College and Research Libraries


The Librarian and the Machine: Obser-
vations on the Applications of Ma-
chines in Administration of College 
and University Libraries. By Paul Was-
serman. Detroit: Gale Research Com-
pany, 1965. 170p. $5.75 (65-25320). 

This is a sane book in the insane world 
of academic librarianship. Temperate and 
calm, it is eminently readable,' has a useful 
"reading list," and is adequately indexed. 
Without entering the soggy field of library 
philosophy and arraying our Big-endians 
against our Little-endians, Dr. Wasserman, 
presently dean of Maryland's graduate 
library school, believes we must adapt the 
machine to do our data processing even 
while we wait, in civilized expectancy, to 
be shown whether it can indeed retrieve in-
formation from large general collections at 
a price we can afford. His evaluation of 
the advantages automation will bring and 
his words of caution regarding expectations 
and operations are judicious and thought-
ful. The academic librarian would do well 
to force the book upon his computer science 
people and the faculties of his science de-
partments. It might spare him the vast 
amount of gratuitous but frequently fatuous 
advice he receives in such quantity. 

The author looks both backward and for-
ward. He notes the belated impact the com-
puter has had on libraries. He also exam-
ines the Florida Atlantic experiment, the 
Columbia-Harvard-Yale medical libraries 
project, and a few of the other attempts to 
cope not only with the so-called informa-
tion explosion, but, more importantly, with 
the burgeoning record-keeping accompany-
ing it. He reports, but does not really judge, 
or even evaluate, these efforts. Since his 
book was conceived there have been small 
indications, at least, that some of the efforts 
are not achieving the success we had hoped 
they would. None of us is likely to tout his 
failures, but Dean Wasserman pays indirect 
tribute to those who have made our mis-
takes for us. Dean Wasserman briefly but 
specifically surveys coordinate indexing, the 
key-word-in-context indexes, MEDLARS, 
and selective dissemination of information. 
This is a useful summary, but more im-
portant is his recognition of the profession's 

488/ 

Book Reviews 
desperate need for user studies. He is prob-
ing one of our sore spots here, but perform-
ing a service the while. 

The various roles our professional organi-
zations, the computer companies, research 
scientists, and business and industry have 
played in bringing us to an awareness of 
what computers can do for librarianship are 
touched on. While recognizing, but not 
belaboring, the fact that librarians are wary 
of computers, Dean Wasserman, perhaps in 
charity, does not finger the library schools 
as the villains of his piece. He recognizes 
that our whole profession suffers from the 
fact that for years non-selective admission 
policies and low financial rewards have pro-
duced librarians sketchily educated in the 
genteel disciplines (English, history, music, 
or even, heaven forfend, French!) who are 
hostile to machine techniques. He has sym-
pathy for the human problems involved, 
but is hopeful that an increasing awareness 
of the need for experimentation and change 
will move us further along the road from 
amateurism to professionalism. 

If the book has a fault, it is that his com-
ments on the quality of the new men-that 
exciting bunch of madmen and mechanics, 
dreamers and scholars-who hopefully will 
give us the leadership we need so badly, 
are curiously understated. Perhaps he is 
going out of his way to reassure those of 
us who do not know COBAL from Cockney 
that we need not fear for the traditional 
value and functions of librarianship. In 
fact, the growing number of lively young 
men like those in the select Committee on 
Library Automation is one of the bright 
spots of the profession. Not only have they 
"savvy" and style, but they know library 
problems and have demonstrated an im-
pressive professional competence. A few of 
them are even bookmen! 

Paul Wasserman merits our thanks for 
his "observations."-Stuart Forth, Univer-
sity of Kentucky. 

Ontario Libraries, a Province-wide Sur-
vey and Plan, 1965. By Francis R. St. 
John Library Consultants, Inc., Toronto: 
Ontario Library Association, 1965. 182 
p. $2. (Cover-title: A Survey of Libraries 
in the Province of Ontario) . 



