COMMENTS OX KORSTIAN'S CLASSIFICATION OF 

 FORESTRY LITERATURE 



By Helen B. Stockhridge, Librarian, Forest Service 



As a classification of the subject of forestry, which might be appHed 

 to manuscripts or other data for which no card index is to be main- 

 tained, Mr. Korstian's outHne should be useful. In a forestry library, 

 however, even as large a one as that of the Forest Service, its ap- 

 plication to the arrangement of the books on the shelves would hardly 

 be practicable. In the first place, a too detailed shelf subdivision of the 

 books on a given subject, so that only a very few books fall in each 

 class, is unnecessary and often confusing to the library users. As 

 Doctor Fernow has said, the classification scheme in a library corre- 

 sponds to the contents of a book. It simply shows the general arrange- 

 ment' of the material treated, under its main divisions and subdivisions, 

 and does not try to give in detail all of the specific subjects covered. 

 These are brought out in the card catalogue, which corresponds to the 

 printed index of a single volume. Just as, in consulting a book, a 

 person would turn to the table of contents to get a general idea of 

 how the subject is treated, so the classification scheme in a library 

 shows how the books are arranged on the shelves. For any specific 

 subject, however, the card index must be consulted, just as the alpha- 

 betical index of a single volume wOuld have to be consulted to locate 

 the minor subjects treated. 



The user of a library cares very little about the arrangement of the 

 books on the shelves, the classification scheme being useful mainly to 

 the library staff, and to persons who wish to see in a general way what 

 the library has along a certain line. The card index is the main de- 

 l)en(lence of the user, the place to which he turns first to find what 

 there is in the library on a given subject, no matter how specific, or 

 what the library has by a certain author. In the Service library he 

 will find all the card headings arranged in one alphabet, for books, 

 manuscripts, or articles in periodicals. This form of catalogue has 

 been found to be more satisfactory than any other in the majority of 

 libraries, as it is much simpler to look for a subject in its alphabetical 

 position than to have to run through a classed arrangement before it 

 can be found. No classification scheme could possibly bring all of the 

 material on one subject together in one place on the shelves, especially 

 in forc'strw as so nnich of tlie literature on this subject is in the shape 



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