bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Comment
Authors: Murison Jock , Bibble Quentin , LOEW SEBASTIAN , Preston Richard , Lindsay Margot , Fussell GE
Published: March 2008

‘WITH HIS hundred up, CB lifted his cap for a moment and turned again quickly to get on with his task.’ Do any of you, Dear Readers, remember C B Fry's 144 against the Australians at the Oval in 1905? It does not matter really because it is Clive Bingley's 100 for NLW which is my concern here. To score a hundred runs at cricket is success indeed, but to buy a professional periodical in declining economic conditions and still to breathe more life into it again is quite phenomenal. And that is no criticism of previous editors, Roy McColvin and Ken Harrison, without whom LW would probably have collapsed altogether!
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Lawson Sarah , Fleming Edwin , Hills Kate
Published: March 2008

AS FAIRLY WARNED to you earlier this year would transpire, what you are now reading is the 100th issue of NEW LIBRARY WORLD, a span of issues which has encompassed some 8½ years, several million words, a sizeable copse of trees to produce the paper on which those issues have been printed.
A sort of celebration
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

ONE OF the first branch librarians I worked under was a man after my own heart. I shall refer to him pseudonymously as Bill Brown—which won't prevent those who knew him from recognising him. He was a decent, taciturn chap who had been gassed during the first world war. He took his time over things and took frequent swigs from a bottle of dark linctus to soothe his lungs.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

I HAD FORGOTTEN, in recent years, just how much dull donkey‐work there is about publishing books. My erstwhile firm eventually possessed just enough slaves to shelter me from the most boring and repetitive of the numerous jobs in a publishing house.
Comment
Authors: Palmer Casini Barbara , Day Alan , Newton‐Davies John , Preston Tony
Published: March 2008

LIBRARY NETWORKS are a very hot topic on the US library scene these days. Nearly every library periodical one picks up seems to contain news about changes in OCLC, RLG/RLIN, and WLN and the growing competition among them. This report will review what has been happening during the past year and consider what may develop in the future.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Lawson Sarah
Published: March 2008

CHRISTMAS is coming, and the year is nearly done. On the whole, a good year, I think—at any rate for realism. No doubt we shall have our (by now) customary industrial fun and games during the winter, with lights going out, rubbish piling up in the streets, and the car‐workers continuing to perform their slow‐motion, ritual suicide. But it is becoming appreciated that inflationary, pay increases simply spawn unemployment.
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

FOLLOWING last month's directions to librarians in general, chief librarians and reference librarians, we conclude with guidance to a few more colleagues.
Comment
Authors: Joseph Tony , Reid David , Onadiran GT , Lawson Sarah , Brewer Gordon
Published: March 2008

LAST WEEK I gave myself a nasty shock. I had been spending an afternoon in another town doing some research in the central reference library there. I went on till past seven in the evening, rushing at the end to get through all I wanted, then dashing to catch my train home. On the train I opened my briefcase; to discover that I'd come away with an envelope of unissued and strictly ‘confined’ material from the library's local collection.
Library security systems
Authors: Basker Jim
Published: March 2008

THE SOUTH WESTERN branch of the Library Association ran two one‐day schools, at Exeter on 23 April and at Fareham on 2 May, on the subject of library security.
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

THE Times was no sooner back with us last November than it was running the ‘My best books of the year’ feature— which is often depressing and was particularly so last year. 1979 was not a good year for the book world. Bernard Levin was back with us too, and managed to get three days' wordage out of two books. He frequently mentioned the authors and titles (thus ensuring that his fans would pester their public libraries for them) but omitted to mention those bibliographical trifles: publishers and dates.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Ashworth Wilfred , Fleming Edwin , Lawson Sarah
Published: March 2008

SINCE I have spent the better part of fifteen years parading in the public arena the superiority which attaches to me by reason of not possessing a television set, I had better now come clean and reveal that immediately before Christmas my wife and I changed our minds and rented one for a trial period of six months.
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

In future, the Secretary of the Library Association will be known as the Secretary‐General, it was decided at the Council meeting on November 2. Professor Keith Harris said that if his secretary rang someone with the title of secretary, she would expect that person to take shorthand notes, and Godfrey Thompson said that a secretary was a clerical officer of fairly low standing. LAR 81 (11) November 1979.
Comment
Authors: Bingley Clive , Rennie McElroy A , Cronin Blaise , Cornford Mike , Payne Roy , Palmer Casini Barbara
Published: March 2008

THE MIDLAND county borough of Dudley has produced two post‐war chief librarians who have gone on to become national librarians. Alex Wilson told me this with some pride, when we met at the beginning of February to discuss his new appointment, which takes effect this month, as Director‐General of the British Library Reference Division. A couple of decades ago, Alex took over at Dudley, at one remove, from George Chandler, who has just retired as Australia's National Librarian.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Bunch Allan
Published: March 2008

