[DCRM-L] Shelf list card catalog.

[Margaret Nichols]

At Cornell we maintain a paper shelf list (in special collections 
only, not in the rest of the library), for all the reasons that 
others have given. We have been through several successive ILSes, and 
sometimes in the transition from one to another some bits of 
information (such as which collection the book is shelved in) fall 
off of the catalog records, so the supposedly "redundant" paper 
backup has often saved our necks. If we could figure out a 
convenient, automated way to continue to print shelf list cards for 
all the books we catalog, we'd do it.

Margaret Nichols

At 12:18 PM 6/2/2009, you wrote:
>Hello all,
>
>Here at Harvard Law School Library we still maintain a shelf list, too,
>for similar reasons.
>
>But also, the shortcomings of retrospective conversion have made it
>critical to keep the shelf list. For example, copy specific info from
>the backs of cards, such as "Bound with"  often didn't make it to the
>online catalog records. And when successive editions were listed as
>"Same" on the old card, they were often ignored in recon. So the shelf
>list is still the best record we have of the library's pre-recon
>holdings.
>
>Mary
>
>Mary Person
>Rare Books Cataloger
>Special Collections
>Harvard Law School Library
>

________________________________

Margaret Nichols
Head, Special Materials Unit
Library Technical Services
110 Olin Library
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY. 14853-5301
mnr1 at cornell.edu  *  Tel. (607) 255-5752 / 255-3530  *  Fax (607) 255-9524