Recorded 1964
Transcribed from a cassette in the collection of the Faculty of Information Studies at the University of Toronto, retrieved by William Denton and posted on his Web site. Ellipses mean I could not make out the words.There are undoubtedly many errors in my transcription. Feel free to improve it. [Note: The links in the body of the text lead to the evidence Terrell Russell kindly supplied when he suggested corrections to this transcript.]
William Denton's site where the recording is posted.
And so, I am very delighted that you asked me to give my experiences with Melvil Dewey in chronological sequence.
My first contact with him was in London. It was not as person to person but as mind to mind. I was then in the University College. It was 1924. I hated to become a librarian. I just went into the college ___ library. By chance I found a classic great catalog of the Pittsburgh Carnegie Library by MacMillan. It thrilled me. I found it was all arranged by the DC numbers. .... That very day I decided I should like to be ...
After that my contact came in 1932. I had published my first book, The Five Laws of Library Science, in 1931. Naturally I sent a copy of it to Melvil Dewey, although I had not known him. He had not known me. We had not even corresponded. As a young aspirant publishing a book, I had sent it to him for an inscription. But to my great delight and surprise, it brought a letter from him. That letter was most interesting, according to the most characteristic [?]. He had found out a few lines in the book where I had reference to classification. And he wrote to me .... saying, "You say you write in your book that the DC has been mangled by the ....Let me know the addresses of the libraries. I am going to sue them in a court of law."
Then came the sentence, very good advice to me: "I find you are designing a new scheme of classification. Let me tell you how dangerous it is." I am talking from memory; I am not quoting . "It's very dangerous. I have suffered. People attribute all kinds of motives to you. Apart from that, if anything goes wrong, they will pounce upon you. It may cost your appointment. On the other hand, if you use a scheme which is established, which is used everywhere, which is not yours, if anything goes wrong, you will go scot free. Why do you think of doing another scheme of classification?"
Then there was another statement. "I know that DC is fully American, or at best Anglo-Saxon, and I know that I have not provided adequate placings in it for Indian thought and culture. Instead of doing a new scheme, why don't you write out a schedule in classics, Indian literature, Indian thought. I shall incorporate it in DC."
Well, this thrilled me very much but unfortunately my scheme, to use one of the modern terminologies, was not an enumerative scheme. It was an analytico-synthetic schedule. So it was difficult for me to send him a schedule unless I worked out ready made schedule for all possible Indian literature. That was too much of a task because my hands were then quite full with building up the university library, building up the colon classification, building the classificatory catalog code, building the administrative procedure. It's difficult for me to send you a schedule. My book on colon classification will be out next year, and if after producing it, if you think that I can of be any help in collaborating with you, I would be most happy. Well, next year my book did come out. But unfortunately, Dewey had died before my book came out. That was [one of?] the saddest experiences in my life.
I know then he had devoted so much thought to my five laws, he could have done much more to Colon Classification. Number one I would have benefited it would be to have included it with all his experiences [?]. Number two, we would have collaborated so as to enrich both the DC and the CC.
That is my second contact. And then comes the third contact. That was again, because he was dead, that happened in 1948. In that year, I was a member of the faculty of the UNESCO International School for Public Librarians. And the dean of that faculty was Mr Trudall [?], the inspector of libraries in Norway at that time. I met him first in Oslo and then I met him Manchester. Then I met him Oslo. He had not revealed he had been a student of Melvil Dewey. But we were thrown together for a month in Manchester. We had to spend a good deal of time together. Then slowly came the information that he was a student of Melvil Dewey. Well, we had several talks where he reviewed some of his reminiscences. I was extremely glad to get all that information. That was the third contact.
more: http://www.hyperorg.com/misc/ranganathan_on_dewey_transcript.html
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Colon Classification Part-5by ignousoss617 views
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