ONE OF MY oldest friends in the profession of librarianship retires next month from the post he has held for the last 19 years —that of City Librarian of Westminster.
Comment
Authors: Reid David , Iwaschkin Roman , Barnett Graham
Published: March 2008

ONE OF the most valuable but neglected aspects of local history librarianship is the study of thesis literature. The dictionary definition of thesis in unenlightening: ‘A dissertation to maintain and prove a thesis …’ (Shorter Oxford). Usually this type of literature is produced as part of a course in higher education, and has become prevalent outside strictly university circles because of the educational concept of project‐produced research. Personal examination, assessment and compilation of material has become a permanent part of contemporary study. The local history librarian is interested in the final end‐product and its place in the library. Most of the producers—and with a very few exceptions we must exclude child ‘projects’—are academic students of college or university age, but an increasing number of titles are produced by Open University students, WEA classes, and individuals working for their own interest. The key element to remember is that most of this material is unpublished in its final form, but by‐products in the form of lectures, papers, articles and much‐reduced book forms are common. This is simply because theses—often in excess of 100,000 words—are too verbose, convoluted and detailed for instant transmutation into print.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Lawson Sarah
Published: March 2008

IT WAS in the mid‐1970s when, having been in the habit for a year or so previously of commenting on public library authorities' annual reports in a partially analytical manner, I observed a decline in the arrival of the same in my post. A decline which has been maintained, I may add, and which has led me to the conclusion that, while it is OK on the sender's part if I remark how splendid has his service been, he would nevertheless be happier if the ammunition was withheld for me to observe that his annual loans cost x‐pence more each than those of such‐and‐such an authority!
Library lit of the 1970s
Authors: Ollé James G
Published: March 2008

IN DECEMBER 1969, I reviewed for the Library world the library literature of the 1960s'. I remember hoping, when I wrote that I might have the chance to perform a similar office for the library literature of the 1970s. The opportunity has come. But note: I have not used it to nominate the best publications of the decade. I would certainly like to think that I knew the best, and therefore also the worst, when I saw them, but after a swift reconnaissance of the decade's offerings I was appalled at what I had missed. There was a time when I could recite the names of every British librarian who had published at least one book on librarianship, and a fair number of American librarians besides. Who could do it now? Who would want to?
Comment
Authors: Broad Susan , Smart Richard , Iwaschkin Roman , White Alan G
Published: March 2008

WITHIN ACADEMIC libraries there is always the divide between postgraduates and undergraduates and it is inevitable that their needs differ, although one must remember that to become a postgraduate one will have been an undergraduate, at least in most normal circumstances. Many of the ideas and ideals put forward in this article can equally well apply to both categories in other subjects than law. However, it is true to say that law undergraduates usually have to deal with a subject which is a totally new concept which they have not usually studied at Advanced Level, so that special attention needs to be given to the basic concepts of law. Undergraduates' thoughts lead immediately to the next set of exams and how they can get hold of all the material required to pass these exams, especially in law which is heavily based on examinations. It is especially difficult to persuade undergraduates that they could perhaps find the cases they need in other sources than those on their tutorial sheets. They also believe that material should be there when they want it; they forget that there could be more than a hundred other people wanting the same volume.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

AFTER the little flurry of dispute recently whether Sir Keith Joseph should or should not have been invited to address the LA conference in Sheffield this year, the Secretary for Industry has himself withdrawn, on the grounds that he now finds himself obliged to lead an overseas trade delegation at the same time as the conference. Thus hot air doth dissolve into the atmosphere, as Hamlet might have said (but did not).
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Hills Kate
Published: March 2008

SINCE THEY ARE now in possession of a modest amount of my own money each year, it was with more attention than I have devoted in the past to its predecessors that I studied the Library Association's balance‐sheet as at December 31 1979, which is printed in the June issue of the Record.
Piffle
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

LAST MONTH I wrote about the pressures brought to bear on publishers in order to achieve a blameless blandness in their products through no hint of race, sex or class bias; and I mentioned the various Guidelines drawn up to prevent authors and editors offending any militant minority. In view of this, what self‐respecting minority will remain unmilitant?
Comment
Authors: Neesam Malcolm , Palmer Casini Barbara , Dolman Steve , Rainford Anna , Lockyer Kathleen , Iwaschkin Roman
Published: March 2008

THE INTRODUCTION of the pre‐recorded tape cassette in the 1970's made many predict that within ten years there would be no gramophone records or gramophones being marketed, and that the cassette would be the supreme means of distributing recorded sound. Just how wrong that prediction was can be seen in any audio shop in the country, where huge displays of the latest record albums are to be found next to racks of similar cassettes. Far from sounding the knell for records, cassettes have probably been instrumental in furthering their popularity, by way of the spin‐off in technical advances, marketing, and the ease of distribution.
The century of the common man
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

