Robot Librarian In New York Collapsible Tubes

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23288, 24 June 1950, Page 6

Robot Librarian In New York Collapsible Tubes

NEW YORK. Free public libraries in a number of cities of the United States arc merchandising routine clerical tasks to improve their service.

The public library in New York City is the-most recent one to institute the use of a photo-electric device for checking books as they are Withdrawn and returned. The machine is designed to save the borrowers' time and to enable librarians to devote more of their time to helping readers, the New York Herald Tribune notes The machine operates as a camera and as a projector. The book, together with the borrower's card and a dated transaction slip, is placed in the machine. A button is pressed, recording the transaction on a 16 millimeter film. Six thousand transactions may be photographed on a 100 ft. reel. These are dated, developed, and stored in small boxes at the library. If the librarian later needs to refer to one of the transactions, she puts the film back in the machine for viewing. A time study conducted by the library shows that it takes only 17 seconds to change a book electrically, compared with 43 seconds by hand. The mechanical process also is said to reduce operating expenses of the library since it costs only about half as much to record transactions under the new system as to do the work manually.