A Library Primer | Page 5

such a
recluse as loses sight of the point of view of those who know little of
books.
As the responsible head of the institution, he should be consulted in all
matters relating to its management. The most satisfactory results are
obtained in those libraries where the chief librarian is permitted to
appoint assistants, select books, buy supplies, make regulations, and
decide methods of cataloging, classifying, and lending; all subject to
the approval of the trustees. Trustees should impose responsibility,
grant freedom, and exact results.
To the librarian himself one may say: Be punctual; be attentive; help
develop enthusiasm in your assistants; be neat and consistent in your
dress; be dignified but courteous in your manner. Be careful in your
contracts; be square with your board; be concise and technical; be
accurate; be courageous and self-reliant; be careful about
acknowledgments; be not worshipful of your work; be careful of your
health. Last of all, be yourself.
CHAPTER VII
The trained librarian in a small library
Julia A. Hopkins, of the Rochester (N.Y.) Public library, in Public

Libraries, December, 1897
The value of training for the man or woman who shall take charge of a
large city library is now so firmly established that no one thinks of
discussing the question. If it is true that technical training is essential
for the headship of a large library, why is it not equally necessary for
that of a small library? Trained service is always of greater value than
untrained service, be the sphere great or small. If a woman argued from
the standpoint that, because the house she was to take charge of had
only seven rooms instead of twenty she needed to know nothing of
cooking, sweeping, and the other details of household work, I am afraid
that her house and her family would suffer for her ignorance. So in
many departments of library work the accident of size makes little or
no difference; the work is precisely the same. The difference lies in the
fact that the head of a large library oversees and directs the work done
by others, where the village librarian must, in many cases, do all of the
work himself. In the distinctly professional duties, such as the ordering,
classifying, and cataloging of books, there is a difference only in
amount between the greater and the less. And it is precisely these
professional duties of which the person untrained in library work is in
most cases wofully ignorant.
It is inevitable that in starting a library there should be some mistakes
made; but with a trained librarian in charge, these mistakes will be
fewer in number. For example, what does the novice know of
classification? He realizes that the books, for convenience in use, must
be grouped in classes. If he has had the use of a good library (as a
college student would) he has some idea as to how the class divisions
are made, and knows also that there must be some sort of notation for
the classes. Necessity being the mother of invention, he contrives some
plan for bringing together books on the same subject. But with the
addition of books to the library and the demand which growth makes,
he finds that constant changes have to be made in order to get books
into their right places; and then some day he awakens to the fact that
there is some perfectly well-known and adopted system of
classification which will answer all his purposes, and be a great deal
more satisfactory in its adaptability to the needs of his library than the

one he has been struggling to evolve. Then he exclaims in despair: If I
had only known of that at the beginning! He feels that the hours which
he has spent in rearranging his books, taking them out of one class and
putting them into another, although hours of such hard work, are in
reality so many hours of wasted time. And he is right; for every minute
spent in unnecessary work is so much lost time. Not only that, but it is
unnecessary expense, and one of the most important things which a
small library has to consider is economy.
Is it not of value to the library that its librarian should know how best
to expend the money given him to use? that he should not have to
regret hours of time lost over useless experiments? Surely if training
teaches a librarian a wise expenditure of money and an economy of
time, then training must be valuable.
CHAPTER VIII
Rooms, building, fixtures, furniture
The trustees will be wise if they appoint their librarian before they erect
a building, or even select rooms, and leave these matters largely to him.
They should not be in haste to build. As a rule it