ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries


July/August 1 9 9 2 /4 5 3

formation retrieval. They are not even worried 
that the books they are buying may be out of 
date, containing “bad” information. I am aware 
of my own surprise at seeing people scoop up 
old periodicals, reference books, damaged ma­
terials, antique editions, etc., that we routinely 
throw away at the library.

A larg e c h ild re n ’s b o o k  illu strate d  by 
Maxfield Parrish has caught the attention of the 
crowd; the bidding is intense, going higher and 
higher until the book—which is in pretty good 
condition but still somewhat worn—sells for 
$650. Some of us from the professional book 
world shake our heads in disbelief, but the book 
buyers seem unperturbed as the sale moves 
right along to 19th century bound volumes of 
The Y o u th ’s Companion, editions of Jam es 
Whitcomb Riley (obviously a favorite for Hoo­
siers), boxes of old Life magazines, and then to 
an old art textbook. A handbook on raising 
flowers in your garden is sold next to a first 
edition of Mark Twain (a disintegrating leather 
tome with detached covers repaired with old, 
yellowing cellophane tape), and a coffee-table 
book on gems of the world next to a num­
bered, limited edition set of Dickens’ works. 
This mad gamble has brought out a common

theme in the disparate denizens of this back­
yard drama: all these people love books!

By the end of the day my face is sunburned 
and my feet tired, but my own little stack of 
treasures has grown tall. Through an amazing 
distribution process the lifelong book collec­
tion of someone we will never know  has been 
parcelled out to a hoard of people w ho may

…  here are hundreds o f  aver­
age, everyday people actually 
p a w in g  their way through a 
sweaty crowd f o r  the sole purpose 
o f  acquiring books!

never come together again but w ho will return 
hom e with books to be read, cherished as 
works of art, or marked up in price and resold 
to other bibliophiles. Somehow I can’t see these 
p eo p le forsaking their books for com puter 
screens or spending all their spare hours star­
ing at reruns of old movies on television. The 
good news is that there still is a “real world” 
where books and literacy are not yet dead. ■

Letters
Are standards appropriate?
To the Editor:

The revised Standards f o r  Faculty Status 
(May 1992) seem to me to make perfect sense 
but for their apparent assumption that the sta­
tus of teaching faculties (referred to as if ap­
p ro p ria te to them , alth o u g h  that m ay be 
doubted) is everywhere and automatically ap­
propriate to academic librarians. Surely it is 
strange to set forth as standards whatever work­
ing conditions apply to larger populations la­
boring alongside those persons whom the stan­
dards in question are intended to benefit.

I hope that librarians contemplating employ­
ment in colleges and universities that have ac­
cepted the nine standards will scrutinize every 
aspect of employment to which the standards 
refer (especially tenure and promotion) and 
then decide whether conditions at particular 
institutions are ones they not only can endure 
but can, as it were, joyfully embrace. (But why 
are we not setting forth our own standards— 
standards applicable to all academic librarians,

indeed, to all members of the profession re­
gardless of the kinds of libraries that employ 
them? A related question: Is academic librari- 
anship essentially a subset of library service or 
a subset of higher education? If the latter, ACRL 
should consider leaving ALA and emigrating to 
what?—the AAUP?—even if to enjoy only mar­
ginal status there.)—Robert M. Pierson, cata­
loged The Santa Fe Indian School, New Mexico

Kudos for Washington Hotline
To the Editor:

I was pleased to see “Washington Hotline” 
focus on telecommunications issues (April 1992). 
Librarians have a lot of homework to do to keep 
up with these complex and important issues.— 
Mark Scott, Massachusetts Institute o f Technology

(C&RL News welcomes your signed, typed com­
ment on recent content in our pages or on matters 
o f interest to the academic or research library pro­
fession. Send to: The Editor, C&RL News, 50 E. Hu­
ron St., Chicago, IL 60611-2795; fax: (312) 280- 
7663; bitnet: U38398@UICVM.bitnet ■