THE first Shallow end appeared in February 1972 and this is my one‐hundredth. Arithmeticians and those of you with electronic gadgets may compute a greater total of New library world issues since that date (and if you make it 104 you're right); but, in 1977 I had a sod‐it‐all spell (or ‘brief sabbatical’ as cb prefers to call it) and in the December 1976 issue, John Fines wrote the column under the heading ‘Deep down he's really Shallow’—a scurrilous piece which would have landed him in court but for my magnanimity. (True, he was drunk at the time of composing it, but it was my gin he'd been slurping to get that way, so I should have sued him for some‐thing.) Howsoever, this really is the one‐hundredth Shallow—or the century of the very common man, as you might say.
Comment
Authors: Ollé James G , Tank James , Jefferson George , Liddle David , Reid David , Steele Colin
Published: March 2008

IF YOU should ever have a mind to experience the flavour of life in the British public library service during the early decades of this century, you could not do better than turn to the contemporary files of the periodicals of librarianship. Apart from its beastlier aspects, to which only a George Orwell could have done justice, the library journals reflected pretty well the public library world as it used to be: impoverished and imperfect, but optimistic and resilient.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Lawson Sarah
Published: March 2008

REGULAR READERS of this column will have noted, perhaps with relief, the self‐restraint I have applied in recent months in connection with the game of cricket, not a word about which have I imparted to you throughout the summer.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Bunch Allan , Lawson Sarah , Hills Kate
Published: March 2008

NEXT JANUARY, it will be ten years since I acquired The library world from W H Smith & Son Ltd. Next July, NEW LIBRARY WORLD may be ten years old.
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

THE Publications Division of the Directorate‐General for Information and Public Relations of the Secretariat of the European Parliament: now, apart from the fact that it must beat cock‐fighting, what do you know about that mouthful? Nothing? Well, you should know, at least, that one of its publications European Parliament: EP news (ISSN 0250‐5754) is despatched nationwide to numerous types of institutions, including your local public library—without charge. But, as all readers over the age of seven will guess, by no means free.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Lawson Sarah
Published: March 2008

THERE MUST BE, I think, some sort of automatic professional override‐switch which cuts in on lawyers and slows them down to a pace not exceeding two yards per hour whenever two parties to a proposed agreement indicate that they wish to complete a deal with extraordinary swiftness.
Comment
Authors: Day Alan , Key Malcolm , Cornford Mike , Ashworth Wilfred , Preston Richard , Pattinson Mike , Iwaschkin Roman , Ashworth Wilfred
Published: March 2008

THE New English dictionary on historical principles founded mainly on the materials collected by the Philological Society, edited by James A H Murray, forty‐four years in the making, and now known the world over as the Oxford English dictionary holds an unchallenged place in that remarkable series of substantial works of learning and scholarship planned, nurtured, and executed in the latter half of the nineteenth century. The Rolls series, the Dictionary of national biography, and at the turn of the century, the Cambridge moderm history and the Victorian history of the counties of England, all bear witness to the tremendous, almost incredible, energy of the Victorian middle classes who, sometimes holding academic posts at the universities, or perhaps earning their bread as publishers (regarded then as one of the very few commercial pursuits allowed to gentlemen), formed clubs and learned societies to occupy their ‘leisure’ hours, and conceived and brought to fruition their costly schemes for ambitious publishing programmes, refusing to be deterred by years of unremitting toil which consumed their time, their money, but never sapped their vision or their dedication.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Lawson Sarah
Published: March 2008

CONCLUDING THAT much of the ennui which afflicted me during 1980 must have been due to my forfeiture of the mid‐winter skiing holiday to which I have become accustomed in recent years, I have arranged to be back among the mountains of Austria at the time when this issue of NLW is committed to the mercies of the postal services. (Postage rates having just gone up, do let me know if your copy reaches you earlier than usual — that would be called ‘productivity’!).
Oh my dead dears!
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

DURING the latter part of 1980 I read a number of articles dealing with the subject of obituaries. The first, in time and in professional interest, was by Edward Dudley in the Library Association record — which he edited for nine years. It is good to see that he now has time to take a critical look at some sections of that journal, starting (LAR September 1980 p423) with the obituaries.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Bunch Allan
Published: March 2008

THE BIAS towards the shires in the rate‐support grant for the next fiscal year has brought benefit, albeit of a negative kind, to one county librarian to whom I was chatting recently, who has to face a cut in his budgets of ‘only about £60,000’, which is some 3% of his total. We agreed ruefully that in real terms public libraries have had to live with annually reducing expenditure for at least a decade, and that 3% next year was at least manageable, if no great stimulus to morale.
Comment
Authors: Afolabi Michael , Cornford Mike , Roberts Lorna , Hendry Joe , Radmore David , Greenhalgh Michael , Ashworth Wilfred
Published: March 2008

THE Department of Library Science at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria was founded in 1968. Its foundation is regarded as an offspring of the Sharr report of 1963. The department was formerly known as the Department of Librarianship until the 1971/72 session when the name was changed to the present one. Its objective is the training of professional librarians at all levels.
Bells, books and candyfloss
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

