New Britain herald., 1925-02-24
AT YOUR LIBRARY
Behind the Scenes

Bchind the Scenes What Is your mental picture of librarian? Don't you think of her as a friendly. feminine person en.
 gagged in the perpetual process of taking In and passing out books.
 fQu remember too that you have overheard her attempts 20 z, swer the most extraordinary questions, such as: What was the conception
 or the supernatural in the time Of shakespeare?" or What kind of lime do they have in New Bruns- wick?" to say nothing of requests Tor books about drums tailoring and fancy icings. You have vague notion that she probably does other things but are not very clear as to what they may be. As a matter Of Tact about three fourths of the work of a library is done behind the scenes.
 Choosing Your Books
 For instance there is the very complicated process ot getting new books from the publishers store house to your library table, We near about books in great many ways, from lists, advertisements, re- views, and people who have read them. And out of the floods that are published every year we try just as far as possible to buy those that will help you to master your job, to know your world and to en- joy life. z
 Of course the actual buying it. self means making out orders and checking bills and carrying on cor respondence with dealers and book stores. Then we have to put on our ownership marks so plainly that when you start for nasty trip to the library, you will know at glance which you should take back and which are the ones that came as Christmas presents or from school.
 That is only one of the numerous details which one would never think of as library work but which do take quantities of time. Finally we are ready to decide how the books shall be numbered and ar ranged to be most easily used.
 What the Numbers Mean
 You have probably had the em- barrassing experience of handing in a slip for a solemn treatise on ad- vertising or engineering and being presented with a particularly frivo- lous bit of fiction. And thereafter you resolved to find out what the mysterious symbols on the catalog cards and the books really stand for and why one has to give 'every- thing written in red on the corner" The first number simply tells what the book is about and the one be- low shows who wrote it. Suppose you have S21-St4. The means that 1t is literature and not science or history or any of the other things 1t might be; the that it is written by an Englishman, the 1 that it Is poetry and the St4 that that Sarti- cular Englishman was Stevenson. It | isn't always quite as easy as that though, for authors have most in- considerate habit of wandering all over the field of knowledge in one little book. and it is sometimes hard | to know where to put it.
 'I Want a Book About"
 But since it can be put on the | shelf with just one sort of books, | we make up for that by having | cards in the catalog which will re- fer to it under every subject where you might find it useful. For in- stance you ask for book on health. We know that most of the material will be with the "60's" on cer- tain shelf in the stack so we look there. But if we didn't use the cata- logue we should miss the books on school hygiene which are with those on education in ST0 and mind heal ing in 131 and diet In GAO. Then one needs to be reminded of re- lated subjects such as care of chill dren and occupational diseases. That is done by means of a card which comes after all the others and says "see also" and it pays 10 look up at least some of the head ings which it suggests. All this means that we spend a great deal of time and thought in planning and making the cards.
 Always Out"
 You sometimes feel as if this were true of books you want es- pecially to see. It often happens that there is another in which will almost take its place. But when there isn't we are very glad to take on non-fiction. But how are we to know when the book is returned and remember to save it for you? You have noticed that when We charge your books we keep the slip from the back page. These are filed in order under the late the book was taken and wait there in the file until the book comes back. In the meantime we hunt up the one belonging to the book you want and mark 1t Ire 'erve." So that when your desired eventually appears we can let it aside and send you your pos al.
 "Please Return"
 Did ynM erer U0pdor