United States by Melvil Dewey in 1876. Originally described in a forty-four-page pamphlet, it has been expanded to multiple volumes and revised through 23 major editions, the latest printed in 2011. It is also available in an abridged version suitable for smaller libraries. OCLC, a non-profit cooperative that serves libraries, currently maintains the system and licenses online access to WebDewey, a continuously updated version for catalogers. The Decimal Classification introduced the concepts of relative location and relative index. Libraries previously 
Title: Dewey Decimal Classification
Content:  to a study done in 1927, the Dewey system was used in the US in approximately 96% of responding public libraries and 89% of the college libraries. After the death of Melvil Dewey in 1931, administration of the classification was under the Decimal Classification Committee of the Lake Placid Club Education Foundation, and the editorial body was the Decimal Classification Editorial Policy Committee with participation of the American Library Association (ALA), Library of Congress, and Forest Press. By the 14th edition in 1942, the Dewey Decimal Classification index was over 1,900 pages in length and was published in two volumes.
Title: Melvil Dewey
Content:  Dewey was a pioneer in American librarianship and an influential figure in the development of libraries in America in the late 19th and early the 20th century. He is best known for the decimal classification system that many public and school libraries use. Among his other innovations was the idea of a state library operating as the controller of the state's school and public library services. In Boston, Massachusetts, he founded the Library Bureau, a private company "for the definite purpose of furnishing libraries with equipment and supplies of unvarying correctness and reliability." Its investigative unit, devoted to studying the best practices of library loss-management, circulation and data retention, recovered 3,000 books in its first year of existence. Dewey's Library Bureau company is also said to have introduced hanging vertical files, first seen at the Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago. In 1905, Dewey established the American Library Institute which was an organization conceived to provide for the investigation, study and discussion of issues within the field of library theory and practice.
Title: Natale Battezzati
Content:  In each of the first fourteen editions of the Dewey Decimal System, Melvil Dewey included a short acknowledgment of Battezzati and his card system: "Perhaps the most fruitful source of ideas was the Nuovo sistema di Catalogo Bibliografico Generale of Natale Battezzati, of Milan. Certainly he [Dewey] is indebted to this system adopted by the Italian publishers in 1871, though he has copied nothing from it." It is not obvious, however, how and where Dewey encountered Battezzati's system. Battezzati himself states that: "... the system was studied and admired by Mr. Melvil Dewey of Boston, secretary of the Association of American 'Libraj' at the Vienna Exposition of 1873..." and that the system was adopted in America using the term "Title-slips." There are a number of things wrong with Battezzati's statement. Dewey was not at the Vienna Exposition, but perhaps was alerted to it by others who were there. It is clear that he wrote to Battezzati as he is quoted by Battezzati as saying that he had never seen "such a beautiful proposal." The other thing that Battezzati gets wrong is that he translated "American Library Association" into "Associazione dei Libraj d'America," which means "American Booksellers' Association."
Title: Dewey Decimal Classification
Content:  The second edition of the Dewey Decimal system, published in 1885 with the title Decimal Classification and Relativ Index for arranging, cataloging, and indexing public and private libraries and for pamflets, clippings, notes, scrap books, index rerums, etc. [sic], comprised 314 pages, with 10,000 index entries. Five hundred copies were produced. Editions 3&ndash;14, published between 1888 and 1942, used a variant of this same title. Dewey modified and expanded his system considerably for the second edition. In an introduction to that edition Dewey states that "nearly 100 persons hav [spelling of 'have' per English-language spelling reform, which Dewey championed] contributed 
Title: Dewey Decimal Classification
Content:  the previous edition. In response to the needs of smaller libraries which were finding the expanded classification schedules difficult to use, in 1894, the first abridged edition of the Dewey Decimal system was produced. The abridged edition generally parallels the full edition, and has been developed for most full editions since that date. By popular request, in 1930, the Library of Congress began to print Dewey Classification numbers on nearly all of its cards, thus making the system immediately available to all libraries making use of the Library of Congress card sets. Dewey's was not the only library classification available, 
Title: Dewey Decimal Classification
Content:  not attempting to satisfy the needs of the very largest or of special libraries. It also reduced the size of the Dewey system by over half, from 1,900 to 700 pages. This revision was so radical that an advisory committee was formed right away for the 16th and 17th editions. The 16th and 17th editions, under the editorship of the Library of Congress, grew again to two volumes. However, by now, the Dewey Decimal system had established itself as a classification for general libraries, with the Library of Congress Classification having gained acceptance for large research libraries. The first electronic version of "Dewey" was created in 1993. Hard-copy editions continue to be issued at intervals; the online WebDewey and Abridged WebDewey are updated quarterly.
Title: Dewey Decimal Classification
Content:  Dewey Decimal Classification numbers formed the basis of the Universal Decimal Classification (UDC), which combines the basic Dewey numbers with selected punctuation marks (comma, colon, parentheses, etc.). Adaptations of the system for specific regions outside the English-speaking world include the Korean Decimal Classification, the New Classification Scheme for Chinese Libraries, and the Nippon Decimal Classification (Japanese). Despite its widespread use, the classification has been criticized for its complexity and its limited capability for amendment. In particular, the arrangement of subheadings has been described as archaic and biased towards an Anglo-American world view. This is particularly clear in the 800s section, in which most literature, particularly from outside the United States or Europe, is relegated to 
Title: Dewey Decimal Classification
Content:  and suggestions". One of the innovations of the Dewey Decimal system was that of positioning books on the shelves in relation to other books on similar topics. When the system was first introduced, most libraries in the US used fixed positioning: each book was assigned a permanent shelf position based on the book's height and date of acquisition. Library stacks were generally closed to all but the most privileged patrons, so shelf browsing was not considered of importance. The use of the Dewey Decimal system increased during the early 20th century as librarians were convinced of the advantages of relative 

Question: where did the dewey decimal system come from?
Answer: Melvil Dewey.