FOR ME there is only one serious drawback to the forthcoming marriage of the Prince of Wales to Lady Diana, and that is the prospect of our Poet Laureate flogging his dead muse to drool out another epithalamium similar to his O‐level effort for Princess Anne and Mark Phillips.
Comment
Authors: Winkworth Ian , Moses BL , Ollé James G
Published: March 2008

AMIDST OTHER preoccupations, the Library Association is again considering its internal structure. A modified version of some of the proposals of the former Branch and Group Structure working party has been produced by an Ad Hoc Sub‐Committee chaired by Alex Howson. Your groans on hearing that ‘the structure’ is being trotted out for another airing are understandable.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Bunch Allan , Hills Kate
Published: March 2008

IF THE Guinness book of records is still watching these columns, I can now tell them that, after all, Mrs Carole Bignell's hope (NLW February p30) that she had established a record by registering her daughter as a library member at the tender age of two weeks must be dashed. Ken Bowden, District Librarian at Bacup, Lanes (where he gets his copy of NLW a little late), writes that not only did one of his neighbours enrol his daughter when she was five days old some years ago, but that Ken's own son entered the world in February 1977 and was enrolled at Bacup on his third day. Any advance on three days?
Nationwide
Authors: Day Alan
Published: March 2008

THE general objectives of the English Tourist Board, a statutory body created by the Development of Tourism Act 1969, are: ‘to provide a welcome for people visiting England, to encourage people living in England to take their holidays there, and to encourage the provision and improvement of tourist amenities and facilities in England’. In marketing terms, this means that the Board has to compete with overseas tourist destinations in order to maintain and to increase the general level of tourism in England, by helping the established resorts to maintain their peak level of business, and by assisting those resorts to achieve growth over an extended season. That is the strategy. It is implemented by five annual marketing operations.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Fleming Edwin , Bunch Allan
Published: March 2008

WHAT WITH one thing and another, and especially the weather during our so‐called Spring, not only had I attended no cricket by the end of May, but I completely forgot to make my characteristic song‐and‐dance about the fact that last month's issue of this Organ saw the completion of ten years of NLW.
Comment
Authors: Goff Martyn , Reid David , Orton Ian
Published: March 2008

IN The age newspaper, Dennis Pryor writes: ‘Booksellers remainder them, publishers pulp them, churches and wowsers ban them, dictators burn them, students photocopy them. Marshall Mcluhan wrote them to prove they were finished.’
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

IN JUNE, I broke my 18‐month‐long moratorium on public speaking—a blessed rest!—to travel to the Isle of Wight to talk to the members of HATRICS assembled for their AGM. I attempted to repay the kindly hospitality of Hampshire County Librarian John Beard, IoW County Librarian Len Mitchell and his Deputy, Mike Howley, by a lengthy disquisition on the endlessly fascinating topic of myself, at the end of which I woke up the assembled company in time for tea by banging on the table with my trumpet, whereat they sneezed and expressed themselves well satisfied.
The leek & the thistle
Authors: Day Alan
Published: March 2008

A WIDE variety of attractive, colourful, and informative literature published by the Scottish Tourist Board and the Wales Tourist Board is available to prospective tourists and holiday‐makers. This year bigger and better than ever, Enjoy Scotland contains an outline travel map showing rail, ferry, and air facilities; features on places to stay and things to eat; double pages on suggested touring centres, public transport, the places to see and things to do; on events; and sources of information, in each of the nine tourist regions. Also featured are spring, autumn and winter holidays, festivals, details of companies offering coach tours from England and Wales, and special interest holidays.
The ballad of Cannon Street
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

In Cannon Street, by London Stone, Some fourteen years ago, A pub, two banks, a grocer's shop, Stood in a homely row Flanking a public library, In mid‐commuter‐flow.
Comment
Authors: Woodhouse Roger , Devereux Michael , Day Alan , Hudson Andrew , Chapman Liz , Garratt Morris
Published: March 2008

A GREAT deal is being, and has been, said about the role of public libraries in the provision of information of all kinds to the community. Sometimes there are full blown experiments such as that in Sunderland, but more likely is the gradual, evolutionary approach that most libraries have taken in recent years. Examples of libraries taking initiatives abound, ranging from stocking leaflets, to actually getting into an advice giving role, or to seeing information as simply an adjunct to more radical experiments in community librarianship. The gradualism may however be replaced, in such places as Corby, Shotton and Consett, to name three steel towns, with a more sudden push into the consideration of the underlying purpose of information services to a community.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

AS OUR subscription‐renewal reminders for 1982 go out, may I offer you a cautionary note— though not, perhaps, the one you will be expecting of me from these introductory words?
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

I HAVE had a soft spot for the Bibliotheca Britannica ever since Ronald Benge recounted to us, his students of historical bibliography at the Northwestern Polytechnic, the tribulations of the compiler, Dr Robert Watt, during the final stages of that great work.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

