College and Research Libraries


244 j College & Research Libraries • May 1975 

Woodburn will inevitably be compared 
with Evan J. Crane's Guide to the Litera-
ture of Chemistry · ( 1957) ; M. G. Mellon's 
Chemical Publications: Their Nature and 
Use (1965); and C. R. Burman's How to 
Find Out in Chemistry ( 1966). In several 
fields-collections of spectra, microform 
material, and computer-readable material 
-Woodburn is clearly more up to date, 
and the entire work is a valuable and most 
useful addition to the science reference 
shelf.-David Kuhner, Librarian, Sprague 
Library, Harvey Mudd College, Claremont, 
California. 

Computers and Early Books: Report of 
the LOC Project Investigating Means of 
Compiling a Machine-Readable Union 
Catalogue of pre-1801 Books in Oxford, 
Cambridge and the British Museum. 
London: Mansell, 1974. 131p. $12.00. 
(74-76872). (ISBN 0-7201-0444-0). 
The LOC Project represents search for 

a practical method to produce a union list 
of the contents of all libraries of Oxford and 
Cambridge universities and to relate their 
resources to those of the British Museum. 
The calculations based on the results of the 
project indicate that about a half million 
unique titles of pre-1801 books alone are 
held in these libraries. Until now, the suc-
cess in making the entire spectrum of this 
wealth systematically available to research-
ers has eluded the efforts of bibliographers. 
However, the emerging computer technol-
ogy recently has opened up possibilities to 
attack this mammoth task without armies 
of skilled manpower. The LOC Project has 
aimed to devise, test, and evaluate tech-
niques for the massive task of compiling a 
union catalog by exploiting the potential of 
the new emerging technology. 

The LOC Project, which was funded by 
the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in 1968 
and was brought to completion in 1973, 
represents thoroughly planned and meticu-
lously performed research in the funda-
mentals of creating machine-readable bib-
liographic records from books on shelves. 
It has assumed no available systematized 
bibliographic data in the sense of customary 
catalogs. It has researched the feasibility 
of creating adequately precise machine-
readable records on the basis of rudimen-
tary, easily recorded data from the books 

themselves. Bearing in mind that the object 
union catalog had been restricted to books 
published before 1801, the task assumes an 
additional dimension of challenge if one re-
members the character of the title pages of 
early books, ranging from the elusively de-
scriptive to the poetic. 

The method chosen for the project speci-
fied the compilation of the bibliographic 
records from the title pages of a sample 
consisting of all pre-1801 books in all Cam-
bridge and Oxford libraries cataloged un-
der the letter "0," except for three college 
libraries which were recorded in their en-
tirety. To serve as a system of normalized 
base for comparison, a reference file was es-
tablished also against which the records 
from all college, departmental, and faculty 
libraries could be matched. This file con-
sisted of the "0" letter catalog records from 
the British Museum, the Bodleian, the 
Cambridge University Library, and the li-
brary of the Taylor Institution, Oxford; 
added were also .. 0" entries from Pollard 
and Redgrave's Short Title Catalogue (re-
vised), from Wing's Short Title Catalogue, 
and from H. M. Adam's Catalogue of Books 
... in Cambridge Libraries. The records 
produced by the project were matched by 
computer against each other and against 
the reference file, using three matching 
techniques: a computer generated search 
code, the ''keyed title," and the "finger-
print'' identification technique. The 
matched records from the entire sample 
were assimilated, and a specimen union list 
was produced. 

Aside from its principal objective the 
project produced a wealth of statistical data 
about the distribution of materials by date, 
language, and numbers of copies of works 
in the various libraries; about the relative 
merits and costs of various methods in cap-
turing bibliographic data for machine-read-
able transcription; about the problems in-
volved in several methods and devices used 
in the transcription; and about the prob-
lems which arose in computer matching 
and printing of bibliographic records, rang-
ing from identification of data structures to 
representation of characters in a large array 
of languages. 

A particularly noteworthy achievement 
of the LOC Project is the successful ex-



ploration of the matching of bibliographic 
records representing materials in 221 li-
braries for the purpose of correlating their 
bibliographic identity. In the process of this 
activity the project has shed new light on 
possibilities of computer-aided recognition 
of identification of bibliographic items. It 
has also elaborated a new, powerful, and 
ingeniously simple method of this recogni-
tion, the "fingerprint," which may open up 
a far-reaching potential for the manage-
ment of bibliographic records in national 
and international context. 

