Thursday, February 27,
Library Director Explains New Plan
For Book Checking at Love Memorial
BY SAM WARREN.
' Sitting ominously at the head
of each stairway approach to the
second floor of Love Library
(that's the floor Humanities read
ing room is on) are two silent,
wide-eyed men who, if not drow
sied by late study, come to an
alert each time anyone passes
with books, boxes, zipper note
books, bird cages, strong boxes,
treasure chests or boarded-up bar
rels. To conceal from them an il
luminated library manuscript of
Boccaccio's "Decameron" or a
copy of Thurber's "Is Sex Nec
essary?" comes near to the phys
ically impossible. If history majors
take an outside-class interest in
the colorful love-life of Louis
XIV or Charles II, they can take
home all the absorbing details,
so long as they check out books
officially.
Desk Men.
Here's where the little men at
the desks come in, and the stu
dents go out if every book they
carry is either a duly-stamped
library copy or a personal text
book. No tom-foolery, this check
on books that leave the library
is serious business, but at the
same time as simple as Chester
field's abc's.
A change from the former
system of having a check-out desk
in each of the four reading rooms,
where attendants were also sup
posed to check over each book
a student carried out .with him,
the new system accomplishes three
improvements in library service.
To Wit
First of all, it saves students'
time for now they can go from
one reading room to another
without being checked "every
time they turn around," as li
brary director Frank A. Lundy
put it earlier this week in an in
terivew. "We thought it would
be smart to centralize circula
tion by having only one check
out desk in the main lobby in
stead of having four."
In the second place, the libra
rians who are subject-specialists
in the several fields by which
reading material is organized
humanities, social sciences, edu-J
Gas Turbine, Jet Propulsion
Manual Explains Progress
BY IRIS FRAUEN.
"A large reserve of young en
gineers given the proper 'know
how' is priceless insurance against
our country becoming a second
rate power in aviation," Gen. Carl
A. Spaatz, Commanding General,
U. S. Army Air Forces, declares
in the preface to the new, en
larged fourth edition of "Gas
Turbines and Jet Propulsion For
Aircraft," by G. Geoffrey Smith,
M.B.E., internationally known
British aviation authority.
This is the only book in the
world on the most important war
time aviation development. It has
been adapted as a text by the
Army Air Forces and the Bureau
of Aeronautics, and by many col
leges, universities, and technical
institutions, including Minnesota,
Kansas, and others, and has been
designated as the textbook at
Westinghouse's Gas Turbine Divi
sion and other civilian plants en
gaged in jet work.
The book contains an exhaustive
study of gas turbines as applied i
to aircraft, and broaches possible i
use in ocean liners, railroads, and
automobiles.
A complete analysis is made of
all known jet-propelled planes
and engines today in operation or
projected in the United States and
Britain. German jet fighters and
bombers are also described in de
tail. Smith's comprehensive work
contains the first complete re
view of American, British and
German gas turbines, fully illus
trated with detailed drawings.
Students and engineers will be
especially interested in his chap
ter on tailless aircraft and the
flying wing future trends and
possibilities. Other aspects of the
new aviation development which
are included for the first time
in the new volume are: Metal
lurgy, problems associated with
turbine discs and blades, testing
and maintenance, fuel equipment
and control, turbine components,
1947
cation and natural sciences can
now devote their time to helping
students locate reference mate
rial. Heretofore, "half their time
was taken up with clerical work
at the check-out desks," Mr.
Lundy said. "Each room was a
little library in itself, circulation
desk and all." Seventy-five man
hours are saved each week, this
way.
Important.
But most important of all, the
check-up against loss of books
careless or intentional guaran
tees continuation of the system of
open-shelf reading rooms. "At
present there are 25,000 on open
shelves," said Mr. Lundy, "and
that number eventually will be
doubled. If these books disap
pear in any number the system
won't work." We haven't been
losing a lot and we don't intend
to. In any group of 10,000 peo
ple, some will steal if encour
aged," Mr. Lundy pointed out.
"Books are the students' to use,
not to destroy. They'll cooperate,
once they understand. But if we
don't make it clear, they'll take
books every time."
Recalling his experience as li
brarian at the University of Cali
fornia he described a graduate
reading room which had to be
discontinued because graduates
were careless. "At the University
of Chicago, a reading room with
10,000 choice books lost 300 in
six months. It would cost us
$3,000 to replace and catalogue
500 books." In the old library
system, books in effect were
locked up from students in stacks
and could be obtained only by
looking up the call number in the
card catalogue, filling out a call
slip and waiting for the book to
be "paged" from the stacks. "Now
books are no longer locked up,
but put right before the student."