ANDRE DEUTSCH has sold his library science imprint Grafton Books, which he acquired in 1961 along with the services of myself, to Gower Press.
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

THE Barbican development was first thought of during that strange post‐war period of euphoria which gave us the Festival of Britain and bread rationing.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

I ATTENDED the Famous Extra‐ordinary General Meeting of the la on January 6 as an ‘observer’ (which is all they would allow, shoving me in the back row next to Charles Ellis, to whom I made indecorous remarks as the proceedings unfolded). Few of the speeches bore much relationship to the motions and amendments under debate, the prize for irrelevance going to a smarmy young woman who droned on interminably about the unfairness of not doubling staff pay‐packets every five weeks or so; but this didn't much matter, as the audience had clearly arrived with the intention of passing the motion calling for more information about the financial crisis, and chucking out the ones aimed at personalities.
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

HERE we are knocking out copy for the February 1982 issue, with three more days to go in 1981. This is Monday, the official or statutory or whatever Boxing Day and already two members of the family are back with bargains from what used to be called January Sales.
Comment
Authors: Baldwin Leslie , Day Alan , Orton Ian , Bibble Quentin , Barnett Graham
Published: March 2008

IN THESE recessionary times it is encouraging to be able to record some library expansion. After several years of anticipation (by turns eager and nervous, according to the state of rumour at both the national and local levels in the higher education world), the City University Business School moved into imposing new premises on the uppermost floors of the emerging Barbican Arts Centre.
The Shallow end
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

READERS of this column will acknowledge that there are few observers around these days more disinterested, or hollow, than Shallow. This not only guarantees unbiased commentaries on this page, but should also ensure that no‐one is offended—which is now our sublime object.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

I READ WITH particular interest P R McKenna's observations in this issue on librarians as book‐reviewers (which I did as part of my normal proof‐reading duties). As a publisher, and to a much lesser extent as author, I have been on the receiving end of book‐review criticism for a great many years, and though my epidermis has thickened in that time, it is still occasionally penetrated by advanced crassness or irresponsibility.
Comment
Authors: Ellis Charles , McDonald Vincent , Hannabuss Stuart , Wills Tony
Published: March 2008

IMMEDIATELY after the EGM in January the editor invited me to write something about publishing since, as he put it, ‘people don't seem to know much about it.’ He suggested 1500 words: I have a straight, unvarnished tale to tell and will therefore resist commentary, though the temptation to irony is not absent!
Barbican and books
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

SINCE the Barbican Centre was officially launched it has displaced many times its own volume of other topics from most of our journals and newspapers. It is good for a para or two of knocking copy in any critic's column, no matter what the brief—local government, the arts, architecture or the state of the economy.
Comment
Authors: Iwaschkin Roman , Reid David , Day Alan , Francis Jim , Hannabuss Stuart
Published: March 2008

FOR MOST of us, public library history usually amounts to scarcely more than rapidly dimming recollections of a handful of acts and commissions; dry facts memorised during library school lectures and retained just long enough to put the exams behind us. Of course, we remember the great names— Carnegie, Dewey, McColvin, and perhaps a few others—but apart from retiring old‐timers' regular assurances that it was all so much better and worse back then, we tend to know little of the day‐to‐day routines of our predecessors.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

PETER LABDON, of the calibre of whose editorship of this organ during the past five years you should be thoroughly appreciative, is to become the Hon Treasurer of the Library Association in 1983; and, while none of us felt his ordinary membership of LA Council to have been in conflict with editing NLW, one of the principal honorary officerships of the LA obviously is. So, with a great deal of regret all round, and gratitude on my part for his achievements, Peter will be relinquishing the editorship at the end of this year.
Old books and new verse
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

ONE Saturday morning a few weeks ago, my wife and I were standing in a queue. We guessed that we were about fifty yards from the beginning but, as the front part dog‐legged out of sight to the right, that was a very rough guess. Certainly, another fifty yards or more stretched away behind us and it was then still ten minutes before the doors of the Church Hall were due to open.
Comment
Authors: Chapman Liz , Baker Elizabeth , Mann Peter H , Munford WA , Leonard AGK
Published: March 2008

‘WHAT A novel arrangement. Is any reason given?’
Comment
Authors: Griffin Brian , Harkin Mike , Day Alan , Duckworth Alan , Reid David , Wills Michael
Published: March 2008

MY VOTE for the Most Depressing Spectacle of the Month goes to a shelf of leather‐bound, gold‐tooled ‘video classics’ seen in my local video rentals shop. The leather binding and gold lettering looked quite impressive until you touched one of the volumes—Wuthering heights, for example—and realised that this ‘book’ was plastic, every single molecule of it. And empty, unless you counted the video tape.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

