College and Research Libraries ~------------------------------------------------------------- 160 I College & Research Libraries • March 1980 the collecting process the knowledge of the field that few . specialists in books itself have. Osler comes through the pages as a nineteenth-century Renaissance man not likely to be seen again, what with changes in costs and the dimension of time for active practitioners in any field. As many other libraries have found out, the example of the donation of one person's collection leads to donations by others. The Osler Library is thus more than just Osler's collection: besides the Francis library, al- ready mentioned, it has been ~iven all the papers used by Cushing in writing his fa- mous Life of Sir William Osler; a large col- lection of Sinhalese medical olas and books on ophthalmology by Dr. Casey Wood; the Frank Dawson Adams collection in the his- tory of science and medicine; engravings and portraits from the Kalz collection formed in Czechoslovakia in the nineteenth century; other forms of pictures in the great collection of the cancer expert, Dr. John Howell Evans; manuscripts (including the famous poem "In Flanders Fields") by the Montreal General Hospital pathologist Dr. John McCrae; as well as all the books in the McGill University Medical Library pub- lished before 1850. The Osler Library has become the focus of material on Norman Bethune, who did such outstanding work in China both before and during the Mao Tse- tung revolution. To help keep up the li- brary, the Friends of the Osler Library have been constituted, and their contributions are a small steady source of annual funds. The Osler Library is described on the cover as "a pictorial tour with stories about manuscripts, books, and people involved in the Library's growth." No author is given, but whoever was responsible for the grace- ful prose and the magnificent illustrations should be encouraged to do the same thing for other libraries elsewhere. At $10 a copy, the book is a delightful bargain.-Estelle Brodman, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri. Bahr, Alice Harrison. Automated Library Circulation Systems, 1979-80. 2d ed. Professional Librarian Series. White Plains, N.Y.: Knowledge Industry Publi- AMBASSADOR BOOK SERVICE, INC. ; AMBASSADOR BOOK SERVICE, INC. "serving academic and research libraries" 42 Chasner Street • Hempstead, NY 11550 Call us 516/489-4011 collect! cations, 1979. 105p. $24.50. LC 79-16189. ISBN 0-914236-34-2. Like circulation vendors exhibiting at ALA conferences, studies about automated circulation control systems seem to be pro- liferating. Markuson's landmark 1975 analysis in Library Technology Reports was followed by Scholz (1977) and Boss (1979). Now from Knowledge Industry Publications comes this second edition of Automated Li- brary Circulation Control Systems, updat- ing the previous work by Dranov. Bahr' s study largely follows the format and style of its predecessor. Introductory chapters describe the technologies available, provide an overview of alternatives and sys- tems, and offer guidance in criteria for sys- tem selection. Following the introductory materials are descriptions of twelve auto- mated circulation systems and summaries of user comments. Concluding the volume is a list of manufacturers and users. The infor- mation is presented in a lively journalistic style, with liberal quotes from both the pub- lished literature and from librarians using the systems. Much of the text, however, is derivative from previous studies. A major problem with the book is that it oversimplifies the complexities of library au- tomation to the point that a less than knowledgeable librarian can be misled. For instance, Bahr states that "another reason universities design their own systems is that most have computer equipment and staff al- ready available to them .. (p.8). She cites, as examples, the development of the Ohio State University circulation system and its later transfer to SUNY at Albany and the University of Illinois. Surely, there were other more compelling reasons for these in- stitutions to automate than the availability of computer time and staff. In another instance, the author discusses the loading of a machine-readable data base from another library as one means for bib- liographic conversion (p.13). Omitted, how- ever, is the crucial point that even when this method is used, it is still necessary to match every circulating volume against the data base in order to assign item-specific bar code labels. The chapter describing the operational characteristics of the tWelve automated sys- tems appears to be based largely on a cull- Recent Publications I 161 ing of product literature · and interviews with vendors. While Bahr admits that "no attempt is being made to evaluate systems .. (p.24), she does include numerous subjec- tive statements based apparently on man- ufacturers' claims. To describe a system as being "particularly responsive to innovations which librarians request .. (p.33), when the system is operational in only one library, does not add credibility to a report. The amount of detail concerning the sys- tems varies, in part because some were not operational when the study was undertaken. All, however, are covered with greater clar- ity, objectivity, and detail in Boss' study for Library Technology Reports.* The very brief section on user comments, four and a half pages on eight systems, contributes lit- tle additional knowledge. That Automated Library .Circulation Sys- tems is less than the definitive volume on circulation control should by now be clear. Librarians embarking on an automation pro- gram would do well to read the reports by Markuson and Boss in Library Technology Reports and to contact the vendors for more recent product information. Bahr' s study is simply not worth the money.-Howard Pas- ternack, State University of New York at Stony Brook. *Editor's note: The July-August 1979 issue of Library Technology Reports includes Richard W. Boss' "Circulation Systems Update .. (p.423-29), which adds to the information presented in his January-February 1979 LTR article. Allen, Nancy. Film Study Collections: A Guide to Their Development and Use. Research assistance, Laura Drasgow. Cataloging chapter, Michael Gorman. Ungar Film Library. New York: Ungar, 1979. 194p. $14. LC 78-~0935. ISBN 0-8044-2001-7. Film Study Collections is a bit of an ano- maly. It is the only title in the Ungar Film Library that deals with libraries and film study, the other titles being concerned with the analysis of film content (Faulkner and Film) or the study of certain filmmakers (Fellini the Artist). It is partly a manual on collection development, partly a guide for reference and information services, and partly a survey of available resources. And it seems to suffer from · some uncertainty as to