College and Research Libraries By R A L P H T . E S T E R Q U E S T Aspects of Library Cooperation LI B R A R Y C O O P E R A T I O N is a favorite sub-ject of conference speakers.1 It is a topic which has consumed tons of paper in our library periodicals. In proportion to real accomplishment, probably more has been said and written about coopera- tion than about any other single aspect of librarianship. Yet there are aspects of library cooperation that have been rel- atively neglected in our many discussions and surveys of this subject. There is an important distinction be- tween two kinds of interlibrary coopera- tion—between that concerned with the apparatus for mobilizing and using exist- ing library resources, and that concerned with adding to and enriching resources we already have. T h e first kind has to do with the fa- miliar devices of union catalogs, union lists, bibliographic centers, surveys of re- sources, and so forth. All of these tools perform important functions. They help us find a particular book or journal or film that is needed. They are important. Scholarship and research would be in a sorry state today without them. At the same time there something missing here. Even if all the books in the great libraries of the country were to be listed in the National Union Catalog, this would still be no guarantee that the par- ticular book that I might want is going to be found, for the simple reason that no mechanism exists for anticipating my need for this item and for making cer- 1 P a p e r presented at the Midwest Academic Librar- ians Conference, Milwaukee, Wis., May 11, 1957. Mr. Esterquest is Librarian, Harvard Medical School, School of Public Health, and School of Dental Medicine. From 1949 until February, 1958 he was Direc- tor of the Midwest Inter-Library Center. tain that some library somewhere has acquired it. Although the cooperative lo- cating devices do mobilize the resources of a great many large and diversified li- braries, they still lead only to books which exist in those libraries as a re- sult of the independent and uncoordi- nated acquisitions policies of each of them. They lead us to books that are in libraries other than our own, but they contribute nothing toward bringing a needed book into a library somewhere. T h e interlibrary loan picture is affect- ed by relevant characteristics of a li- brary's acquisitions policy. A typical col- lege library in the Middle West builds its collection in response to faculty re- quests for books and periodicals and the librarian's interpretation of them in rela- tion to institutional policy. With a mod- est book budget, this usually results in little more than a core collection. Neigh- boring institutions of similar size and wealth are doing much the same thing. T h e same kind of libraries buy most of the same books. They subscribe to most of the same journals. T h o u g h they reject thousands of items as being too special or too expensive in relation to potential use, by and large they all reject the same items. T h e interlibrary loan librarian in one of these college libraries knows, or soon learns, that when an item is not in his library's bookstacks it is not likely to be in the bookstacks of the similar li- braries around him either. Naturally he turns to the larger university libraries in the region or to the library centers in Chicago, New York, Washington, or Cambridge. Among universities the situation is similar. Their libraries acquire for local needs, well- or ill-defined. When a new MAY 1958 203 journal is announced, the desirability of entering a subscription is weighed by the librarian and the faculty on each cam- pus, and a decision is reached either to subscribe or to pass it up. By and large, the pros and cons are about the same on each campus, and, if the University of Wisconsin decides to enter a subscription, it is for most of the same reasons that subscriptions will be entered at the Uni- versity of Minnesota, at the University of Illinois, at the University of Michigan, and at Princeton. If the subscription is rejected, the reasons are about the same as the reasons for rejecting it at the other places. Although the percentage of unique items in a g r o u p of university libraries is apt to be higher than in the case of col- lege libraries, there are relatively few factors that influence one institution to acquire materials different from those acquired in university libraries of com- parable size and offering similar pro- grams. T h i s leads again to the situation in which the interlibrary loan librarian has his best results when he turns to larger institutions, such as H a r v a r d or the Library of Congress. T h i s system works pretty well. For most of us there is always a bigger institution from which we may borrow, but this has the effect of requiring the larger institutions to car- ry a disproportionate burden in supply- ing books on interlibrary loan to their smaller sister institutions. Library cooperation concerned only with mobilizing and using existing re- sources does leave something to be de- sired. How about the other kind—the kind concerned with adding to and en- riching those resources we already have? In the first place, cooperative acquisi- tion is a recent development in librarian- ship. Except for occasional instances of subject field specialization and instances where regional or national needs have been recognized in an individual li- brary's buying policy, the most conspic- uous example of cooperative acquisitions on the American scene is the Farming- ton Plan. T h e Farmington