College and Research Libraries 186 College & Research Libraries lyn Hickey (Chicago: American Library Assn., 1984) is a very good example of one such work. The enduring contribution of Library Technical Services: Operations and Manage- ment will most likely be realized as users refer to its guidance on "keeping up" and to the references and bibliographies that document operations in the functional ar- eas of library technical services.-Don La- nier, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb. Leaders in American Academic Librarian- ship: 1925-1975. Ed. by Wayne A. Wiegand. (Beta Phi Mu Chapbook, no. 16) Pittsburgh: Beta Phi Mu, 1983. 419p. $50. LC 83-21448. ISBN 0-9102-3016-X. (Distributed by American Library Asso- ciation.) This book will be of value to all those in- terested in ascertaining the paths to influ- ence and renown in the American aca- demic world followed by academic librarians in the period surveyed. This vol- ume might, however, more accurately be entitled Leaders in American Libraries since the fifteen people included have all been library directors. The avowed goals of the editor are to: (1) increase academic librari- ans' awareness of their profession by re- viewing crucial events and the leaders who shaped or reacted to them, (2) recall a generation of leaders now being forgot- ten, and (3) generate more interest in aca- demic library history. While the collection of essays should do these things, as well as occasion speculation on how the ap- proaches discussed would apply to con- temporary situations in academic li- braries, the unfortunately high price of the book will effectively keep it out of the · hands of many potential readers and some libraries. The academic librarians included have been rather arbitrarily chosen: a commit- tee of six well-known librarians narrowed down an original list of twenty-five aca- demic librarians to fifteen on whose im- portance consensus could be reached. Secondary sources were not consulted in these deliberations, and the final group selected is not claimed as a definitive list of the greatest academic librarians of the pe- riod. Many readers will feel that omitted March 1985 librarians rate inclusion as much or more so than some of those selected, but this dissatisfaction is inherent in any brief se- lection, no matter how it is arrived at, and the editor is honest in his subjectivity. Some readers will feel that too heavy an emphasis has been placed on library direc- tors to the exclusion of other types of aca- . demic librarians. Once again, in an avow- edly subjective survey that does not claim representativeness, such an emphasis is harder to fault. This lack of any explicit ed- itorial focus does, however, result in a va- riety of unmediated viewpoints from which the reader must isolate and synthe- size those traits that contributed to effec- tive performance and leadership in the ac- ademic library context. Those librarians included are Charles H. Brown, W. S. Dix, Robert Downs, Ralph Ellsworth, Lillian B. Griggs, Guy Lyle, Stephen McCarthy, Blanche P. McCrum, Keyes DeWitt Metcalf, Jerrold Orne, Law- rence Powell, Ralph Shaw, Maurice Tauber, Robert Vosper, and Louis Round . Wilson. All are known primarily as library · directors except for Tauber and Wilson, best known for their activities in catalog- ing and library education, respectively. They, too, however, had directed li- braries. No member of the Library of Con- gress is included except for McCrum, who ended her career there as a specialist in documents and a bibliographer after de- cades as the director of two academic li- braries. The editor allowed considerable free- dom to his contributors as to style and or- ganization. While most articles summa- rize all facets of the subject's library activities, the one on Wilson is conceived as a supplement to his authorized biogra- phy. While most of the writers endorse the editorial committee's choice of sub- jects, the biographers of Dix and Lyle claim that their high reputations among contemporaneous librarians were more the result of luck and personal charisma than of vital contributions to, or innova- tions in, the field. The biographers of Griggs and McCrum, on the other hand, present the case that these librarians' ca- reers have been unjustly ignored because of the bias against female leadership in the period. My own feeling, based on these essays, is that Dix, Lyle, and McCrum were sufficiently active in a variety of or- ganizations and influential pursuits to jus- tify their inclusion in this group, whereas the case for Griggs is much less persua- sive. While her contributions seem wor- thy and valuable within the libraries in which she worked, they did not gain her national or international prominence or prove lastingly influential. Much is made of her influence on the ideas of Harvie Branscomb, but he does not figure among these librarians. Examining the goals that many of these people shared as well as the individual ex- cellences or accomplishments that stand out, it seems that the committee was more concerned with librarians who were na- tionally or internationally recognized in li- brary associations, and on the wider non- library front, than with those whose activities were more narrowly focused within the libraries in which they worked. The superior management of an academic library in itself does not lead to selection, though all of these librarians had such merits among their more public achieve- ments. Bringing honor and recognition to one's library through action on the na- tional or international levels is clearly a vi- tal criterion here. The librarian as scholar and/or faculty member was, then as now, a vexed topic. Several of the biographees favored faculty status for academic librari- ans; others stressed that the academic li- brarian must be a scholar-librarian in or- der to work most effectively with faculty and to win their trust and esteem. While such activities will continue to as- sure visibility and influence for academic librarians, modern developments such as restrictive budgets and participatory man- agement styles are apt to make the library director's operations within his or her li- brary more problematical than it was for many of these earlier librarians. Indeed, some of these directors, whose careers ended recently, retired with a sense of pessimism about the future of academic li- braries for these very reasons and because of dismay at the increasingly technological bent of the modern research library, to the detriment of humanistic scholar- Recent Publications 187 librarianship as they perceived it. On the other hand, two of them, Metcalf and Wilson remained active in professional life up to their deaths at extremely advanced ages. The earliest generation of librarians in this survey had to face the deprivations of Depression and war, so contemporary readers can find precedent for dealing with distinctly unpromising situations with resourcefulness, dedication, and en- ergy. Thus, despite the casual nature of the selection process and the exorbitant price, this book can be recommended to those concerned with the development of American academic libraries and the strengths and limitations of those library directors who built and dominated them for fifty years.-John Cullars, University of Illinois at Chicago. Library Instruction and Reference Ser- vices. Ed. by Bill Katz and Ruth A. Fra- ley. New York: Haworth, 1984. 254p. $24.95. LC 84-505. ISBN 0-86656-288-5. (This work has also been published as The Reference Librarian, no. 10, Spring/Summer 1984.) Increasing the Teaching Role of Academic Libraries. Ed. by Thomas G. Kirk. (New Direction for Teaching and Learning, No. 18) San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1984. 102p. $8.95. LC 83-82744. ISBN 87589-791-6. . Third International Conference on Library User Education: Proceedings. Ed. by Pe- ter Fox and Ian Malley. Lough borough, England: INFUSE, 1983. 174p. £12 ISBN 0-946084-15-7. These three books are additions to the vast, and growing, body of literature on bibliographic instruction. The first two works are collections of essays and the last a collection of the papers presented at a conference. As such they are, in varying degrees, prone to the faults of collections of papers; they are uneven, occasionally repetitious, and cacophonous. However, sitting down to read them seriatim, while occasionally tiring, was never a trial. Indi- vidually, the essays are well written and make their point or points in a clear and forthright manner-a tribute, no doubt, to the skills of the editors.