Page 159 - Training for librarianship; library work as a career

TRAINING FOR LIBRARIANSHIP

library are an adequate annual appropria-
tion, a trained librarian and an organized cen-
tral library. Of the three the librarian is the
most important. She must know how to
select books wisely and economically, how to
classify and to catalog them, how to install
such methods of record keeping and use as
are common to efficient library administra-
tion, and above all how to bring book and
reader together. Hers being a work akin in
certain respects to hospital social service, she
must have the willingness as well as the abil-
ity to serve, and, in a measure, the attitude
of the social worker. A cheerful spirit, a
broad, human sympathy, and a kindly, but
not sentimental disposition, are great helps in
this field. For the institutional hbrarian is
not merely a dispenser of books. Hers is an
opportunity for influence on those in the
shadow of ill-health and imprisonment, who
are apt to brood and to regard the future
with misgiving. Can she help them back
to health and to self-support? That is her
opportunity and her measure of success.
There is yet another phase of the work of
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