The project has contributed new knowl-
edge about bibliographic data also in other 
areas. There is much in the pages of the 
LOC Report pointing in the direction of a 
sophisticated simplicity inherent in biblio-
graphic data as contrasted with our current-
ly prevailing and unquestioned reliance on 
systematically exhaustive accumulation of 
interpreted bibliographic data as a basis for 
future direction of computerized manage-
ment of bibliographic records. Implicit in 
some of the principal observations in the 
LOC Report is the potential for a powerful 
alternative to the present-day bibliographic 
management anchored in a cataloging code 
coupled with a large measure of interpreta-
tion for compatibility. 

The LOC Report is rich in detailed data; 
it summarizes the results with clarity and 
is oriented within a perspective of practical-
ity. The success of the work owes much to 
the distinguished group of experts who par-
ticipated in the definition of the project and 
to the competent and devoted work of the 
project team working against a full measure 
of difficulties caused by a computer not in-
tended for textual data processing. The di-
rector of the project was John W. Jolliffe, 
keeper of catalogues of the Bodleian Library, 
Oxford, a library automation pioneer re-
nowned for his insight, research discipline, 
and professional standards. The report will 
take its place among the select group of 
classics in library automation literature, and 
its observations and tabulated data are 
likely to inspire reevaluation of many a cur-
rent practice. For the automation-oriented 
rare books bibliographer in particular the 
LOC Report offers the challenge of radical-
ly new horizons.-Ritvars Bregzis, Univer-
sity of Toronto Library. 

Recent Publications/ 245 

OTHER BOOKS OF INTEREST 
TO ACADEMIC LIBRARIANS 

Abajian, James de T. Blacks and Their Con-
tributions to the American West; A Bib-
liography and Union List of Holdings 
Through 1970. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1974. 
487p. $29.50. (74-8695). (ISBN 0-8161-
1139-1). 

Abramowitz, Molly, comp. Elie Wiesel: A 
Bibliography. Metuchen, N.J.: Scare-
crow, 1974. 206p. $6.50. (74-17166). 
ISBN 0-8108-1731-9). 

Adams, Laura, comp. Norman Mailer; A 
Comprehensive Bibliography. Metuchen, 
N.J.: Scarecrow, 1974. 151p. $6.00. (74-
17163). (ISBN 0-8108-0771-8). 

The Almanac of World Military Power. 3d 
ed. Ed. by Trevor N. Dupuy and others. 
New York: Bowker, 1975. 400p. $25.00. 
(74-7578). (ISBN 0-8352-0730-7). 

American Association of School Librarians 
ALA, and Association for Educationai 
Communications and Technology. Media 
Programs, District and School. Chicago: 
American Library Assn., and Washing-
ton, D.C.: Association for Educational 
Communications and Technology, 1975. 
136p. $2.95. (74-32316). (ISBN 0-
8389-3159-6). 

Armitage, Andrew D., and Tudor, Dean. 
Annual Index to Popular Music Record 
Reviews, 1973. Metuchen, N.J.: Scare-
crow, 1974. 681p. $20.00. (73-8909). 
(ISBN 0-8108-0774-2). 

Atkinson, Jennifer McCabe. Eugene 
O'Neill; A Descriptive Bibliography. 
Pittsburgh: Univ. of Pittsburgh Pr., 
1974. 440p. $27.50. (73-13312). (ISBN 
0-8229-3279-2). 

Baker, Alfred W.; Boots, Frederick; and 
Pultz, Donald. Automation at the Fair-
fax County Virginia Library System. 
(Computerized Cataloging Systems Se-
ries, vol. 1, issue 2) Tempe, Ariz.: LARC 
Association, 1975. 

Bederman, Sanford H. Africa: A Bibliogra-
phy of Geography and Related Disci-
plines. Atlanta, Ga.: School of Business 
Administration, Georgia State University, 
1974. 334p. $6.95 (74-22175). (ISBN 
0-88406-089-6) . 

Bell, S. Peter. Dissertations on British His-
tory: 1815-1914: An Index to British