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“Theprinted word is neither more nor less than the judgment of a specialist in printed form. Our files and our libraries are really vast collections of expert opinions in formal, recorded form.” These words of Dr. Ralph R. Shaw, the Librarian of the United States Department of Agriculture, illustrate effectively the work and aims of the public reference library which is, in fact, the living encyclopædia of its area. Its purpose is clearly the maintenance of whatever is available of the most up‐to‐date information on each subject.

AT the very outset of this paper it is necessary to make clear that it is not an attempt to compile an exhaustive bibliography of literature relating to special librarianship. Neither space nor time permit this. In fact, the references given can only claim to be a sample of the wealth of material on the subject and this paper is submitted in the hope that it will stimulate others to more scholarly efforts. Reference numbers throughout this paper refer to items in the ‘Select list of references to the literature of special librarianship’, section 2 onwards.

For the first time since this series of annual reviews of the literature of special librarianship and information work began, the authorship has changed hands. It is fitting to pay tribute to the skill with which Mr J. Bird has compiled this review each year and to express the hope that the same standards of selectivity and pragmatic appraisal set by Mr Bird will be maintained. The aim of the survey remains unchanged: to bring to the notice of librarians, particularly those in the smaller organizations, the more significant and practically useful books, pamphlets, and articles which appeared during the past year, or, more strictly, were received in the Aslib library during the past year. Experience of the types of inquiry most frequently received in the Aslib library has been particularly useful in determining the type of publication that could most profitably be included. As has been stressed in previous years, the survey is not intended to be used as a bibliographical tool, since this purpose is adequately served by other existing services, but rather as a guide to current reading.

Do these reference requests sound familiar? “I need to know what has happened on this day in history. Can you help me?” Or, “I'm doing a paper on Thornton Wilder. He was born on 17 April. Can you tell me who else was born on that day?” Or, “Are any national or regional anniversaries coming up next Friday?” These questions call for a special type of reference work—a book of days. A book of days (or day book) lists important events that have occurred on each day of the year throughout history, and is arranged by month and day. These works often include not only historical, cultural, and literary events, but also the dates of the births and deaths of notable people, commemorative days of saints, and special anniversaries. A book of days, for example, can reveal that historians Will and Ariel Durant were married in New York City Hall on Halloween in 1913, or that Hart Crane and Ernest Hemingway were born on the same day in 1899 (21 July). This article will review some of the more useful books of days that are often found in reference collections—works that are uniquely suited to answer questions about each day of the year.

MR. DENIS HOWELL, M.P., Minister for Libraries, who was to have told Conference how public libraries had progressed since the Act, had to withdraw and so we did not find out how the responsible minister felt about us.

THE interval between the Library Association Conference and the printing of THE LIBRARY WORLD is too brief for more than a series of impressions of it. Comment is probably preferable in our pages to mere record. The Association is publishing in the next few weeks all the papers that were read and, as we hope, the substance at least of the unwritten contributions. In this second particular reports in recent years have been lacking. A report that merely states that “Mr. Smith seconded the vote of thanks” is so much waste of paper and interests no one but Mr. Smith. If Mr. Smith, however, said anything we should know what it was he said. What we may say is that the Conference was worthy of the centenary we were celebrating. The attendance, over two thousand, was the largest on record, and there has not been so large a gathering of overseas librarians and educationists since the jubilee meeting of the Library Association at Edinburgh in 1927. So much was this so that the meeting took upon it a certain international aspect, as at least one of the non‐librarian speakers told its members, adding that it was apparently a library league of nations of the friendliest character. It followed that an unusual, but quite agreeable, part of each general session was devoted to speeches of congratulation and good‐will from the foreign delegates. All, with the possible exception of the United States, dwelt upon the debt of their countries in library matters to the English Public Libraries Acts and their consequences. Even Dr. Evans, in a very pleasant speech, showed that he had reached some tentative conclusions about English librarianship.