TOP TITLES, measured by the number of loans from Dumbarton District Libraries last year, were newish books by the following ten authors: Wilbur Smith, Jeffrey Archer, Catherine Cookson, Virginia Andrews, Danielle Steel, C McCullough, Susan Howatch, Desmond Bagley, Belva Plain, Douglas Reeman. (How can anyone be willing to go through life called ‘Belva Plain’?) The most popular non‐fiction writer was James Herriot, and for children (can you guess?), Enid Blyton.
Comment
Authors: Bevan Alun , Apted Sheila , Hannabuss Stuart , Ashworth Wilfred
Published: March 2008

As Joe Shams moved towards the exit he caught a glimpse of a familiar cover‐pic half‐hidden behind a porta‐reader. Recognising it as a copy of Philip K Dick's Counter clock world, he knew that it had been planted there by the library's security division in another of their far from subtle attempts to trap a ‘Dick‐'ead’.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bingley Clive , Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin
Published: March 2008

THE NAME OF Peter Labdon was first printed as Editor of NLW in the issue for July 1977. In this present issue it appears thus for the last time. In January 1983 Peter takes on the honorary and taxing role of Treasurer of the Library Association, which he sees as conflicting with continuation as NLW's Editor, and I will eschew mischief and concede him the point.
The Information Game
Authors: Shallow Robert
Published: March 2008

OUR elder son, a fledgling Frank Johnson on a provincial daily newspaper, frequently telephones his reference enquiries home rather than directing them to his paper's library or his friendly neighbourhood one. He does this because he gets priority service from his Ma; and she is happy to oblige because she can, at the same time, check up on his diet and the state of his laundry.
Comment
Authors: Russell Taylor Elisabeth , Kingston Irene , Maltby A , Kerns Ruth
Published: March 2008

I WAS standing in a queue at the till in a department store in London, recently, when a woman in front of me, apparently unprovoked, showered racial abuse over the heads of a crowd of lunchtime shoppers. She started with the 20th‐century cliché, ‘They should all be sent back where they came from!’, she continued by accusing the despised minority of all manner of depravity and degeneracy, and climaxed with a comparison between Black Britons and jungle beasts—to the latter's advantage.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin , Dudley Edward , Ashworth Wilfred
Published: March 2008

I RECEIVED a most unusual publication through the post the other day which may not strictly come within the scope of this column, since it won't answer any particular problem except that of where to go for your holidays. It's called The North: a feminist local history and holiday guide by Susan Evasdaughter and is one of a series of similar booklets that includes London, Home Counties, West Country, Wales, and Central England. The books are not intended to be comprehensive holiday guides listing the best places to stay, the most interesting walks etc, but rather set out by area some of the most important things of specific interest to women. Information ranges from ‘pre‐historic matriarchal times’ to present day feminist activities. There is information on women castle builders, famous lesbians, local women heroes, artists, queens and witches, suffragettes, politicians, discoverers etc. Where possible information is given about places for women to stay although there aren't many specifically for women. The quality of printing is fairly basic; I expect the booklets were produced on a shoestring, so don't expect tourist board glossies. However, a lot of work has obviously gone into them, each has a name index, and they would be useful additions not only for local studies collections but also for any libraries who have a community information section on women's studies. The booklets cost £1.00 from 47 Ladysmith Avenue, Newbury Park, Ilford, Essex.
Periodical panel game
Authors: Place Hillary
Published: March 2008

‘GOOD afternoon gentlemen. This is the only meeting of the periodicals selection panel scheduled for this session, so we have more than the usual number of suggestions to plough through this afternoon. First, I would like welcome two new members, Dr Tyler for Media Studies and Mr Bough from Hospitality Administration. As a matter of fact Dr Tyler sends his apologies, he has a studio booking which naturally takes precedence, in this era of scarce resources. I'm sure his contributions to our deliberations will be invaluable if they should be forth‐coming next year.
Comment
Authors: Hendry Joe , Davinson DE , Iwaschkin Roman
Published: March 2008

I SPEAK of the crucial, central role of what public libraries can be about in society, and most especially in working class life and in our service's abilities to make an impact, however slight, on disadvantage in British society.
Commonplaces
Authors: Fleming Edwin , Bunch Allan , Ashworth Wilfred
Published: March 2008

THE European campaign to catch up with the United States and Japan in the provision of information technology took a major step forward at the end of February when the Council of Ministers of the European Communities adopted the ESPRIT programme. ESPRIT equates to the ‘European Strategic Programme of Information Technology’ and the main areas of research cover micro electronics, software technology, advanced information processing, office systems, and computer integrated manufacturing. The programme will span the years 1984–88 and will cost 1,500,000,000 European Units of Account (£900,000,000), half of which will be contributed by the European Communities Commission, and half by industry. Although the European Community represents over thirty per cent of the world IT market, European industry provides only ten per cent of this market. For further details of the programme, contact Mr W Colin, IT Task Force, 200 Rue de la Loi, B 1049 Brussels, Belgium, tel 235 4477 or 235 2348, telecopier 230 1203, tx 25946.
Librarian of the year show
Authors: Spens Patrick
Published: March 2008

