College and Research Libraries 532 I College & Research Libraries • November 1977 fied, books uncataloged, guards with guns. The book contains a range of other in- terests-sketches of Sir Thomas Bodley and Henry Clay Folger (though not of Hunting- ton), experiences in the British Museum Li- brary and the Bodleian in 1930, and reminiscences of a far more relaxed aca- demic world. The director of the Hunting- ton, in the 1930s, spent every summer at Bar Harbor. Of the two accounts, that of the Hunt- ington shows a certain amount of feeling, whereas that of the Folger is rather flat and mechanical. Wright's heart remained be- hind in southern California where he had been most happy. As autobiographical writ- ing, Wright's style, which holds his material at arm's length from himself, is unfortunate. His writing does not i!lvolve him as a per- son, and it does not reflect the qualities and mind of a remarkable person. Consequent- ly, although his material has a range of in- terest for anyone interested in libraries and scholarship, its presentation is not very ex- citing.-Ellsworth Mason, Head, Special Collections Department, University of Colo- rado, Boulder. A Study of Coverage Overlap among Four- teen Major Science and Technology Ab- stracting and Indexing Services. Toni Carbo Bearman, principal investigator. William A. Kunberger, project coordina- tor. NFAIS-77 I 1. Philadelphia: National Federation of Abstracting and Indexing Services (NFAIS), 1977. 75p., 8 micro- fiche in pocket. $15.00 (prepaid). Abstracting and indexing services are virtually essential for gaining access to in- formation contained in an ever-increasing volume of journals. It is hardly necessary to point out that, as the body of scientific literature has grown, problems in reaching information in this literature have intensi- fied. The authors state in their introduction: "If each A & I service must scan a constant- ly growing number of journals, including many which are interdisciplinary in scope, Personalized • -~\ 88rvJ.C8 • .. ~ ~ ;utomatically Faxon's automation means even more than computer speed and accuracy. It means systems designed to make Faxon customers virtual experts in subscription management. . Faxon's new SCOPE Service enables libraries to monitor price 1nc~eas~s over a three.-year period by taking price data directly from !h~1r umque personal h1story f1les stored in Faxon's computer. SCOPE IS Ideal for d~partment he?d~ and subject specialists who can make a thorough rev1ew of subscnpt1on costs as they relate to budgets prior to annual renewal. Serials control information is also available from Faxon's com- puter on either punched cards or magnetic tape. Libraries with data processing capabilities will find our input precise and time-saving. Faxon makes automation work for you ... personally. £m F.W. FAXOn COmPAnY, InC. library Magazine Subscription Agency 15 Southwest Park , Westwood, Massachusetts 02090 Tel: 800-225-7894 (toll-free) • 617-329-3350 (collect in Mass. and Canada only) it is logical to assume that many A & I ser- vices must cover the same journals." The authors question the degree of journal over- lap between services but more importantly seek to establish the extent of journal ar- ticle overlap. Thus their definition of over- lap as a two-level concept: journal and journal article. This report is exactly what its title pur- ports it to be. The journal and journal article overlap among the chosen fourteen abstracting and indexing services are studied and reported in minute detail. The fourteen services are: Nuclear Sci- ence Abstracts, GeoRef, Internatioruil Aero- space Abstracts, Mathematical Reviews, Psychological Abstracts, Meterological and Geoastrophysical Abstracts, Searchable Physics Information Notices, BIOSIS, Chemical Abstracts Service, Engineering Index, INSPEC, Bibliography of Agricul- ture, Index Medicus, and Selected Water Resources Abstracts. Journal literature published in 1973 cov- ered by at least one of the fourteen services constitutes the population for the study. A painstaking and ponderous description of the progression of the study leads the reader through the mathematics and statis- tical methods employed. The tables are excellent and profuse with, in most cases, commendable explanations. The study re- veals that of the approximately 26,000 jour- nals scanned by the services, 5,466 of them had articles included in at least two ser- vices. This figure reflects journal overlap; the individual articles are not necessarily covered by more than one service. Statis- tical treatment of the massive study data allowed the authors to estimate a 23.4 per- cent maximum article overlap fo'f the 5,466 journals. This project, which was supported by the National Science Foundation, Division of Information Contract C875, was completed within the short period of eighteen months. Therein may lie the reason for some of the errors which mar the report. More careful editing perhaps would have eliminated the profusion of typefaces encountered and straightened out the mix-up in page num- bers early in the report. An exception to the commendable explanations of tables is that given for Table 8, "Article Overlap-Ser- vices Perspective." The description, far Recent Publications I 533 from explaining the table, renders it unin- telligible. The appendix contains some of the most interesting information found in the report, namely the comparison of the fourteen ser- vices by the methods of factor analysis and multidimensional scaling ( MDS). Clusters of services in the graphical form, resulting from multidimensional scaling, clearly re- veal similarities of coverage. The study makes no qualitative judgment of overlap. The data are provided, figures for maximum possible article overlap and estimates of actual overlap are given, and the conclusion "overlap is considerably less extensive than was estimated by the re- searchers before the study" is drawn. This information will probably be most useful to the services included in the study. The practical application for academic librari- ans is not readily apparent-Dolores B. Owen, Documents Librarian, University of Southwestern Louisiana Libraries, Lafay- ette. Clinic on Library Applications of Data Pro- cessing, 13th, Champaign, Ill., 1976. The Economics of Library Automation: Pa- pers Presented at the 1976 Clinic on Li- brary Applications of Data Processing, April 25-28, 1976. Edited by J. L. Divil- biss. Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Graduate School of Library Science, 1977. 164p. $8.00. LC 77-075153. ISBN 0-87845-046-7. ISSN 0069-4789. This volume contains the papers present- ed at the thirteenth annual clinic in a series which has managed to attract recognized authorities on specific topics in the field each year. Contents of this volume are "The Economics of Library Computerization," by Frederick G. Kilgour; "Cost Analysis of Au- tomation in Technical Services," by Ryburn M. Ross; "The Economics of Automated Circulation," by A. Robert Thorson; "Per- formance Measures in Automated Systems Management," by Martha West and Brett Butler; "The "lmpact of Computers on Bogk and Journal Publication," by Hugh Folk; "Cost Analysis and Reporting as a Basis for Decisions," by Douglas S. Price; "The Eco- nomics of Book Catalog Production," by Maurice J. Freedman; "The Economics of Catalog Conversion," by Michael Gorman; "Cost Advantages of Total System Develop-