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Aeronautical research scientists of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics have in the last six years indexed 7,070 non‐security classified NACA research reports under 458 different subject classification headings for a total of 18,619 subject entries. They further face the task of subject classifying over 400 similar research reports per year, plus the large number of security classified reports issued annually.

There is in my library a report with a most engaging title—On the nature and conditioning of least work equations in structures. I must add that I am far from being sure what it is all about, but anything on the nature of least work is attractive, and particularly so in the documentation of reports. Aeronautical libraries are mostly small, with staffs varying possibly from one to three, and the handling of reports is only one of their functions. Moreover the number of requests for reports may be small when compared with other enquiries. On this basis there is no doubt whatever that the time and effort spent in organizing this material is quite out of proportion.

Before I begin to talk to you this evening on public relations in London Transport, I thought it would help if I were just to touch on, in a general way, this phrase ‘public relations’.

Exploitation is a word which has only one meaning, but its connotation may not be quite the same for the trades union leader as it is for the tactician. To the librarian it has for some years meant getting the utmost value from a book stock limited by a rigid book fund. Having spent valuable staff time and money in selecting the book and putting it through ordering, accessioning, classification and cataloguing processes, he wants it to reach as many as possible of those able to profit from it. To achieve this, he indulges in publicity of various sorts—library bulletins and accessions lists, specially prepared booklists on individual subjects, displays of new books and of material of topical interest, and so on.

It was estimated in 1952 that the United States was then spending more than 3,000 million dollars a year on research and development. Over half of this was paid for by the Federal Government and, more particularly, two‐fifths of it by the Department of Defense. Much of the research made possible with these tremendous government funds is of a fundamental character and, in the military sense, unclassified; a further large proportion is in the nature of applied science or development and has far‐reaching industrial significance. The scientific work carried out for the Federal Government, either in its own laboratories or under contract in American industry and universities, is thus of interest to scientists and technologists everywhere. The sponsoring agency which pays for the work naturally has control over the distribution of the scientific information which results from it. The international scientific community has no prescriptive right to this information, but fortunately the agencies concerned do make much of it available.

All items listed may be borrowed from the Aslib Library, except those marked, which may be consulted in the Library.

The Conference of the Scottish Branch of Aslib was held this year on 27th February at the Mitchell Library, Glasgow, under the Chairmanship of Dr. D. G. Brown. The opening address was given by Sir Andrew McCance, Deputy Chairman and Joint Managing Director of Messrs. Colvilles, Ltd., and is reported in this issue. He was followed by Mr. M. C. Pottinger, Librarian of the Scottish Central Library, who surveyed Scottish resources of scientific and technical literature and information, and by Dr. C. Macrae who described the work of the Scottish Council. Both these papers are given in full. In the afternoon Mr. J. Revie, of the British Jute Trade Research Association, traced the steps by which a small special library could be set up, and Mr. E. N. Simons, of Messrs. Edgar Allen & Co., Ltd., spoke on the writing of English in abstracts and reports. Mr. Revie's paper is included in this issue; that by Mr. Simons was published in the May, 1953, number of Aslib Proceedings.

All items listed may be borrowed from the Aslib Library, except those marked, which may be consulted in the Library.

Since its formation in 1950 the Aslib Aeronautical Group has been concerned with various aspects of classification, particularly with regard to the retrieval of information from research reports. During the last year the Documentation Committee of the Advisory Group for Aeronautical Research and Development of N.A.T.O. has been working along the same lines. While the application has been restricted to the field of aeronautics, it is felt that the conclusions are valid for other branches of science and engineering.

When Eugene O'Neill died, theatre critic Brooks Atkinson said of him, “A giant writer has dropped off the earth….He shook up the drama as well as audiences and helped to transform the theatre into an art seriously related to life.” (New York Times, 30 December 1953).