MELVILLE DEWEY: FATHER OF LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE

            

          Melville Louis Kossuth Dewey was born on December 10, 1851, to a poor family who lived in a small town in upper New York state. Keenly interested in simplified spelling, he shortened his first name to Melvil as a young adult, dropped his middle names and, for a short time, even spelled his last name as Dui.

           He attended Alfred University and Amherst College, from which he graduated with bachelor's and master's degrees.

           Immediately after receiving his undergraduate degree, Dewey was hired to manage Amherst's library and reclassify its collections. He came up with a system of decimal numbers used to classify a structure of knowledge first outlined by Sir Francis Bacon.

         Dewey invented the Dewey Decimal Classification^® (DDC) system when he was 21 and working as a student assistant in the library of Amherst College. His work created a revolution in library science and set in motion a new era of librarianship. Melvil Dewey well deserves the title of "Father of Modern Librarianship."

      Dewey changed librarianship from a vocation to a modern profession. He helped establish the American Library Association (ALA) in 1876; he was its secretary from 1876 to 1890 and its president for the 1890/1891 and 1892/1893 terms. He also co-founded and edited Library Journal. In addition, Dewey promoted library standards and formed a company to sell library supplies, which eventually became the Library Bureau company of today.

       A pioneer in library education, Dewey became the librarian of Columbia College (now Columbia University) in New York City in 1883 and founded the world's first library school there in 1887. In 1889, he became director of the New York State Library in Albany, a position he held until 1906.

        Dewey's range of knowledge and work was wide and varied. He pioneered the creation of career opportunities for women. He and his first wife, Annie Dewey, developed the Lake Placid Club, a resort for social, cultural and spiritual enrichment in the Adirondack Mountains. As an aforementioned spelling reformer, Dewey presented some of the early editions of the DDC in simplified spelling; his original introduction in simplified spelling was reprinted in subsequent editions of the DDC through publication of Edition 18 in 1971.

         Dewey worked in the college library during his last 2 years as a student and for the 2 years following his graduation. Although then still attracted to a missionary career, he carried out intensive investigations of other libraries and began to develop his own ideas. His work culminated in 1876, when he published A Classification and Subject Index for Cataloguing and Arranging the Books and Pamphlets of a Library. This system, still in use today in most public and some college libraries, was his major contribution to his profession.

         Arranging the various fields of knowledge into a logical order and using a decimal system of notation to indicate the arrangement of books, Dewey's system proved easy both for librarians and users to understand, capable of expansion to suit the needs of large as well as small libraries, and applicable to a wide variety of books and ideas. Although he was not the first to come up with the basic idea, his version was both logical and workable. Pushed by Dewey and his students with missionary zeal, it triumphed over its competitors.

        In 1876 Dewey left Amherst for Boston, where he founded the Library Bureau and worked for a number of reform movements, including the metric system, temperance, tobacco, and spelling. The spelling of his first name (he was baptized Melville) demonstrates his devotion to the last-mentioned cause. He played a major role in founding the American Library Association in 1876 and served as its secretary (1876-1890) and president (1890-1891, 1892-1893). He edited Library Journal (1876-1880) and all through his life contributed to it.

        In 1883 Dewey accepted an offer to become librarian of Columbia College and vigorously proceeded to put his ideas into effect, reclassifying and recataloging the library and starting a library school. The zeal with which he applied his ideas was accompanied by a spirit of intolerance of disagreement and tactlessness toward others that aroused controversy and bitter opposition, climaxing in his suspension by the Columbia trustees in 1888. Although exonerated of the charges brought against him, he resigned later that year.

            In 1888 Dewey was chosen director of the New York State Library and moved to Albany the following year, taking his library school with him. Again, he plunged into his work, expanding the scope and usefulness of his institution by enlarging its collections and establishing or improving the home education department, the extension division, and the traveling libraries. He helped found the Association of State Libraries in 1890 and was active in its deliberations. Again, his professional competence was counterbalanced by his inability to manage human relationships. Charges of profiting from financial transactions with his students were dismissed, but after he was rebuked by the board for his role in organizing a club at Lake Placid, N.Y., that discriminated against Jews, he resigned as of Jan. 1, 1906.

