You see their work, but when you go to the library you don’t see them. Or if you do, you can’t distinguish them from patrons like you unless you know them personally. Catalogers. I have been haunting libraries for as long as I can remember. Especially after I got to graduate school, I became very sophisticated in my ability to use the card catalog. (That should date me.) I was ABD (all but dissertation in completing a doctorate) when I got my first job working in a library. It was there that I learned to catalog. Until that moment, it had never occurred to me that someone actually sat down and wrote the information on those cards! Color my face red. My mother was a professional librarian, but never worked for pay after I was born. She did a lot of volunteer library work, though, and I well remember the amount of time she sat at the dining room table with a stack of books, a stack of blank library cards, and a typewriter. She didn’t merely type things on the cards. She had to write the description following a set of rules. The rules, the classification, and the subject … Continue reading →