ACRL College & Research Libraries News

Association of College & Research Libraries

Letters

Making new books available quickly

To the Editor:

I hope you will let me comment on an article that appeared some time ago in C&RL News: “Patron access to on-order and in-pro- cess titles,” by Elizabeth Ten Have and Denise Forro (December 1992). In it the authors note: “In the past this type of assistance was relatively unknown in academic libraries. A search of the library literature shows that even in today’s automated libraries, with the benefits of integrated systems, this is a fairly unique service. Many libraries do not offer access to materials that are waiting for cataloging, let alone items that are on order.”

I believe, through a glitch in Library Literature, two articles (and perhaps more) that dealt with browsing and circulating newly acquired, uncataloged books have been lost to researchers. As the author of one of the articles, “Backlog to Frontlog” (Library Journal, September 1, 1969), 1 would like to amend the record. Daniel Gore, then librarian of MacAlester College, adapted my approach for an academic environment. He published an article in LJ (September 1, 1972) with the great title, “In Hot Pursuit of FASTCAT.”

For browsing (and many books are selected by browsing), my Frontlog System shelved uncataloged books in a public area in “accession” number order. Gore added the appropriate LC classification prefix letters to divide the Frontlog/FASTCAT book by broad subject categories.

The Orange (NJ) Public Library still uses the Frontlog System. All adult books awaiting cataloging are on public shelves available for browsing and borrowing. I suspect even in academic libraries newly published books circulate better than older books.

In this era of “Customer Service” we all should consider making new books browsable and available for circulation.—Marvin H. Scilken, The U.N.A.B.A.S.H.E.D Librarian ■