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Page 26
[Illustration: Accession book, right-hand page. (Reduced size.)
PLACE AND PUBLISHER DATE BINDING SOURCE COST REMARKS
N.Y. App. 1885 pa. Scribner 28 Bind No. 354
L. Vizetelly 1888 cl. " 81 " " 355
B. Ho.M. 1892c " " } 2.97
" " " " " } ]
Each book and each volume of a set has a separate accession number and
a separate entry. Each entry occupies a line; each line is numbered
from one up to such a number as the library has volumes. The number of
each line, called the accession number, is written on the first page
after the title-page of the book described on that line. The accession
book is a life history of every book in the library. It forms such
a record as any business-like person would wish to have of property
entrusted to his care. It is also a catalog of all books in the
library, and a useful catalog as long as the library is small. Never
use an old accession number for a new book, even though the original
book has disappeared from the library.
Record should be made of all books, pamphlets, reports, bulletins,
magazines, etc., received by the library as gifts; and every gift
should be promptly and courteously acknowledged in writing, even if
previously acknowledged in person. Keep this record in a blank book,
alphabetizing all gifts by the names of the givers, with dates of
receipt. Books given should appear on the accession register the same
as books purchased.
CHAPTER XX
Classifying books
The smallest public library should be classified and cataloged. This
will make its resources more easily available, and will prevent the
confusion and waste of labor which are sure to come if systematic
treatment of the books is deferred. Get the best advice obtainable;
consider the library's field and its possibilities of growth, and
let the first work on the books be such as will never need to be done
over.
To classify books is to place them in groups, each group including,
as nearly as may be, all the books treating of a given subject, for
instance, geology; or all the books, on whatever subject, cast in a
particular form--for instance, poetry; or all the books having to do
with a particular period of time--for instance, the middle ages. Few
books are devoted exclusively to one subject and belong absolutely
in any one class. The classification of books must be a continual
compromise. Its purpose is not accurately to classify all printed
things, this can't be done; but simply to make certain sources of
information--books--more available. Any classification, if it gets the
books on a given subject side by side, and those on allied subjects
near one another, is a good one.
Books may be classified into groups in a catalog or list, yet
themselves stand without order on the shelves. For convenience in
getting for anyone all the books on a given subject, and especially
for the help of those who are permitted to visit the shelves, all
books should stand in their appropriate classes. Each book, therefore,
should bear a mark which will tell in what class it belongs;
distinguish it from all other books in that class; show where it
stands on the shelves among its fellows of the same class; and
indicate which one it is of several possible copies of the same book.
This mark can be used to designate the book in all records of it,
instead of the larger entry of its author and title.
There are two classification systems worthy of consideration, the
Dewey, or decimal, and the Cutter, or expansive. They are outlined in
the following chapters. Don't try to devise a system of your own.
Having decided on your system of classification, begin to classify.
This is one of the many things which can only be learned by doing.
Give fiction no class number, but an author number or "book-mark"
only, as explained in a later chapter. Give all biography a single
letter as its class number, and follow this by the author number.
Distinguish all juvenile books, whether fiction or other, by writing
before their numbers some distinguishing symbol.
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