          After leaving Albany, Dewey concentrated on the affairs of his club and a similar venture he began in Florida in 1927. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage on Dec. 26, 1931, in his Florida home.

       Dewey copyrighted the system in 1876. This system has proved to be enormously influential and remains in widespread use.

        In 1877, Dewey moved to Boston, where he founded and became editor of The Library Journal. The journal became an influential factor in the development of libraries in America, and in the reform of their administration. Dewey was also among the founders of the American Library Association.

         Dewey became librarian of Columbia College in 1883. On the 5th of May 1887, Melvil Dewey inaugurated the librarians’ school: “School of Library Economy at Columbia”, which in 1889 moves to New York, Albany, known as: “New York State Library School”, where he was followed by five of the professors at Columbia: Walter Biscoe, Ada Alice Jones, Florence Woordworth, May Seymour and Mary Salome Cutler, appointed deputy director of the school, with whom he actually had lots of professional arguments, especially on the relationship between the theory and practice of the college curriculum.When Dewey relocated to Albany in 1889, he took the school with him. It eventually returned to Columbia in 1926. Dewey also served as director of the New York State Library from 1888 to 1906. During his tenure he reorganized the state library and established a system of traveling libraries and picture collections.

        Dewey founded the Lake Placid Club with his wife, Annie, in 1895, and helped to organize the Olympic Games there. The Lake Placid Club was a private institution with a policy of excluding Jews and other minorities. Close to 10 years later, the New York State Board of Regents received a petition demanding that Dewey be removed as State Librarian because of his ties to the Lake Placid Club. The Regents issued a formal rebuke, leading Dewey to resign his position in 1905.

           In 1926, Melvil Dewey traveled to Florida to establish a new branch of the Lake Placid Club.Melvil Dewey died after suffering a stroke on December 26, 1931, at age 80 in Lake Placid, Florida. Seven decades after his death, he is still primarily known for the Dewey Decimal Classification system, the most widely used library classification scheme in the world. 

Dewey contributions to the library and information science:

1. Dewey Decimal Classification and Relative Index
2. Abridged dewey decimal classification and relative index
3. a classification and subject index for cataloguing and arranging the books and pamphlets of alibrary
4. 200 religion class
5. library notes, volume I
6. descriptive circular and sample pages of the decimal classification and relative index
7. librarianship as a profession for college - bred women: an address delivered before the association of collegiate alumne,on march 13, 1886
8. library school rules: 1. card catalog rules
9. on libraries: for librarians
10. ALA catalog: 8,000 volumes for a popular library, with notes.1904
11. table 2 geographic areas : great britain republic of south africa
12. Decimal Classification and Relativ Index for Arranging, Cataloging, and Indexing Public and Private Libraries and for Pamflets, Clippings, Notes, Scrap Books, Index Rerums, Etc
13. Simplified Library School Rules: Card Catalog, Accession, Book Numbers, Shelf List, Capitals, Punctuation, Abbreviations, Library Handwriting 
14. Agriculture Scheme for Decimal Classification
15. Decimal Classification and Relativ Index for Libraries: Clippings, Notes, etc
16. Dewey Decimal Classification: Reprinted from Edition 21 of the Dewey Decimal Classification: With a Revised and Expanded Index, and Manual Notes from Edition 21
17. Melvil Dewey's Bibliographic Decimal System and Its Proposed Application for the Arrangement and Rapid Search of Scientific Subjects Contained in Bee-Journals
18. Simplified Library School Rules; Card Catalog, Accession, Book Numbers, Shelf List, Capitals
19. The Classification of Everything
20. Library Editing and Printing...
21. Library School Card Catalog Rules: With 52 Fac-Similes of Sample Cards for Author and Classed Catalogs; With Bibliography of Catalog Rules
22. Tables and Index of the Decimal Classification and Relativ Index for Arranging and Cataloging Libraries: Clippings, Notes, Etc