Plan adds to our total library resources many books that would not otherwise be acquired. It substantially increases the probability that a requested item will be found in at least one American library. T h e most important thing is that it does this in accordance with a plan. T h e cooperative acquisitions programs of the Midwest Inter-Library Center, the Hampshire In- ter-Library Center, and the Southeastern Interlibrary Research Facility seek out and identify the books and journals that participating libraries will not otherwise acquire. T h e s e books and journals are the ones which are then added, by col- lective action, to the total library re- sources of the respective groups. Again, the enrichment of resources is carried on in accordance with a plan. As a form of library cooperation it is different in both nature and purpose from what has here- tofore commonly been regarded as li- brary cooperation—the erecting of ap- paratus for locating books and journals in other institutions, books and journals which were acquired for local reasons and for local clientele without reference to regional or national needs. One kind of library cooperation is not necessarily better nor more important than the other. Each has its place, each its value. B u t our planning in the future can be more realistic if the distinction between the two is clearly recognized. Successful inter-institutional library co- operation requires, as an essential ingre- dient, the will to cooperate. I am sure we are all prepared to say that we want to cooperate. But cooperation is easier said than done. H e who would cooperate must be prepared to give a little and must often give this little before he re- ceives anything in return. If my neighbor has a lawnmower and I do not, it is fairly easy for me to co- operate in sharing the single lawnmower. 204 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES But even for me the situation is not per- fect because there will be occasions when I want to cut my grass when my neigh- bor is using the lawnmower. T h i s is an inconvenience that I can resolve in two ways: I can relax and postpone the mow- ing, or I can tense up, become irritated, and finally buy my own lawnmower. At that point cooperation ceases. However, if I am broke and cannot buy a lawn- mower, I have as alternatives, the first one, again, of relaxing and cheerfully postponing my grass-cutting, or I can sit and fume and boil and curse my neigh- bor and the whole principle of coopera- tion. T h e analogy can be translated to the library scene and to a particular case. About three years ago a microcard pub- lisher announced as a new annual service microcard copies of the annual reports of the leading American corporations, those 1,100 listed on the New York Stock Exchange. For $280 a library could sub- scribe and would receive each year on microcards all of these annual reports in a convenient, space-saving format. Iowa State University proposed that the Mid- west Inter-Library Center subscribe to a single copy of these cards to be housed at the Center for the collective use of the then sixteen supporting members. Iowa pointed out that these annual reports were desirable to have, would be used infrequently, could be mailed easily in an ordinary envelope, and that a shared copy at the Center would certainly serve Iowa's purposes and would probably serve the purposes of the other members at a cost per member library of roughly one-sixteenth of $280, instead of the full amount. Following its usual procedure, the Cen- ter circularized Iowa's proposal. All mem- ber institutions but one reported agree- ment. This member reported that its business school was engaged in a research activity which required frequent access to corporation annual reports and for this reason its business library had decided it must buy the microcards and have them immediately at hand. According to a fundamental rule at the Center, the pur- chase by one of the members made this item out of scope for the Center, and the Center announced to its member librar- ies that it would not subscribe to the mi- crocard corporation reports for the rea- son that Institution X was going to buy it. Iowa and Wisconsin were two institu- tions which considered this result in re- spect to their own needs and came to the conclusion that a copy at Institution X was not equal to a copy at the Center (for reasons involving priority of de- mand, equality of use, mailing time, etc.), and these two institutions decided they needed to subscribe themselves. T h u s three copies—at Library X , at Iowa, and at Wisconsin—were bought. This story is not intended to be an in- dictment of Library X for refusing to play ball, because, as a matter of fact, the reasons for X doing what it did were valid and compelling. Cooperation among individualistic institutions such as li- braries is never easy. It is one thing for the M I L C members to assert as a prin- ciple that they wish to share some of their funds for the joint acquisition of little- used materials. It is quite another matter when we get down to cases and find that Library A wants to have a proposed item at home, Library B has no earthly use for it in the first place, and Library C doesn't think it should invest even one- eighteenth of the cost of an item which it might itself decide to buy next year. T h e fact remains that there are instances when the sharing technique does work, usually to the degree that the partic- ipants want it to work. T h e will to co- operate means more than lip-service to a principle. It means a real