To ask of a multilibrary survey "what 
are its conclusions?" is naive these days. 
They deal with cooperation and the inter-
dependence of libraries. Ask, rather, about 
the libraries surveyed, or the sponsoring or-
ganization, and you will be better able to 
assess the value of the surveyor's recom-
mended levels and techniques of coopera-
tion. 

The present survey was commissioned 
by the Ontario Library Association, but 
paid for by a direct provincial grant since 
it was expected that this report would form 
the basis for new legislation. Its scope was 
the broadest possible: all types of libraries 
-public, university, college, school, spe-
cial, and government. Can a provincewide 
"plan" for a province of six million people 
and four hundred thousand square miles, 
incorporating all these diverse types of li-
braries, be presented in under two hundred 
double-spaced typescript pages? 

This is not to suggest that each square 
mile demands a square inch of report space, 
but rather to ask what such a report might 
be expected to include of: ( 1) background 
information; (2) isolation of problem areas; 
( 3) principles to be observed in finding 
solutions; ( 4) technical and administrative 
details of suggested solutions; and (5) sup-
porting statistical evidence. 

It would be kind to suggest that much 
of the first could be omitted since Ontario's 
librarians are perfectly aware of it. But 
why omit the important historical frame-
work of, say, the independent religious col-
lege libraries and then spend half a page 
on such trivia as Ontario's scenic spots? 
The problem areas are identified: geo-
graphic imbalance, administrative inefficien-
cy of small units, lack of ready communica-
tion even among nearby libraries, and lack 
of provincewide coordination. A less super-
ficial treatment, however, might have lent 
a greater air of authority through more ob-
vious attention to local circumstances than 
to a procrustean use of old published sta-
tistics and generalized norms. 

The principle of cooperation is certainly 
valid, but the surveyors ride it so hard that 
one wonders if they even considered the 
tempering role of tradition, of day-to-day 
work efficiency, or of library purposes. In 
proposing concrete steps toward an inte-
grated library system, this report unfor-

Book Reviews I 489 

tunately falls between two stools. It speci-
fies many solutions in administrative detail 
rather than leaving the principles to be 
worked out as the time of application and 
the local circumstances demand. This ap-
proach is not in itself bad, but every pro-
posed solution becomes suspect when it 
is found that the ramifications of some have 
not been thought out carefully enough by 
the surveyors to indicate their impractical-
ity. Of particular interest here is the fact 
that the province's academic librarians are 
now on record as severely critical of many 
aspects of the report's view of their place 
in the grand scheme. 

This is unfortunate, for the approach and 
conclusions of the "St. John Report" are 
not in general poor or invalid. And for 
Ontario's libraries, the report has already 
had the salutary effect of increasing certain 
provincial grants and of obtaining press 
headlines. Should one ask for more? For 
readers of this journal, this report will tell 
something about Ontario's conditions and 
needs, very little that is new or detailed 
about the practical operation, of cooperative 
efforts, and much about how not to write 
a survey report.-Ronald Hagler, The Uni-
versity of British Columbia. 

The Role of the Library in Improving 
Education in the South. Ed. with an 
introduction by Hallie Beachem Brooks . 
Atlanta, Georgia: Atlanta University 
School of Library Service, 1965. 112 pp. 
Apply. 

In the Spring of 1965 the Atlanta Uni-
versity school of library service, with the 
cooperation of the Emory University divi-
sion of librarianship, sponsored a confer-
ence on "The Role of the Library in Im-
proving Education in the South." To pro-
vide an opportunity for defining the role 
of the library in the South's efforts to solve 
a variety of economic, educational, social, 
and cultural problems; to communicate to 
nonlibrary groups the need for joint con-
cern as well as the fact that libraries can 
make a significant contribution to programs 
designed for social betterment; to consider 
specific methods of planning and imple-
menting all types of programs concerned 
with advancing the cause of education in 
the South: these were the purposes of this 
conference which was made possible by a