Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from First Report of William Coolidge Lane, Librarian of Harvard University, 1898
Chicago. The arguments in its favor are (l) more convenient use of the books by the workers in the department concerned, because the collections, being comparatively small, can be more easily handled, and can generally be installed in such a way that more table space in close proximity is available; (2) in the case of scientific subjects, the possibility of having the books in or near the laboratory, which is the natural headquarters for scientific work. The arguments against such a policy are (1) increased dit?cnlty of access for persons not imniediately connected with the department, the result either of want of familiarity with the arrange ment and the rules of the special library, or of its being open less constantly or lending its books less freely than the central library; (2) less careful supervision of the libraxi'y, or else increased expense for its administration, and in most cases less security from fine; (3) the loss of the reenforoement which each department of a gen eral library receives from all related departments, unless the special library at considerable extra expense goes outside its own special field and acquires works which also belong in other departments and must be duplicated there (the publications of learned societies and many other important periodicals of too general a nature to be included in a department library have, of course, to be left in the central library) (4) a tendency to narrowness which the student who works in a well-equipped comprehensive library is likely to escape; (5) the growth of the special collection beyond a convenient size, while its earlier treatises and old editions become superseded by new ones, the natural result of which is that the central library is asked to take back the less useful books with which the special library no longer wants to be cumbered. These various considerations have more or less weight in different cases according to the subject, according to the situation and size of the library, and according to the habits and traditions which have prevailed in the College; but they make it fairly clear, as it seems to me, that in general the ideal arrangement is to have a strong and comprehensive central library, with commodious and conveniently situated study-rooms for proies sors and advanced students, supplemented by well-selected working libraries in the departments.
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