willingness to give a little today, because, in the long haul, reciprocity sets in, and cooperation pays off. T h e will to cooperate means quite a MAY 1958 205 number of things: It means being pa- tient and philosophical when my neigh- bor is using the lawnmower on the day my own grass needs cutting. It means one concedes occasionally, and that some- times these concessions seem important and difficult at the time. It means one faces inconveniences, sometimes at em- barrassing moments. It means for a li- brarian, a new outlook concerning the relative importance of pride in the size and greatness of his own collection and a true sense of service to his clientele. It sometimes means apparent decline in service to readers: T h e professor who wants all the books in his own office, or at least in a departmental library across the hall, has had to accept the realities of life and to have a great many of the books he needs two blocks away in the central library, unless his institution is going to go broke buying multiple cop- ies. T h e scholar may need to make a fur- ther adjustment in his thinking and his habits. Unless his institution is going to go broke buying all the books for all the campus research programs, he is going to have to share the less-used ones with neighboring institutions, in the form of single copies located perhaps in another city but accessible on interlibrary loan or from a regional center. T h e will to co- operate means realizing that, although the alternatives sometimes appear to be having something at home, as against having it in another library two hundred miles away, an honest evaluation of the realities would show that the true alter- natives are having it two hundred miles away, as against not having it at all. It means the realization that cooperation and sharing pay off in the long run rather than promptly on Monday morning. One can weigh the disadvantages, in- conveniences, and concessions involved in the sharing of books and in interli- brary cooperation, but all these incon- veniences are out-weighed when the tre- mendous advantages are considered. T h e most compelling point is that our society today requires access to such a multiplic- ity of books, journals, reports, and gov- ernment documents that no single in- stitution can hope to acquire everything needed for research on its own campus but must cooperate with its sister institu- tions to acquire them and service them collectively. What is appropriate to share? You and I, if we share the same office, could con- ceivably share the same telephone book. If we live and work a mile apart we should each have his own telephone book. But living a mile apart, or even a thousand miles apart, will not seriously impair our ability to share a back file of the journal of the C u b a n Library As- sociation. T h e libraries of Knox College and of Beloit College could probably share a single file of the Hansard Parlia- mentary Debates, because on neither campus would these volumes be used of- ten. On the other hand, the University of Illinois and the University of Wiscon- sin could share a copy of Hansard only with inconvenience. What would be more appropriate for these larger librar- ies to share would be a run of the Aus- tralian parliamentary proceedings or those of British Columbia. Although this point may seem obvious, it is one which is frequently overlooked. T h e president of an Ohio college proposed, about four years ago, that all the libraries in Ohio— public, college, university, the state li- brary, libraries large and small—should together build a library storehouse which would be a center of state-wide coopera- tion, on all the libraries, presumably, sharing the same books. For Wooster Col- lege and Ohio State University to share the same books is a little like the First National Bank and me sharing our money. Of course Wooster can always borrow books from the large collection at the University (and I am sure it frequent- ly does), but this is not the same as library cooperation. T r u e library cooperation 206 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES implies at least a degree of reciprocity. Sharing of books works best when the books are little-used in the libraries that plan to do the sharing. T h i s is the best general criterion. Let us be fairly cold- blooded about this. When we decide to explore possibilities for cooperation and reciprocal sharing, let us ask the first question first: What are we going to share? Library cooperation costs money. When the presidents of midwestern uni- versities decided to organize a Midwest Inter-Library Center I am afraid that some of them briefly hoped that library budgets in their own institutions might thereby be reduced substantially, or that they would never again have a request for a building addition. Such hopes are clearly unrealistic. We are living in an expanding economy in every sense of the phrase. We see this trend everywhere in research libraries. T h e recently issued list of journals abstracted in Chemical Ab- stracts includes 22 per cent more titles than the 1951 list. T h e expanding cul- tural and industrial consciousness in Africa and Asia means more government publications, more newspapers, more journals, more everything from countries whose output libraries in this part of the world collected only casually in the past. What a cooperative enterprise like the Midwest Inter-Library Center is able to do is to contribute toward making the upward curve a little less steep for the individual libraries in the area. Since the Center collects state