"This check as he leaves the
building is only a protective de
vice to continue our open-shelf
system. If the students like this
system, they must cooperate and
make the check work. Coopera
tion will encourage even greater
freedom, while failure to catch
the occasional thief will make us
return to the Dark Ages plan of
radial and axial compressors, and
thrust and performance.
Quotations from papers deliv
ered recently by aeronautical and
turbine engineers are freely cited,
so that the reader will have a
broad survey of the trend of pres
ent thought and progress both in
the United States and Britain.
FRIDAY, FEB. 28
COLLEGE
NIGHT
SKIPPY AHDERSOH
featuring
"SINGIN' SONG TITLES"
Dancing 9 until 12
Couples Only
at
K J
1
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1 - 1
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A -... -. Hag, mil- iifcn mm
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
inaccessible stacks. In that system
a student never would see 80 per
cent of the books he now uses
because ho wouldn't know how to
ask for them."
Student Reaction.
On the whole, student response
has been good. "They were
puzzled at first, and didn't want
to be bothered," one checker told
us as Mr. Lundy and I strolled
thru the building. "The rare stu
dent who takes the 'Why are you
checking ME?' attitude doesn't
understand that if he wore King
George himself, he'd be stopped."
Faculty members, who arc fully
as careless as students, often liv
ing up to their "absent-minded"
reputation, are checked, too. And
yet the faculty reaction expressed
to Mr. Lundy is "It's a wonder
you didn't start the check long
ago." The absent-minded person
who walks off with a book is,
by the way, far more embar
rassed at the check-desk than the
real book-lifter. "The veteran
group," Mr. Lundy added, "is the
most serious and able bunch I've
seen. We've had no discipline
problem there whatsoever."
The fact that 1,1150 volumes
were circulated in one day this
month, 1,600 of them on a two
hour basis from the third-floor
Reserve Desk, shows how much
student use of books would suf
fer from any loss. "We have no
idea how many books were taken
off the shelves and read in the
reading rooms. We might guess an
over-all circulation of three or
four thousand books daily."
Memorable
Evening
Dresses'
I
Ah wi
UUP i- Aa
It Says Here
By Toltie Fiddock.
Well, people, we have buried
the old date bureau, Ragged
Edges, that is, for a good long
time ...The howl that arose
when it appeared no more made
our illustrious society editor de
cide that something must be done
to replace it.
Lots of people are tired of hear
ing about who went where with
who, so if that's all you're lookin'
for here, read no farther.
So now we'll get on with It
....Have you heard about BUI
Moorhousr? lie's one of the few
men on campus who have free
access to second and third floors
In sorority houses when he has
his Cornhusker camera . . . and
the little picture-snapper Is
what gets Bill into trouble. He
develops his pictures on the
third floor of the Union in the
Cornhusker darkroom, but the
other day he developed a Noah
complex . . seems Bill left the
water running in the sink and
got Involved In conversation
with one of the fascinating
Jensen sisters, who so entranced
poor Willy that he forgot all
about the modern plumbing and
didn't come to until he felt
water gurgling around his ank
les... for the next hour Bill
turned janitor and mopped
madly to save the Union from
damp destruction.
Susie Storz is having a lot of
trouble these days. .. .nobody has
nosed the news around that Susie
and Don McKay are no longer
Page 5
going steady. Hut Tee Knight has
the scoop aiiii is taking up an
option on the Store property start
ing Friday night.
And speaking of Lee Knight, he
and Curt Hasselbach and Al
Burke decided that school wasn't
worth it, and quit . However,
after a hard two weeks' vacation,
the boys felt rested enough to
make another try and will stick
around for a while longer.
Life gels pretty lonesome for
the engaged-gals-gang, especially
when the gentleman in question
is far from the Nebraska prairies.
But Jackie Carothers has solved
her problem nicely, by spending
most of her free time with John
Ayres, an old admirer.
Bouquets of cabbage to the
fellas who managed to get in to
see Coed Follies Tuesday night . .
you were really nifty. Can't un
derstand why John Cover didn't
get booted, though, for he wore
his own shoe 'cur.' he couldn't
find a girl with feet as big as his
. . . but John stayed for the entire
show, and 'tis rumored that he es
pecially enjoyed the Tri-I)elt act.
The Phi Delt Mothers Club
must really be a fine bunch of
people ...according., to. eligible
(for the night) bachelor Duke
Derry, the dinner they served to
the fellas and their best girls last
Sunday evening is the answer to
the perfect way to entertain.
That's about all for this issue
... so see ya around.
for I lie pxHtfing
iiUerfmtemUy Unit
A gala ball ralln for a dress of
dreamN ... a dresN to equal the magic
of the evenlnr ... a dresn of whir
ling net-or enchanting rayon crepe. See
the romantic collection Gold's
ha aNsrmbled for your selection.
Size 10 to 10.
1 05 - its00
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