<...librarians are essentially just filing clerks who put the books back on the shelf in the slots ordained by Mr. Dewey.

If you knew many librarians you'd be eating those words for even suggesting them sonny! Librarians are part tutor/counselor/research assistant/mother/social secretary all in one. They come in all shapes, sizes and ages and are as diverse as the general population - they also have strong arms and tired backs. They wage a very real and protracted war with an age-old enemy: shelf space. They work long hours for little pay and they help many children develop their first love of books and reading - often much earlier than parents instill this desire.

The libraries vary from state to state and region to region, but that part remains the same

I have been pointed towards many good books and am indebted to many librarians who have been of great assistance ever since grade school. Those encyclopedia sets (the most unwanted item a library can receive) and old books she talks about, often end up in hands of collectors who know their value and desire their preservation.

You'd be surprised how many people pass on and bequeath their books to the local library. Some of these folks (who are not really dead) more often than not prompt the librarian to tell me all about them, if they knew the patron, when I acquire some of their books. "Oh so-n-so was a professor at SDSU for years...loved botany, etc. etc." These so-called "dead" folks really like to see that someone appreciates the books they had kept or collected. In one instance the son had been bequeathed a mint set of Stoddard's lectures among other fine books and he had no use for them and passed them to the library. The library promptly called me up and I must have spent fifteen minutes listening to this family's life story. The librarian afterword was somewhat shocked she had spent fifteen minutes chatting about this family - and was nonplussed, even apologetic. I knew exactly what was going on.

"Strange things are afoot at the library."

You have my vote to be the first librarian in space!



--Robert



She has mine too - I don't know of any others that would wish to be in space (maybe Mary Anne does not either)!

SDAI-Tech1