College and Research Libraries


on several programs intended to increase 
the effectiveness of academic libraries. 
The author describes those programs and 
how they came about, discusses their role 
in contemporary academic librarianship, 
and assesses their effectiveness in meet-
ing their implicit and explicit aims. 

Although most of the programs have 
been forgotten by all but the most senior of 
us today, they were viewed during the pe-
riod as central to the most significant de-
velopments in academic libraries. Princi-
pal among these programs, in the minds 
of most academic librarians at the time, 
were a series of collection development 
grants made by the Carnegie Corporation 
to four-year, junior, teachers', black, and 
state colleges and to technical institutes . . 
In determining who should receive these 
grants, Keppel relied almost entirely upon 
several advisory groups of librarians and 
educators, all chaired by Bishop. In total 
these groups were instrumental in seeing 
that some $1,636,800 was granted to 248 
institutions for strengthening their library 
book collections. In addition, the corpora-
tion granted $1,824,500 to college libraries 
on its own initiative. 

Among other accomplishments within 
the academic library profession that re-
sulted from Carnegie grants between 1928 
and 1941 were the development of the first 
sets of four-year and junior college library 
standards, the preparation by Charles B. 
Shaw of the first list of books for four-year 
colleges and of Foster Mohrhardt' s list of 
books for junior college libraries, and B. 
Lamar Johnson's "library-college" exper-
iment at Stephens College. Carnegie sup-
port also led to the writing of William M. 
Randall's landmark monograph on The 
College Library, B. Harvie Branscomb's 
classic Teaching with Books, Erret McDiar-
mid's treatise The Library Survey, and 
James T. Gerould's pioneering College Li-
brary Building. In addition, the nation's 
first centralized library acquisition pro-
gram was established and operated for 
thirteen years under Carnegie auspices at 
the University of Michigan. 

All of these activities are treated in this 
book. The author appears to acknowledge 
the importance to us of all of them save the 
program of book-fund grants. Here he 

Recent Publications 271 

opines that perhaps fewer but larger 
grants would have done more good. He 
laments the absence of objective evalua-
tive material in the Carnegie archives and, 

· finding no hard evidence of success, cau-
tiously and somewhat dourly assumes no 
success. Although he may be right in his 
assumption, one feels constrained to re-
call that this period spanned the years of 
the Great Depression when many Ameri-
can colleges, as well as individuals, went 
bankrupt and when money was worth 
vastly more than it is today. Perhaps, at 
the time, simple survival itself, even cour-
tesy of the Carnegie Corporation, was a 
form of success. Moreover, it may seem a 
bit inappropriate to fault the Carnegie for 
lacking sophisticated evaluative mecha-
nisms a half-century ago when few if any 
grant-furnishing foundations, or govern-
ment agencies for that matter, have them 
today. 

This is an excellent book, thoroughly re-
searched, effectively presented, and well 
documented. It belongs alongside George 
Bobinski's Carnegie Libraries, which docu-
ments the foundation's earlier role in the 
provision of library buildings, and John 
Richardson's Spirit of Inquiry, which re-
counts its place in the evolution of library 
education and research. Taken together, 
this scholarly trilogy constitutes a massive 
and salutary reminder of the profession's 
great debt of gratitude to the remarkable 
Carnegie philanthropy, even if we assume 
that the program of grants for book-fund 
support was not a complete success.-
David Kaser, Indiana University, Bloom-
ington. 

Young, Kenneth E. et al. Understanding 
Accreditation: Contemporary Perspectives 
on Issues and Practices in Evaluating Edu-
cational Quality. San Francisco: Jossey-
Bass, 1983. 502p. (Jossey-Bass Higher 
Education Series) $27.95.ISBN 0-87589-
570-0. 
Another solid, useful reference tool has 

been born and added to the education li-
brarian's shelf. A long time in coming, it 
will be worn and dog-eared before the 
next accreditation team has left the cam-
pus. Indeed, if such an experience is im-
minent on your campus, it is recom-



272 College & Research Libraries 

mended that several copies be added to 
your shelves. 

