adapted to the needs of public libraries than to those of large university libraries. A great many improvements were made to adapt the system to the needs of the University of Michigan Library. Unfortunately, these changes made it impossible to apply the modern European expansions of the decimal system.
In 1924 work was begun on recataloguing and reclassifying the Library in accordance with the system of the Library of Congress, already in use in many large university libraries, and in 1926 the Regents provided a force of specially trained people under the direction of the Assistant Librarian, Rudolph H. Gjelsness (North Dakota '16, B.L.S. Illinois '20) to carry on this task (see Part IV: Department of Library Science) . This work by 1940 had progressed to a point where more than three-quarters of the books had been arranged on the new system and each book recatalogued. It would have been an easy task merely to change the numbering and arrangement of the books. But to carry out a thorough and systematic recataloguing has taken time. Every advantage has been taken of the cooperative cataloguing of the larger libraries of the country, thus incorporating the cards for many extensive and intricate monograph series. The Library of Congress deposits in the Library a complete set of its printed cards. In this file, up to World War II, were placed cards from various other libraries, European as well as American, thus creating an unrivaled bibliographic apparatus of great value in research as well as in cataloguing. The collection of books in the field of bibliography was greatly enlarged and strengthened. The Catalogue and Reference departments were equipped as well as or better than other libraries of a comparable size.
In the nineteen thirties all of the libraries organized as part of the General Library system — those of the professional schools as well as those of more restricted scope, such as Chemistry, Physics, and Astronomy — were furnished with separate complete card catalogues. The books were, of course, also recorded in the central catalogue. The contents of the Law and Clements libraries were gradually represented in the General Library catalogues.
In 1917 the Library purchased a photostat camera and the necessary equipment for making photographic reproductions on a large scale. Its first undertaking in this field was the Kentucky Gazette. This, the first newspaper issued west of the Allegheny Mountains, was published at Lexington, Kentucky, from 1787 on. The entire eighteenth-century series of this newspaper, an invaluable source for the student of the political and economic history of the Ohio Valley, was photostated and furnished in bound form to subscribers. Regent Clements underwrote the enterprise. The Lexington Public Library lent its file, a volume at a time, for photographing. Missing numbers were supplied in part from other sources, though some pages have never been discovered. The Detroit Gazette from 1817 to 1830 was reproduced later, chiefly from the files in the Burton Collection in the Detroit Public Library, and in the Buffalo Public Library. These two newspaper reproductions were made without cost to the University, save for supervision, the subscriptions covering the entire expense. By 1940 the Library owned two photostat machines which produced more than 30,000 prints annually, about two-thirds of which were made for various units and offices on the campus. It is fitting to take note of the care with which this work has been done and the excellence of the workmanship, which is under the direction of Mrs.
