In the late '40s, Metcalf proposed a scheme for cutting cataloguing costs by combining the union catalogue which lists the holdings of the University by author, and the public catalogue (which lists the Widener collection by subject, title and author). The faculty objected and he abandoned the plan.

Half a century ago, Ernest Richardson of Princeton suggested another solution to the cataloguing problem. With super simplified "title-a-line," cataloguing, costs would be cut in half, and the catalogue would readily locate 95 percent of the library's books. Although the additional funds made available for books would more than offset the five percent of the library "lost," such inefficiency does not appeal to the administrator indeed, the overseers claim the catalogue is already oversimplified.

In all three of these fields it seems likely that expenses will rise rather than decline. All indications are for a smaller proportion of the budget going to books as the size of the library increases. Thus the need for more and more economical ways of making books available will increase rather than diminish. It is here that Metcalf has done his most significant work. By placing the catalogues of the world's great libraries in Widner, and refining the interlibrary loan, Metcalf has made almost any book in the world available to the patron of the University library.

A refinement of the cooperative expansion in the Farmington Plan, under which most of America's great libraries buy only one copy of every book published abroad. This volume is placed in the library assuming responsibility for the field, and is available by loan or photostat to cooperating libraries.

How Long for Widener?

Regardless of whether Buck refines interlibrary cooperation to reduce the number of books needed annually, or finds money with which to swell the current acquisition, he will have to find space in which to store them. Metcalf has cut the rate of growth from a four percent annually to a constant 125,000 volumes each year, but even these fill almost three miles of new shelving.

One solution to the space problem is departmental growth. Departmental libraries grew up under Winsor when Gore Hall was overcrowded. Today, they exceed the main collection in size, and include 60 percent of today's acquisitions.

Although it will make his job of coordination more difficult, Buck will probably follow this suburban approach, encouraging decentralization, but combining small' overlapping collections. Widener must, still find space in the stacks, however, for 20,000 new books each year. At this rate it will be full by 1975. With the removal of the University Archives and departmental collections, it can perhaps last until 1990.

Long-term planning has always failed in the past. Gore Hall was supposed to last for sixty years, and was full in twenty. Widener was to house the central collection for fifty years, and was full in 25. Today's planning is perhaps more realistic and Metcalf has held down acquisitions for 18 years. One of Buck's problems will be to continue this effort. Metcalf has devised a four way censure to crowding the central collection. When he arrived in 1937, there was room for three years growth. Since then he has realized an undergraduate library, a rare book library, a storehouse for little-used books, and the construction of underground stack space.

The underground stack could eventually fill the entire South-eastern corner of the Yard, housing 2,000,000 volumes. In 1949 the first such structures was finished beneath Lamont, with a 500,000 volume capacity.

The New England Library is Metcalf's invention for storing little used books belonging to 11 Boston area libraries. A building behind the Business School holds 250,000 volumes belonging to the University, and an equal number from other libraries. This frees space for 450,000 volumes in the Widener stack.

A Mammoth Pool

One suggestion for extension of the principle is the Northeastern Regional Library. With the cooperation of Ivy Universities, MIT, and New York Public Library a program similar to the Deposit library could effect vast economies both by eliminating duplication and providing cheap storage for large sections of University collections.

If Buck can push through such a program, large parts of the University collection could go to this cooperative book bank for permanent housing and become available in a single building to interested scholars. The plan could win support not only from the cooperating universities, but from benefactors throughout the country, and from the foundations.

There are also the more general questions, the implications of which extend beyond administration. Whom is the library serving, how should it allot this service, how should it increase its own importance?