The book purports to ''fill the need for a 
comprehensive and current resource for 
understanding accreditation" and the 
writers say it is ''designed to serve both as 
a general reference and as a training tool'' 
for those who make or are influenced by 
decisions regarding the accreditation of 
educational institutions. One will find 
here a full accounting of the various ac-
creditation agencies and their purposes, 
noting relationships and even conflicts 
that exist between and among them. The 
self-study process is analyzed, as welt 
with guidelines offered as to how it can be 
more constructive and less threatening. 

The accreditation process in higher edu-
cation cannot be likened to a holiday plea-
sure, a factor that is well recognized by the 
writers of this volume. One university 
president is quoted in the book as saying 
that administrators ''are tired of having 
the educational and financial policies of 
their institutions dictated by a horde of ir-
responsible outsiders, each representing a 
separate selfish interest. II The chief editor 
of this volume calls accreditation ''a strug-
gle over standards, 11 noting that various 
interest groups within the institutions 
contend with one another and that inevi-
tably accreditation "feels the force of 
those pressures and also bears the brunt of 
criticism from those whose interests are 
not served. II 

As a title in the Jessey-Bass Higher Edu-
cation Series, Understanding Accreditation 
was in process for a period of at least four 
years by the chief editor, Kenneth E. 
Young. Dr. Young, executive director of 
the National University Continuing Edu-
cation Association and past president of 
the Council on Postsecondary Accredita-
tion, is qualified to write on the subject 
and to seek out others to assist him in issu-
ing this volume. Charles M. Chambers 
and H. R. Kells, whom Editor Young de-
scribes as "two of the nation's most 
knowledgeable students of accredita-
tion, II contribute a sizeable share of the 
content of the volume, but we were im-
pressed with the astuteness of other chap-
ter authors as well. They can be credited 
with covering a broad spectrum of topics 

May 1985 

related to the accreditation principle and 
process, from its complexity to details 
about specific aspects, and from govern-
ment controls to the protection of students 
from consumer abuse. The importance of 
encouraging administrators to view ac-
creditation as a helpful tool rather than as 
a threat is pointed out by one of these writ-
ers. Another speaks to the need for self-
regulation, one of the principles of accred-
itation, and yet another writes of the 
importance of voluntarism as a concept in 
the accreditation process. 

Eighteen chapters and an epilogue 
make Understanding Accreditation a com-
plete work on the subject. The experience 
of the contributors is evident in their writ-
ings and the balance in their views is a 
credit to the work. 

This title can be recommended as au-
thoritative, readable, and current. Every 
academic library should own a copy, and 
the price is right.-Roscoe Rouse, Jr., Okla-
homa State University. 

Rare Books 1983-84: Trends, Collections, 
Sources. Ed. by Alice D. Schreyer. New 
York: Bowker, 1984. 581p. $39.95. LC 
84-174331. ISBN 0-8352-1756-6 . 
The first in a proposed series, Rare Books 

1983-84 surveys the main areas of interest 
to the field in nineteen essays, which com-
prise the first 159 pages, then provides a 
set of directory listings, covering more 
than 400 pages, followed by an index. The 
essays are split into three groups, the first 
seven surveying the sale of books and 
manuscripts during that year to private 
collectors and institutions in the United 
States, Canada, and Great Britain. Other 
than references to the sale of the fake 
Hitler diaries and the Gospels of Henry 
the Lion, Europe and the rest of the world 
are scarcely mentioned. Within this limita-
tion, however, the events in the rare-book 
world in 1983-84 are adequately and inter-
estingly surveyed by authors including 
Kenneth W . Rendell (dealer); Katherine 
Leab, and Daniel Leab (American Book 
Prices Current); Robert Nikirk (Grolier 
Club); and William Matheson (Library of 
Congress). 

The review of research and publishing 
in part two contains essays by G. Thomas