Starting cataloging on LibraryThing

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Starting cataloging on LibraryThing

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1sallylou61
okt 12, 2011, 4:41 pm

Hello Friends,

I am a member of the Library Committee of Charlottesville Friends Meeting in Charlottesville, VA. We are considering cataloging our collection on LibraryThing. We are aware that a number of Friends Meetings are doing this.

We had a few questions:

1. Are other Meeting libraries continuing to maintain a card file?

2. What kind of access do Meeting libraries provide? Do you have wifi at your Meeting House? If not, are you transferring your collection into a spreadsheet, and running of hard copy lists by categories such as authors, titles, tags, subjects, etc? Or using the card file?

3. Do you normally have one or two people do your cataloging on LibraryThing or do you have a larger number help?

4. Approximately how long does it take to catalog your collection? We're aware that this would depend upon the size of the collection and where you obtain your records. I image that the Swarthmore/Haverford/Byrn Maur catalog would be a good source for Quaker tiles.

5. Is it possible to copy the catalog of a collection (such as the Pendle Hill pamphlet collection) from one Meeting's Library to another?

6. Are there any additional things we should consider -- or any comments anyone would like to make.

Thanks so much.

Allison M. Sleeman
Charlottesville Friends Meeting
allison.sleeman@gmail.com
sallylou61 in LibraryThing for personal account

2WARM
okt 15, 2011, 8:11 pm

All good questions, Allison. I will offer what I can. Hopefully, others will join in with their experiences.

WARM maintained a card catalogue in addition to LibraryThing until a year ago, when all WARM titles were finally entered on LibraryThing. At this point the card catalogue was discontinued and the LibraryThing database was downloaded into Excel.

WARM does not have Internet access at the meeting house.

One person has so far done all the data entry. It was a painful, four-year process, but there were advantages. Since one person was lovingly handling each book and entering all the data, including information about its contents, it was easier to see where library categories needed tweaking -- eliminating some, adding others.

This was not done purposely. WARM simply couldn't find additional volunteers. If one were to be fortunate enough to have several people involved, I would suggest that each person have a specialty, i.e., Quaker history, biography, healing, church discipline, Bibles and Bible study, etc. WARM has a large collection of Pendle Hill Pamphlets, Swarthmore Lectures, and Backhouse Lectures. It would be quite simple for an individual to adopt just one of these as a cataloguing project.

You also need to make decisions in advance about subject categories. WARM decided to use their cataloguing categories as the subjects. If all books have some sort of "review," whether it's a table of contents, a book-jacket blurb, or a true review, it is a simple matter to search "all fields" for any key phrase. For instance, if one were interested in Quaker commentary on racism, an "all fields" search for "racism" would turn up any book with "racism" in its title or in its review.

In addition, nine other subject categories were added -- the two most important being video and audio. By including these as categories, it is possible to search the catalog for all videos or all audios. (In the WARM library, audios and videos are shelved with books.)

I don't know the answer to transferring titles from one collection to another. The Devonshire Meeting in Sydney specifically asked WARM for permission to use its reviews and permission was granted.

3FMWLibrary
okt 22, 2011, 10:41 am

I started cataloging our books on LT about a year and a half ago; our library is pretty large- I've cataloged about 1800 books and I'd say we have another few hundred to go (mostly pamphlets). I cataloged everything myself; I am a librarian and used to be a cataloger; other people on the committee don't have much library background, or they didn't have much computer experience, so I thought it would be easier for me to do it. Especially difficult without a library background would have been selecting the correct title/edition, adding tags/subjects, and creating call numbers. (By the way, I had a difficult time figuring out where to list the call number so that it would show up in excel spreadsheets- I think I finally put it in Local Notes). Having one person do all the tagging should help with consistency, though I find that I veer off sometimes and create some inconsistencies- fortunately they are easy to edit.

Anyway, there is plenty of work for committee members to do- helping to process books, shelving/reshelving, straightening up the shelves, creating signage, and soon I want to set up some kind of friendly library presence for a little while on First Days to help people figure out how to check things out, etc. Library use isn't extremely heavy, but a couple of books seem to circulate every week.

I haven't printed out a spreadsheet yet, but plan to do so soon. Our card catalog is fairly useless- it is very old and I suspect does not correspond to what is on the shelves much any more. Some have expressed reluctance to get rid of it though- we need to discuss it. We stopped making cards quite a while ago- too time consuming- people were writing them out by hand at one point.

We do have wifi in the Meeting House- I requested it specifically for Library work.

We've also been weeding. About a year ago we got rid of our "rare book" collection, which went back to the late 1600s- one of them was even printed by Benjamin Franklin, though a rat or something had once tried to eat it for lunch. We searched around to find a Quaker college library that didn't have most of the books- Wilmington College in Ohio was the winner- and gave them most everything dating before 1900 (about 200 items). Many of them were in very poor condition and locked up in cabinets where nobody knew of their existence anyway. I also weeded out some items that didn't have to do with Quakerism and were quite outdated, mainly some family counseling self-help books from the 1970s and "marriage manuals" from the 1960s. There are probably many other items that should go, though we still have plenty of shelf space.

I don't know about copy cataloging from another collection- I have just been "importing"/selecting from things that I find in LT; the catalog of Swarthmore/Bryn Mawr/Haverford Colleges has been particularly helpful- they have most everything related to Quakerism.

I've also found lots of duplicates stashed away in cabinets- mostly gifts. We started putting them out on a table "for sale" with a suggested price of $1 each on the honor system. This has moved a lot of books and earned us about $50.

I also put a LT widget on our Library's page: http://www.quakersdc.org/Library. I'd like to do much more with the page, but haven't had much time.

I'd love to hear what others are doing. I'm especially wondering how much use people's libraries actually receive and what titles you find are most popular.

Thanks, Michael

Michael North,
Friends Meeting of Washington (DC)
belgrade18@yahoo.com

4sallylou61
okt 27, 2011, 9:30 am

Many thanks to WARM and to Michael North of FMW for replying to my post. The info is very useful. Michael, you mentioned using the Swarthmore/Bryn Mawr/Haverford catalog in your cataloging. Have you used it recently? I had thought it would be a good source, but every book I have tried searching results in a no hit -- even when the book is in their libraries. I think something must be wrong with the link. I even tried deleting them as a source and then reselecting them, but still get no hits. If you also don't get hits anymore, I think I will report it to LibraryThing.

Allison

5FMWLibrary
okt 27, 2011, 11:17 pm

Yes, I sort of noticed that the Bryn Mawr catalog wasn't working on LT directly recently, but I tried Overcat instead, which does seem to pull records from Bryn Mawr.

While going through some old pamphlets I found a journal offprint about the history of Quakers in Charlottesville- can't remember its title or author, but I may send it to you if you want it- looked interesting.

We also seem to have a nearly complete duplicate set of Pendle Hill Pamphlets going back to the beginning. I was thinking of asking if any other meetings might want them. They are loose (unbound) and in decent condition. We also have a lot of other duplicate pamphlets, Pendle Hill and otherwise- wouldn't mind finding homes for them.

Michael
Friends Meeting of Washington