AFTER the disgraceful scenes at Wembley last year, it was probably just as well that this year's Librarian of the Year Show was transferred to the more appropriate surroundings of the Taplow Conference Centre. Despite the change in venue, this year's show drew record entries in nearly all categories; and fears of a repetition of last year's troubles happily proved groundless as most of the day's events passed without serious incidents—although the stewards once again had to be called in during the Middle Management Dressage.
Comment
Authors: Ashworth Wilfred , Dudley Edward , Francis JPE
Published: March 2008

WITH A PICKET LINE on the front door of Islington Town Hall where the meeting of June 12 was being held, Council might have been denuded of its NALGO members, but there did not seem any numerical difference made to the attendance and the President assured everyone present that they were not really blacklegs!
Comment
Authors: Foskett Douglas , Day Alan , Kerns Ruth
Published: March 2008

I HAVE SEEN no comments in our professional press on the notice given by the United States of intention to withdraw from Unesco at the end of 1984. Yet this decision concerns all of us who look beyond our own coastline, and take some interest in libraries throughout the world, because there can be no doubt that Unesco has been a major factor in their development. This is certain to suffer if the us contribution to the budget, some 25%, ceases. The decision has not yet come into effect, and there is still time to persuade the us not to implement it.
Commonplaces
Authors: Dudley Edward , Fleming Edwin , Bunch Allan
Published: March 2008

The recent LISC discussion paper Basic professional education for library and information work spoke of the need to recruit ‘a number of potential innovators and high fliers … managers of new enterprises’, particularly those in the it field. Small LISC misery twinges, then, at the publication of Graduate supply and availability to 1986 by the Institute of Manpower Studies. Apparently there's a shortage of high flying graduates, characters with substantial personal drive and matching intellectual skills. What's worse is that the problem is sharpest among it graduates where a drop of 10% is expected in the next two years. So dreary old trad librarians may have a short reprieve from being flown over and innovated at.
Comment
Authors: Bryon JFW , Iwaschkin Roman , Kearns Ruth , Anderson Bill
Published: March 2008

British public librarians welcomed the Public Libraries and Museums Act 1964 with relief: for the first time a government department was made responsible for public libraries and (it was hoped and assumed) norms were going to be established. Communities, Clause 7(i) said, were entitled to “a comprehensive and efficient service” and, innocent as we were, we thought we had gained an advantage over academic and special libraries, which had no such legal warrant for minimum standards. Few would claim that anything of the kind has been achieved.
Commonplaces
Authors: Bunch Allan , Fleming Edwin , Ashworth Wilfred
Published: March 2008

SINCE all the efforts to halt and reduce unemployment have so far signally failed, I would not have been surprised to find a group calling itself Church Action with the Unemployed recommending prayer. But, in fact the kind of help on offer is of a more practical kind, consisting of a series of attractively produced leaflets which ‘contain the most comprehensive description yet published by any organisation about the range of initiatives possible at local level’. Although written from a ‘church angle’, the leaflets also have a universal practical application. Titles include Coping with unemployment, Creating new jobs, Mutual help groups and resource centres, Opportunities for young people, and a list of Contact persons at local level. These contact persons, mostly industrial chaplains, have several years' experience of working with unemployment initiatives and are available for advice, giving talks, etc. CAWTU has also published a book called Action on unemployment: 100 projects with unemployed people which offers essential practical information on working with the Manpower Services Commission, establishing a centre, working with volunteers, fund raising and promoting small business co‐operatives. It incorporates comments and advice from those actually involved in projects. CAWTU is an interdenominational organisation whose objective is to educate church congregations, voluntary organisations and unemployed people about actions which can be undertaken at local level. Copies of the leaflets are free and the book is available at £2.95 (less 10% for libraries) from CAWTU, 146 Queen Victoria Street, London EC4V 4BY. They suggest that the leaflets are displayed ‘in your Local Reference rather than “Religious” section’!
Comment
Authors: BASKER JIM , SNOWLEY IAN , COLEMAN DAVID , KEARNS RUTH , DUDLEY EDWARD , BUNCH ALLAN
Published: March 2008

In the late 1960s and early 1970s there was a passion to develop the study of information for several reasons:
Commonplaces
Authors: BUNCH ALLAN , FLEMING EDWIN , ASHWORTH WILFRED
Published: March 2008

Does your library suffer from staff burn‐out? If so, there is help at hand in the form of a recent booklet from the National Youth Bureau. It's called Value judgements: evaluating community based agencies by Warren Feek and Douglas I Smith and has been written to help any organisation avoid a variety of illnesses from the aforementioned staff burn‐out to failed funding applications (Chief Librarians please note!). The booklet shows how you can assess whether your agency is achieving its purpose and whether you have used the right resources in the right way. It's aimed particularly at those working with people in voluntary and statutory youth and community work organisations but it may well be useful to librarians wanting to assess their services, as well as to their clients. The booklet is well illustrated with cartoons and sells at £1.20 inc. p & p from Sales Department, National Youth Bureau, 17–23 Albion Street, Leicester LE1 6GD.
Commonplaces
Authors: FLEMING EDWIN , BUNCH ALLAN , ASHWORTH WILFRED
Published: March 2008

