Oops!

Ah, the Library of Congress. The cynosure of all things library related in the United States. The creator, and enforcer of general cataloguing policies for all libraries. Before I began work at the Amon Carter, I really had no ideal how much sway the LoC had over libraries in the United States. They made the "standard" system for call numbers for libraries (no, not the Dewey Decimal System), create the standard terms for cataloguing books, and create the original cataloguing records for many of the works published in the United States.

In the course of my personal research into the workings and products of the LoC, I came upon this article.

I was really very stunned. I know the LoC has a massive collection (approximately 33 million books, and 139 million total items), but I felt sure that they had a modern, efficient system to they know where their volumes are at all times. All libraries have some version of this, most of them are electronic and accessible online. At the library which this would be most useful, the LoC, though - they still use paper slips. What? How can you justify this - the LoC has some of the most important, and most rare works in the world, so they keep track of them with paper slips?

No wonder there are so many misplaced items. To be fair, there are many places that books can be in a library - in the reading room, in a special collection, out on Inter Library Loan, out for conservation, and as sometimes happens at the Amon Carter, out in an exhibition. Or, it truly could be checked out to a patron.

This highlights an important trend in libraries today - how do libraries keep track of, and catalogue, all of the different types of information libraries collect? Thinking for the trend towards digitization of information, how will libraries keep track of, and catalogue the information that is not in a physical format? Is this task simply too much for one library to handle?

And, in the end, how do libraries ensure that all of the information they posses is readily available to those who need it?

I really have no answers to this, but it is something I feel sure will be discussed in my MSLIS classes, and it's a discussion I look forward to sharing with you.

- Jason Dean