Biographical Directory of Law Libraries in the United States and Canada by AmericanAssociation of Law LibrariesReview by: James Wilson McGregorThe Library Quarterly, Vol. 34, No. 3 (Jul., 1964), pp. 283-284Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4305489 .

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REVIEWS 283

edge of computers or microimage techniques is assumed of the reader.

No punches are pulled in describing the limitations and expense of information- handling equipment. Although particular oper- ating systems are used to illustrate such equip- ment, the initial processing, and maintenance costs that are given are generally representa- tive. While some of the cost figures are al- ready out of date, they provide a reasonable basis for cost analysis. It is left for the sys- tems designer to weight the economic advan- tages, or disadvantages, gained by use of cards and other equipment. Unfortunately Bourne does not indicate the cost of conversion from, say, a manual card system to a punched-card system or from a punched-card system to a computerized system, but this may be derived with a little effort from the figures given.

The 8 < X 11 inch format is used to full ad- vantage for visual communication through graphs, illustrations, and many examples. The introductory chapter on "The Nature of the Problem," however, is not so clearly presented as the following chapters. The "dot" distri- bution graphs of the introduction contrast unfavorably with the simpler and more dis- tinct bar and distribution graphs used in suc- ceeding pages. Hundreds of convenient foot- note citations to source literature are supple- mented by additional references at the end of each chapter. A list of acronyms and ab- breviations and an excellent detailed subject index set off this attractive and useful volume.

It is difficult, for purposes of reference, to strike a balance between amount of coverage and detail. Bourne is successful in providing "an illustration of the tools, equipment, and methodology that might be applied" to the problems of informnation-processing. No one solution or method is emphasized as being better than any other. On the contrary, the pitfall of systems comparison is avoided en- tirely. The clrcle of user requirements affect- ing file characteristics and of file characteris- tics affecting file use is discussed in connection with file-purging and auxiliary file generation, part of the basic design problem. Similarly Bourne does not take sides in the controversy inherent in choice of controlled or uncontrolled indexing. No attempt is made to encourage or discourage mechanization. These decisions are appropriately left to management. Emphasis is placed on file specifications-what use is to be made of the file and what results constitute

satisfactory retrieval. Emphasis is also placed on what the equipment can or cannot do to a file. The librarian, systems designer, and manager must work out the cost/performance ratio to obtain maximum returns for mini- mum investment. For the librarian, here is a ready reference to available equipment and systems. For the information specialist, here is a survey of applications and design con- siderations. For the student, here is a guide into the fascinating field of file organization and manipulation.

WILLIAM KURMEY

International Business Machines Poughkeepsie, New York

Biographical Directory of Law Libraries in the United States and Canada. By AMERI- CAN AsSOCrATION oF LAW LBRARIES. St. Paul, Minn.: West Publishing Co., 1964. Pp. 57. Printed for private distribution. Biographical dictionaries of librarians are

rare-a strange commentary on a profession that so often bemoans the lack of reference aids in other subjects. Compiling a biographi- cal dictionary, of course, must overcome near- Herculean obstacles, including the lack of adequate funds, the necessity of using an enormous amount of voluntary labor, and the difficulty of securing responsive co-operation of the biographees. In addition, as Robert L. Collison, a British librarian, suggested in 1954, the difficulties have been even more deeply rooted "in that curious modesty with which we announce half-apologetically to any mem- ber of the outside world that we are librar- ians."1 Whatever the cause, it is a fact that there are yet (1) no authoritative directory of important librarians of the past, (2) only a very few book-length biographies on such librarians, and (3) almost no biographical dic- tionaries dealing with special areas of librar- ianship.

An exception to this third group is the new biographical directory of law librarians. Far from being fettered by a "curious mod- esty," this dictionary may well reflect a cer- tain pride among law librarians that harks back even to 1906 when they established their own association, announcing that they were

'Thomas Landau (ed.), Who's Who in Librar- fanship (Cambridge: Bowes & Bowes, 1954), p. ill.

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284 THE LIBRARY QUARTERLY

now "law librarians."2 Rather, the major prob- lem was pecuniary. The project was made possible through the generosity of the West Publishing Company, a law book publisher (p. 4).

The directory was printed for private dis- tribution, is unbound, and is to be supple- mented in 1965. It bears the usual West Company format, which is almost a trade- mark. Pre-publication preparation was han- dled by the American Association of Law Li- braries, and the data were secured through questionnaires. Entries are limited to "pro- fessional law librarians" elaborately defined (p. 3). The various categories within the entries are similar to those found in Who's Who in Library Service (e.g., education, ap- pointments, professional associations, etc.).

Because biographical dictionaries are, inter alia, to help the librarian "know himself," ad- ditional categories would seem desirable for any future editions. The British Who's Who in Librarianship includes honors, special inter- ests, and even telephone numbers! After thumbing through it, Collison exclaimed: "Why, it is really quite a learned profession, and there is an impressive number of military and civil and academic awards and honours. Here are librarians who are barristers-at-law, experts on philately, dramatists, historians, musicians, radio engineers, and travellers." The AALL's biographical directory lacks such glamorous items, but it is a good beginning.

JAMES WILSON MCGREGOR

University of Chicago

Special Materials in the Library: A Series of 14 Lectures Held at the Library Association and Aslib Headquarters, January 17 to April 11, 1962. Edited by J. BURKETT and T. S. MORGAN. London: Library Association, 1963. Pp. ix+179. 40s. (30s. to members).

Much recorded information appears in non- book formats and can be easily overlooked if book selection is limited to standard bibliogra- phies. These lectures were designed to intro- duce librarians to bibliographic, cataloging, and storage problems of diverse forms of pub-

lication. Of course there have been other re- cent compilations designed to introduce librar- ians to special materials. The editors refer to Mason's Primer of Non-Book Materials in Li- braries (1958) which was intended for stu- dents preparing for the Library Association Ex- amination. That work defines some forms of special materials and suggests alternative plans for the organization and use of such publica- tions. Special Materials in the Library pre- sents the personal experience and judgment of a group of experts rather than a survey of present practices or existing literature. It is meant to suggest possibilities and arouse in- terest among librarians, thus complementing existing texts.

The range of special materials treated is wide. It includes reports, trade catalogs, and films as well as such commonly treated forms as government documents, maps, phonograph records, and microforms. There are also lec- tures on foreign literature and local history- topics which might not ordinarily be consid- ered special materials.

Since the contributors are all English, the immediacy of some observations may be lim- ited for American librarians. Thus Mallaber and Lewis of the Board of Trade Library have much good advice on acquisition, cataloging, and use of government documents-for exam- ple, "the fruitful identification of useful items needs a good knowledge of the organization of governments, of the history of individual de- partments, and of the changes in government structure, both national and international" (p. 7)-but naturally the discussion is primarily in terms of H.M.S.O. publications and only secondarily in terms of United States and in- ternational documents.

R. C. Wright's paper on "Report Literature" is especially important because of the lack of introductory discussions of this increasingly common form of publication. He provides a useful evaluation of existing bibliographies (with a lengthy section on announcement serv- ices in the United States), suggests that a cen- tralized card service is needed, and discusses the problem of how much classification and indexing are needed.

The founder of the Hulton Picture Post Li- brary of Illustrations, C. H. Gibbs-Smith, un- doubtedly contributed the liveliest paper de- scribing his solutions to the real problems found in a picture collection of between twenty and thirty million items, as well as his opinions of

2James Wilson McGregor, "The History of the American Association of Law Libraries" (unpub- lished Master's thesis, Graduate Library School, University of Chicago, 1963), pp. 13-17.

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