It is common knowledge that the developing countries have needs for expertise in agriculture, technology, medicine and education. But the call for librarians in specialised fields is now being heard increasingly throughout Africa, Asia and South America.
10 Awkward Questions
Authors: DOUBLEDAY STEVE , BUCHAN ALISON , BINGLEY CLIVE , WILKINS JUDITH , Perry Brian
Published: March 2008

“It's all jargon”, I hear you say. Well, don't put up with that, get an explanation which you understand. With all the following questions, where appropriate, make sure you get your answers in writing and preferably in the contracts!
Scandinavian roundup
Authors: WIDGREN LILLEMOR , HANSTOCK TERRY , CORRALL SHEILA , MALAKUNAS MILDA , FLEMING EDWIN , BUNCH ALLAN , ASHWORTH WILFRED
Published: March 2008

A reference stand among regular stalls offering fruit and vegetables was to be seen in the market‐place of a small town during the library week in Sweden last October. The local public library was marketing its reference service, using reference books as well as a terminal for on‐line searching.
Alerts
Authors: ASHWORTH WILFRED
Published: March 2008

On 26th November, with the help of a speech by Robin Leigh‐Pemberton, the Governor of the Bank of England, Investors in Industry launched a new book by G M J Richardson Understanding industry today (David and Charles, 1984. Paper £4; Hardback £7.95. ISBN 0 7153 8663 8). It is based on a course of eight lectures which have for the last five years been successfully delivered to over 23,000 sixth‐form pupils under an ‘Understanding Industry’ scheme devised by Investors in Industry. The book goes further than the course and provides a clear, readily understandable account of what goes on in industry and its immense importance to the life of the community. Ignorance of industry is by no means confined to sixth form pupils and though the book is especially useful, in a library context, for school libraries and children's libraries, it would undoubtedly also be an excellent acquisition in public libraries for adult readers. It defines many terms used in industry, debunks mystique, clears up common misconceptions, and I wish I had had it available when I was an industrial information officer to put into the hands of my company's new recruits.
Review
Authors: REDFERN BRIAN , ASHWORTH WILFRED , KEARNS RUTH
Published: March 2008

A recently published book, The essential jazz records. Vol.1: Ragtime to swing, should become an essential item in any library's stock, whether it collects jazz records or not. Not only is it an excellent guide for the collector, but it is also a very readable history of jazz from its beginning to the end of the swing era and the beginning of the modern period. There are of course a number of histories of jazz, all of which contain references to records which illustrate the history. This book reverses the process by examining the records in chronological order of the period they cover and relating the records to the history they illustrate.
Research
Authors: CORRALL SHEILA , BUNCH ALLAN
Published: March 2008

Access to published information A recent study suggests that availability of publications is better in the UK than elswhere — but we have no cause for complacency. The report covers the publishing industry, bookselling, libraries and users, within the context of the international UAP programme. Availability of publications in the UK: a state of the art review by Capital Planning Information (BNBRF Report 12) costs £12.50 from the British Library Publications Sales Unit, Boston Spa, Wetherby LS23 7BQ.
I.T. & all that
Authors: MALAKUNAS MILDA , HANSTOCK TERRY , CORRALL SHEILA , BUNCH ALLAN , FLEMING EDWIN , ASHWORTH WILFRED
Published: March 2008

Small micros, big programs The increasing power of micros has meant that programs once thought the province of big science only are now edging toward the grasp of the humble one man bander. This could create a healthy egalitarianism in the library/information world where the large and small don't know one another. For too long real computer power has been for big libraries, either for automation projects of routines or for sophisticated information retrieval in large technical information units.
Hard at Leisure
Authors: SNOB THEO D , TRAYNOR SHAUN , KERNS RUTH
Published: March 2008

“I'm afraid I don't often have the opportunity, myself, of showing people around” explained the director of Multi‐Media Amenity Resources, “but most of my staff are taking industrial action today … oh, some minor dispute about my plan to convert branch libraries into games 'n disco bars.” In fact he hadn't been to the building for three months due to the pressure of committee, sub‐committee, advisory group, interdepartmental, forward planning, twinning, budget trimming, directorate, joint steering committee, management, community profile, section, heads of departments and ‘don't minute that’ decision making meetings. In addition, were day, weekend, short course, refresher, local, regional, national, schools, courses, seminars and conferences which he felt obliged to attend in order to supplement his collection of handy‐packed hotel beverages, and, incidentally, to keep up with all that was new and wonderful in the field of librarianship.