Baugh, Albert C

English

Kosmopolis

Film Reproduction and Scholarship

ScholarlyCommons@Penn

The Library ChronicleVolume 1Number 1 University of Pennsylvania LibraryChronicleArticle 63-1-1933Film Reproduction and ScholarshipAlbert C. BaughThis paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. http://repository.upenn.edu/librarychronicle/vol1/iss1/6For more information, please contact libraryrepository@pobox.upenn.edu.FILM REPRODUCTION AND SCHOLARSHIPBy Dr. Albert C. BaughThere was a time when libraries were collections of books and a suit-able place to house them. The reader wishing to use a book went to thelibrary and consulted it. If it was produced promptly and he was givendecent facilities for reading it, the library had done all it was expected to do.But this was in the days when life was simpler and the needs of the readerand the scholar were more easily satisfied. Today a library, especially a uni-versity library, has become something different. Apart from the role whichit plays in providing the materials for ordinary undergraduate instruction,its chief function is in connection with the more advanced studies of scholarsconnected with its faculties and its graduate schools. It has become aresearch laboratory, and the nature and extent of the work that can becarried on in it is determined to a very great degree by the adequacy of itsequipment.Adequacy is a relative term and it may be said that no library in theworld is or ever can be wholly adequate in all the fields in which moderninquiry is pushed. Indeed, the attempt to pursue an investigation into evena limited field soon carries the investigator beyond the resources at hand.Consequently the scholar inevitably has need for books and manuscripts scat-tered throughout the country and in the repositories abroad. Obviously hecannot visit personally all the libraries in which the books he needs are tobe found. The only available copy of a book, a monograph, or even anarticle in a learned journal, indispensable to the continuation of his investiga-tion, may be a thousand miles or more away. What is to be done?Fortunately the problem admits of solution. But the solution variesin difficulty with the nature of the material he requires. If the book is nottoo rare or expensive, he will be able to borrow it for a limited time throughthe system of inter-library loans. But he will not be able to keep it verylong. Two weeks is ordinarily the period of such a loan. If he wishes toconsult it again, he must borrow it a second time, and it is to be hoped—though this is by no means always the case—that he will not need to referto it repeatedly.If the book, however, happens to be rare, and naturally if his ownlibrary is a large one it is the rare books that he must get from elsewhere,the solution is not easy. Libraries quite properly will not lend their rarebooks. Insurance is not an adequate recompense for a book lost, if the bookcannot be replaced. In such cases, the scholar has generally had recourse tophotographic or photostatic reproduction. This is a very satisfactory method.Its only drawback is its expensiveness. Unless he is a man of considerablemeans he cannot resort to this method indiscriminately. Generally he con-fines his use of photostats to basic documents and texts, and breathes a quietprayer of thanks if the text is not too long.Within the last few years, however, there has been developed a humbleapplication of the moving picture machine that promises to be a great boonto the scholar. It has been found that certain kinds of small motion picturecamera, no larger and no more expensive than thousands of such cameras inprivate use, can be employed to photograph a page of a book or manuscript.The exposure is made on the ordinary moving picture film (non-inflammable).The image is then thrown on a screen, or in some cases projected on a sheetof paper on a desk or table. All that is needed is the projector, and suchprojectors are not very expensive. One of the best can be had for less thana hundred dollars.It is true that such reproductions are not so convenient to handle asthe photostat. They must be read in a darkened room and they can onlybe used with a projector. But they have the advantage of compactness. Abook of three or four hundred pages can be photographed on a roll of filmone inch in diameter. And most advantageous of all, reproduction by thismethod is very much cheaper than by any other process yet devised. Theactual cost of the film (including developing) is about one quarter of a centper exposure. Libraries equipped to furnish such reproductions find thatthey can make them at a cost to the purchaser varying from two to fourcents an exposure, according to the size of the order.A number of the larger libraries have such apparatus now in use.Before long it is safe to predict that every university library in the countrywill be equipped with a camera and at least one projector. Yale alreadyhas several projectors for the use of the faculty and advanced students.Obviously our library should have so valuable an adjunct to research.SPECIAL BENEFACTIONSTo encourage the alumni and other friends who wish to aid the Library,the University Trustees in 1923 made formal provision for Life Member-ships ($200) ; for Graduate's Decennial Contributions ($1000) ; Gradu-ate's Endowment Contributions ($2000) ; Library Founder's Contributions($5000) ; and Library Benefactor's Contributions ($10,000).In 1927 Mr. David Milne presented the first Graduate's EndowmentContribution, a fund of $2,000 for the purchase of books dealing withScottish history and literature.10

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