The Responsibilities and Opportunities of an Agricultural Library in Wartime

A L I B R A R I E S in the United States are of various kinds. T h e most important, both for size and content, is the United States Department of Agriculture Library in Washington, D . C . Largest in number and somewhat similar in type are the several libraries connected with the state colleges of agriculture. Special agricultural libraries are associated with museums, implement companies, flour milling concerns, meat processing corporations, and so forth. There are a few private reference institutions, such as the McCormick Historical Association. Many reference libraries of public character, both general and technical in nature, for example, the" Library of Congress and the John Crerar Library of Chicago, have considerable holdings of agricultural interest. College, university, historical society libraries, and other institutions, containing extensive printed and manuscript collections, frequently possess important agricultural material. Agriculture, both as an occupation and a way of life, has an ancient lineage. Because of this there is hardly an institution in the country which does not offer, somewhere in its files, information of pertinence to the subject. T h e following discussion is mainly concerned with libraries which are primarily of an agricultural character. Certain of the ideas may prove of interest to institutions which have agricultural material.