documents, court re- ports, dissertations, house organs, news- papers, chemical journals from obscure places, government publications from In- dia, Israel, and other diverse sources, its member libraries are able to expand at a rate somewhat less staggering than they would otherwise need to do. Book budg- ets in the eighteen member libraries of M I L C continue to increase. T h e budget of the Center itself increases. T h e mem- ber libraries are now supporting at the Center an operating budget close to $90,- 000 a year. This is cooperation with a price tag. It causes some of the univer- sities' business vice-presidents to question the purpose of the Midwest Center. We librarians must be astute enough to see what is really happening. We must rec- ognize that the scholars in these mem- ber institutions have access to a lot of material to which they would not have access if it were not assembled at the Center by the eighteen supporting li- braries, or, alternatively, that would be collected hit-or-miss by these libraries in- dividually, and with a price tag much greater. This can be stated another way: Co- operation, in the case of the M I L C , means that, although the libraries that support the Center are spending more money for books now than they were ten years ago, they are spending less than they would if they were themselves col- lecting the materials to which they now have access through the cost-sharing prin- ciple on which the Center is based. T h i s principle is one that applies generally to library cooperation, whether it is the Union List of Serials or the Bibliographic Center in Seattle. Library cooperation costs money, but what that money buys costs each participant less than it would cost without cooperation. Three recent developments in the pro- gram of the Midwest Inter-Library Cen- ter are worth a brief special report. Under the subject-field priority system of the Farmington Plan, a number of university libraries are receiving single copies of all the significant books pub- lished in a number of foreign countries. This involves a new concept, that of "complete coverage." T h e complete cov- erage idea is an answer to a point I raised earlier. We ought to take steps to guar- antee that a book which might be needed some time in the future is going to be found in some library somewhere, in- stead of relying on chance. It is an im- MAY 1958 207 portant concept, but one about which we have not done much until recently. T h e public libraries in the British Isles are developing complete coverage of books published in Great Britain, and a number of fascinating formulae have been developed for the division of sub- ject responsibilities and for sharing costs. At the Midwest fnter-Library Center we have recently approached the concept of complete coverage for journals in fields related to chemistry.2 T h e National Sci- ence Foundation has indicated its sup- port for a similar project covering peri- odical subscriptions in the field of the biological sciences. When the H a r v a r d Microfilm News- paper Project was started about fifteen years ago one objective was the increase of the number of foreign newspapers generally available in the United States. Harvard received a Rockefeller Founda- tion grant to initiate the project. In the course of time, the project was filming some thirty foreign newspapers, and the cost of supporting it was derived from the sale of positive prints to libraries at a price which included the cost of mak- ing a positive plus a portion of the cost of making the negative. In the case of some titles the sale of positives took care of the total cost of microfilming. In other cases it did not. A b o u t three years ago, Keyes Metcalf d i d some arithmetic and came to the conclusion that selling prints to support the project had the effect of decreasing the total number of newspa- per titles filmed. Mr. Metcalf's arithmetic went something like this: T h e project was producing negatives of thirty news- papers at an average cost of $100 per year each; total cost, $3,000. Assum- ing twenty-five print-purchasing libraries, buying an average of five positives each at a cost of $40 per positive; total cost, $5,000. T h u s , for a grand total of $8,000 per year, twenty-five libraries were each 2 Cf. Ralph T . E s t e r q u e s t , " T h e M I L C Chemical Ab- s t r a c t s P r o j e c t , " CRL, X V I I I ( 1 9 5 7 ) , 190-92 + . gaining access to five newspapers, and the collective activity was making thirty newspapers available in the country. Now, asked Metcalf, if we were to spend this same $8,000 differently—namely, to create a national pool of lending posi- tives—how much would we be able to buy? His answer was that $8,000 would buy a negative and a' lending positive of eighty different newspapers (instead of thirty) because duplication of titles among libraries would be eliminated. T h i s gain in coverage would assume that participating libraries would be willing and able to share a single positive copy of each title, and, although Metcalf was far from naive on this point, he felt cer- tain that the principle was worth trying. T h i s is the principle upon which is based the ARL-sponsored Foreign Newspaper Microfilm Project, inaugurated in Jan- uary 1956. T h e Foreign Newspaper Microfilm Project now acquires 148 foreign news- papers, with representative titles from most of the countries of the world out- side the United States. It includes Can- ada, Britain, France, and Germany, of course, but also French Equatorial Af- rica, Mozambique, and T h a i l a n d . For every