IT CAN hardly be regarded as a coincidence that 1876, the first centenary of America's independence, was a notable year in American library history. It was a year that saw the foundation of the American Library Association, the launching of the Library journal, and the first publication of Melvil Dewey's classification: three events that have had a worldwide influence on the development of libraries. With only three years to go before the occasion of the second centenary, it is not difficult to imagine that it may also witness the maturity of a new phase in American librarianship. When we consider that less than 125 years ago there were scarce six libraries in America of any considerable size, the fact that—according to the latest issue of the ALA directory—there are now well over 30,000 libraries in North America, makes it clear that American library provision has since developed at impressive speed. Certainly, to anyone like myself, who had the good fortune to see American librarianship in action some 20 years ago, the remarkable strengthening in professionalism in American libraries during the past quarter of a century is astonishing—and it shows no signs of slowing up.

OUR readers do not need the reminder that 1952 is the 75th year of Library Association history. Some opportunity may be found at the Bournemouth Conference to celebrate this fact, in however modest a manner. The American Library Association, older by a year, celebrated its anniversary at Philadelphia last October, on which occasion Mr. F. G. B. Hutchings represented this country and spoke at a luncheon meeting to three hundred of the guests with acceptance. That celebration, however, appears to us to have been most significant for the comment on the Carnegie library gifts which was made by Mr. Ralph Munn, librarian of Pittsburgh Carnegie Library, in some ways the most spectacular one founded by the great Scot. Munn said:—

At a time when a greatly expanded volume of research is giving rise to a mounting flood of publications, and scientists are becoming increasingly aware of the difficulty of keeping informed of all the work that may possibly be of interest to them, it is only natural that the literature on the problems and techniques of information work should itself grow rapidly. Not only is there an ever‐growing number of publications of library and documentation organizations, but as more and more scientists are faced with information problems and try to find solutions to them, relevant articles appear in the scientific and technical Press. The same set of conditions causes many people engaged in industry or research, with no training or experience in library or information work, to find themselves made responsible for the organization of information services at various levels, often in localities where there is no more experienced person to whom they can turn for advice. Such people can benefit greatly from the experience of others as recorded in the literature, but they often have difficulty in finding the papers that would be most helpful among the mass of other material, some of it irrelevant to their particular conditions, much of it too advanced or theoretical, quite a lot of it pure polemics, and some just bad. It is to meet the needs of these people that this series of reviews, now in its seventh year, has been designed. It attempts to pick out each year those items likely to be of direct practical help in running a small library or information service, especially for an untrained person. Advanced research work and theoretical discussions, however important, are ignored, as also are descriptions of practice in large libraries, unless they are capable of easy application in smaller organizations. Important bibliographies and works of reference are covered, including some of the more expensive ones which the librarian of a small organization may wish to know about and consult in other libraries, although he would not add them to his own stock. Items are not confined strictly to the publications of a particular year, though most of those chosen will have been received in British libraries during 1958. Those who have followed this series over the years will not fail to have noticed that the number of references included has increased. Even so, selection has become more and more difficult, and the final decisions as to what must be rejected are inevitably personal ones. Some injustice has possibly been done, but it is hoped that all the items included will prove of value to some of those for whom they are intended.

A LEAN year faces many librarians and, of course, their Staffs as a result of the sudden but not unexpected bound in the cost of public services. It creates, as one well‐known librarian remarked in our hearing, not a crisis but an administrative problem. It is difficult to suggest a condition in which such circumstances may not occur from time to time; the former Stability of local government and its officers has been considerably weakened in recent years: a fact which may have unfortunate effects on the recruitment to this service. Most towns, however reluctantly, have accepted the fact that if municipal or other local services are to continue they must be paid for and, this is the essential, at current rates. The butcher, baker, and perhaps most obviously the builder, decorator, farmer and miner, will not serve them in their homes on any other terms. The proverb of cutting the coat according to the cloth means, of course, according to the weave and certainly has not the silly meaning given popularly to it for, if there is insufficient cloth, there can be no coat at all. It seems then that libraries have not all been deprived in the manner that has been the case in a few towns. As we write the national and international atmosphere has a touch of spring and therefore of promise in it and, while there is as yet no cause for jubilations, some optimism may be felt. Nevertheless, it takes a large library a long time to recover from a temporary mutilation of its services.