As I am desirous that you should apprehend precisely what it is that I
am to suggest as a desideratum for the library schools, I will ask to be
permitted to lead up to my point, rather than state it at the outset.
We are all of us daily impressed with the rapidity of change and
enlargement in the arts, sciences and various achievements of knowledge
to-day. In some departments, indeed, such as the natural sciences, we
expect the accepted opinions of one decade to give place to others in
the next decade. But we perhaps hardly realize that there is a similar
progress in the historical, sociological and religious sciences, and in
the fine arts. New facts are discovered, verdicts of history are
reviewed, new schools of thought and methods of study are established;
new men, new theories, new things come up every year, almost every day.
Now, a librarian is expected to bring the stores of knowledge to an
inquiring public; to render available the resources of accumulated
wisdom which but for him would be like gold hidden in the veins of the
rock. To perform this function requires of course primarily a certain
amount of educational training. A library assistant should be at least a
high school graduate; the librarian of a library of research should be a
college bred man, as such collegiate training will be found to his own
advantage and to that of his library.
But how after all their training and preparation are librarians, library
workers or students of library science to keep abreast of the time? This
is really the problem in what may be called the higher education of the
library profession. It may be thought that the reading of annual
cyclopedias, periodicals and the latest treatises will suffice to keep
members of the profession posted upon all subjects of importance. Yet a
little consideration will show that by such means much time and labor
are sacrificed. A library worker reads in such a case, not for general
information, but to ascertain definite and pertinent facts of importance
to him in his special field of work. What he wishes to know are indeed
the new discoveries, facts and opinions; viewed, however, not in
themselves as events in the progress of the sciences, but as bearing
upon the classification and nomenclature of the respective sciences
which treat of them, and upon the relations which those sciences bear to
others. He needs also an up-to-date acquaintance with the great men of
the time, not in a personal way, but through the contributions which
they have made to knowledge. Otherwise he will not discern the authority
upon any given subject from a tyro or an ignoramus. A true knowledge of
bibliography does not consist merely in knowing lists of books or in
knowing where to find such lists. It implies an acquaintance with the
relative values of books as well.
A thoroughly equipped reference attendant or cataloger should also be
familiar with the shibboleths and theories of the schools and with the
opinions of scholars upon questions of the day. Now how is he to learn
all this? He cannot learn it before he begins to study library work,
because it is a growing, living thing--this mass of current fact and
opinion. Yet he has no time to master each science for himself, and in
merely cursory reading he will miss the point which is to be of most use
to him in his particular line of work.
I reply that he needs the spoken word of the expert, framed and directed
to meet the special requirements of his case. The expert who knows his
subject in all its bearings can tell us at once just what we want to
know, if we have a chance to ask him.
Let us have then before our library schools and--I may add also--our
library clubs and associations, periodical talks by specialists upon
their respective subjects, presenting in a concise form the progress of
these sciences and arts with special reference to the needs of library
workers, as outlined above.
Such a presentation will enable the librarian, the reference attendant,
the cataloger or the classifier to perform his work with an assurance
and a facility that can be acquired in no other way. He will be acting
under expert advice. The special points to be brought out will be
presented to the lecturer beforehand; he will prepare his statement,
deliver it, and later answers inquiries which may have arisen. We all
know how much easier it is to ask somebody about something than it is to
look it up in some book. Let questions be noted as they occur and the
class be given a chance to ask them of an authority.
These lectures or talks need not and should not be confined to student
class rooms. Let them be public lectures which library workers outside
the school may attend upon payment of a small fee. The intrinsic
interest of a lecture upon some topic of the day whether literary,
historical, political, or scientific, would attract in a way that a
course upon pure bibliography can never do. As our library schools are
so integrally a part, as a rule, of some system of collegiate
instruction, there should be no difficulty in securing the services of
different members of the faculty. I may repeat also that no more useful
program of work for a library club during a season could be planned than
a course of just such talks as I have described. To tell the truth, the
matter of this paper first occurred to me in its bearings upon the work
of library clubs. To them and to the directors of our library schools it
is presented for their consideration.
Following this the representatives of the various library schools were
asked to describe the