one of these 148 newspapers a lend- ing positive is placed on the shelves in the Midwest Inter-Library Center, the operating agent for the Project. It costs about $20,000 a year to acquire the newspapers, to film them, to print the lending positives, and to pay the personnel who operate the Project. T h e income to support this effort de- rives from the fifty-three American li- braries that subscribe to the Project at annual fees ranging from $150 to $500. Each subscribing library has liberal bor- rowing privileges and the right to buy a positive print at cost for those few titles which it feels it must have at hand. T h e benefit to the subscriber is made clear when it is realized that it would cost a (Continued on page 263) 208 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES Library Cooperation (Continued j library an average of $125 p e r year to ac- quire a n d film a s i n g l e f o r e i g n n e w s p a p e r . A library w h i c h w a n t s access to t w o f o r e i g n n e w s p a p e r s w o u l d thus pay a b o u t $250; for four, $500. T h e largest library can n o w b u y i n t o the F o r e i g n N e w s p a p e r Microfilm Proj- ect at an a n n u a l cost of $500 a n d have ac- cess, n o t to f o u r f o r e i g n newspapers, b u t to 148, all u n d e r arrangements for quick l o a n a n d liberal l e n d i n g periods. T h e success of the F o r e i g n N e w s p a p e r M i c r o f i l m Project has e n c o u r a g e d t h e M i d w e s t C e n t e r to pre- pare a proposal for d o m e s t i c newspapers, m o d e l e d o n the same p l a n . A third d e v e l o p m e n t at the M I L C has to d o w i t h the p r o l i f e r a t i o n of long-term micro- c o p y p r o j e c t s — t h e Short Title Catalog proj- ect of U n i v e r s i t y Microfilms, the Evans Early American Imprints project, a n d so forth. D u r i n g the winter, the U n i v e r s i t y of M i n n e - sota Library r e p o r t e d that it h a d already in- vested $32,000, a n d was c o m m i t t e d to s p e n d a n o t h e r $21,000, i n subscription fees to such projects, o b t a i n i n g film a n d cards w h i c h are actually s e l d o m used. M i n n e s o t a w o n d e r e d if most of the o t h e r M I L C m e m b e r libraries were n o t p u t t i n g this a m o u n t of m o n e y i n t o the same projects, if they t o o w e r e n o t u s i n g the e n d p r o d u c t o n l y occasionally, a n d if m page 208) there were n o t a g o l d e n o p p o r t u n i t y here for considerable sharing of costs t h r o u g h j o i n t subscriptions. W e h a v e all b e e n busy e x a m i n i n g the situ- ation, r e p o r t i n g d u p l i c a t e subscriptions, a n d e v a l u a t i n g needs. E x p l o r a t i o n seems t o sug- gest that the multiple-sales m e t h o d m a y n o t be the best m e a n s for s u p p o r t i n g projects i n v o l v i n g little-used material, b u t that cover- age m i g h t be a c h i e v e d at less total cost t h r o u g h the p r i n c i p l e of a n a t i o n a l p o o l of l e n d i n g positives, like t h e F o r e i g n N e w s p a - per M i c r o f i l m Project, or a n a t i o n a l p o o l of negatives similar to the U n i v e r s i t y Micro- films doctoral dissertation program. T h e s e d e v e l o p m e n t s are part of t h e n e w l o o k in library c o o p e r a t i o n . T h e n e w l o o k has to d o w i t h creating access to (in contrast to o w n e r s h i p o f ) a n d increased variety of re- sources for research purposes. Emphasis has s h i f t e d f r o m u n i o n lists a n d u n i o n catalogs. Scholarship today requires access to the re- corded k n o w l e d g e of m a n k i n d . T h e bulk of recorded k n o w l e d g e a n d i n f o r m a t i o n is ex- p a n d i n g w i t h n o e n d i n sight. N o i n s t i t u t i o n has, or will have, the resources i n m o n e y , space, or staff to acquire a n d h o u s e t h e ma- terials to w h i c h its scholars are likely to re- q u i r e access. Library c o o p e r a t i o n is the h o p e of the f u t u r e i n o u r race against time. Classified Advertisements R a t e : $1 per l i n e ; 3-line m i n i m u m . Closes first of m o n t h of date of issue. O U T - O F - P R I N T B O O K S B A R N E S & N O B L E , INC. s u p p l i e s b o o k s n o t ob- t a i n a b l e f r o m publishers i m m e d i a t e l y f r o m stock of o v e r a m i l l i o n v o l u m e s or i n rea- sonably quick t i m e t h r o u g h free Search Serv- ice. S e n d lists to D e p t . C R , Barnes 8c N o b l e , Inc., 105 F i f t h Ave., N e w York 3, N . Y . C O L O N I A L B O O K S E R V I C E — S p e c i a l i s t s i n s u p - p l y i n g the out-of-print b o o k s as listed i n all library i n d i c e s (Granger Poetry; Essay a n d G e n e r a l Literature; Shaw; Standard; Fic- t i o n ; B i o g r a p h y ; L a m o n t ; Speech; etc.) W a n t lists i n v i t e d . 23 East 4 t h St., N e w York 3, N.Y. N E W YORK B O O K STORE ( B O X 3655, T e r m i n a l A n n e x , Los A n g e l e s 54, California) is n o w d e v o t e d exclusively to out-of-print remain- ders for e d u c a t i o n a l , i n s t i t u t i o n a l , a n d pub- lic libraries. Lists available free o n request. IRREGULAR SERIALS is o n e of o u r specialties. F o r e i g n b o o k s a n d periodicals, current a n d o u t of print. A l b e r t J. P h i e b i g , B o x 352, W h i t e Plains, N.Y. S T A N L E Y G I L M A N , A m e r i c a n History, News- p a p e r History a n d O u t of Print Books. B o x 131, C o o p e r Station, N e w York 3, N.Y. MAY 1958 263