STUDIES ON MUSEUMS AND KINDRED INSTITUTtONS. 471 



6. A genealogical index of American families, with over 500,0(»<> 

 entries, which contain far more than a million references, in 463 

 Rudolph indexer books. This very comprehensive catalogiie owes its 

 origin to the circumstance that everywhere in tlie United States peo- 

 ple are veiy much given to genealogical researches, everyone seeming 

 eager to show that his ancestors belong to the early colonists, whose 

 footsteps leading from the ancestral home are traced out with the 

 greatest zeal; therefore all sorts of family and local histories have 

 been purchased which could be procured in America, and the index in 

 question is almost an index for the existing American, and for man}- 

 English, family records. It includes over 200,000 families with their 

 branches from the year 1565 on to the present time. The catalogue 

 was begun in 1897. Four persons work on it uninterruptedl}", and it 

 is to be printed. There are, to be sure, printed indices of the kind, 

 such as those of Whitmore and Durrie (1895), but the former contains 

 only 12 notices under Smith, the latter only 196, while the Newberr}- 

 index contains 976. A more detailed description of this undertaking 

 is found in the Lihrary Journal^ XXIV, 1899, pages 53 to 55. 



The libraiy is open from 9 a. m. to 10 p. m. 



Number of readers and number of books and periodicals used in the Newberry Library, 



1895 to 1900. 



These show relatively large variations, together with a general 

 decreasing number of readers and a corresponding decrease in use, 

 })ut the figures are nearly constant in the last three years. Compared 

 with the John Crerar Library the relatively large attendance of women 

 is striking, a difference which may be owing to the departments kept 

 up by the Newberry Library — art, literature, music — for "popular" 

 books are hardly kept. During my visit I saw a couple of quite young- 

 girls, still children, working there, and when I asked what they were 

 doing, was told they were probably reading up for a school task that 

 had been set them for home work. I mention this because it is so 

 entirely contrary to our German practice, for if such tendencies should 

 occur at all we would, though mistakenly, certainly curb thiMU. 



No lunches may be eaten in the library rooms, but at a delinite time 

 a room {<dS) is open for this purpose. 



