Let’s talk a little bit about how we used to find books and how we used to check books in and out at the library.

Two weeks ago, I mentioned that with the new director, Mr. Morse, came a new way of checking books out. The Gaylord System. Before that time, patrons didn’t have a library card. Patron files were kept at the library and brought out when someone either checked out a book or returned a book. With the Gaylord System, patrons were given library cards, cardboard cards with a metal strip. A separate index card was kept in a paper pocket in the back of the books. The Gaylord System stamped the patrons’ library card number onto the book’s index card. That index card was kept in a file box and the patron took the book home.

This was before 1975. Back when we had the card catalog cabinet and cards. I remember the card catalog and I remember learning about how to look for books in the card catalog. Do you remember? Author’s name, or title or subject. The books were cataloged in triplicate. One index card was filed by author’s name, with the book title, the subject heading and maybe a little sentence describing the book. Another card was filed by the title of the book, then the author’s name, the subject, and a little sentence describing the book. A third card was filed by the subject, then the title, then the name of the author; you get the picture. The cards were typed on a typewriter, however, I remember some of the cards being handwritten.

That’s how libraries worked for probably one hundred years, when the Dewey Decimal System was first invented. Librarians had to be able to find a book (otherwise, it was as good as lost). But this way involved a lot of typing.

The Gaylord System made check-out easier but automation made cataloging seamless.

There were several library directors after Mr. Morse, but in 1984, the library hired Sara Charlton. One of the first things she did was apply for an LSCA grant for automation in circulation and cataloging in the library in order to save time, reduce typing errors, and reduce work time and just be overall more efficient. I was so happy to find a copy of the grant application in my archives. Ms. Charlton was progressive and, in my opinion, ahead of her time.

In the grant, Ms. Charlton stated that she was already utilizing a Columbia computer for staff training purposes, to give the staff an “ever deepening awareness of microcomputer technology.” I googled Columbia computers and was given a photo of a big, boxy desktop computer with a heavy screen. Without getting into too much library jargon, this computer helped with cataloging the books so that MCL’s records matched the records of other library’s books. This was the beginning of copy cataloging. For example, every library that owns a copy of Agatha Christie’s “And Then There Were None” has a cataloging record that matches every other library in Pennsylvania, as well as the USA.

The grant application requested $47,640 to be used to purchase five microcomputer terminals as well as barcodes for the books and patron library cards. Two of the computers would be used as a card catalog, one used to catalog the books, and two used to check books in and out. The operating system was budgeted at $23,000. The entire project would be implemented by the end of the year, 1986.

To be honest with you, I haven’t found documentation stating that the grant was awarded in 1985. And I found an article dated April 1991, stating that “barcoding, part of the automation process, is about two-thirds completed. Automation was made possible by a federal grant.” I know that staff took computer classes at the Vo-Tech School but I think that full automation was slow in coming. Ms. Charlton was a visionary in library technology. MCL became fully automated sometime in 1991.

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Susan Miriello is the Executive Director of the Mifflin County Library. The library’s collection of books can be viewed online at www.mifcolib.org.