Manual of Library Economy: Third and Memorial EditionBrown, James Duff
Science
Manual of Library Economy: Third and Memorial Edition
Brown, James Duff
Libraries -- Great Britain -- Handbooks, manuals, etc.; Library science -- Great Britain -- Handbooks, manuals, etc.
The whole of the devices just described are so arranged that leaves can
be inserted, to a more or less limited extent, at any point. The British
Museum type does not provide for unlimited additions, nor for any
subsequent division of volumes, without much trouble and rebinding. The
French and other adjustable leaved binders do allow for unlimited
insertions, subject to the condition that the matter mounted on the
pages must be redistributed. In an adjustable book new leaves can be
inserted at any place till the volume is full, and then the contents may
be divided and two books used, this subdivision and spreading being
continued as the entries increase in number.
=272.= A form of page catalogue combining the powers of inserting new
leaves at any point, and moving single entries about without having to
paste them down or lift them up, is called the Rudolph Indexer. It
consists in its book form of thick cardboard leaves, to which metal
flanges are secured, down each margin. Each leaf is provided with a
double-hinged fastening, which enables it to be hooked on to any
adjoining leaf, so as to form a volume of any desired thickness, to
which a pair of covers can be attached. The catalogue entries are
written or printed on narrow cards, and these are slipped under the
flanges, which secure them by either end. Fig. 94 shows at a glance the
appearance of this form of page catalogue.
[Illustration: FIG. 94.--Rudolph Indexer Book (Section 272).]
=273.= There are certain advantages claimed for page catalogues which
may be enumerated here. The chief is that a large group of entries can
be scanned with one sweep of the eye, thereby facilitating the rapid
finding of any particular entry. Another is that, being in book form, it
is more easily manipulated than other forms of catalogue. Its
comparative cheapness is sometimes put forward as an advantage over
other forms, particularly cards, but on this point it is not wise to
assume cheapness where so much time and labour are necessarily involved.
As regards the claim to rapidity in turning up entries because a whole
page is exposed at a time, there are considerable doubts as to its
soundness. General experience of such catalogues as the British Museum
is that, owing to the number of entries, the occasional congestions and
disorders where double columns of entries exist, it is more difficult to
find a given entry than in the case of cards or slips properly guided
and in accurate alphabetical order. This point may be further
illustrated by the case of men or women who are not adepts at using
alphabetical lists, and who turn up a particular word in a dictionary
with much difficulty and loss of time.
[Illustration: FIG. 95.--Card Catalogue Cabinet with Sliding Extension
Runners (Section 275).]
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