[PW] why dewey decimal system not use 040s?

[Lois Fundis]

--- Dennis Lien <Dennis.K.Lien-1 at tc.umn.edu> wrote:

> include a dozen
> or so titles with Dewey numbers 040 -- the
> best-known of which are
> old duplicate sets of the A.L.A. INDEX and ESSAY AND
> GENERAL LITERATURE
> INDEX.  

The A.L.A. Index is the only title we have in our
catalog that's in 040. It's not even at our library,
but at the only college in our consortium (which is
mostly public libraries and covers the northern third
of West Virginia, where the largest city has about
30,000 people). And I am interested to see that the
publication date listed is 1901.

The powers that be at DDC have been known to rewrite
sections of the Classification for various reasons: to
keep up with modern knowledge and/or trends, to try to
make the system more efficient(and rumor has it, last
but not least,so they can continue to keep it under
copyright. After all, the first edition was 1876.)
Nowadays the ALA Index and its ilk would probably be
in the 010s (bibliographies), 020s (Library Science),
or some other related field. And, as Mary noted, there
are unused numbers for potential future expansion, as
new ideas and fields crop up.

--
Lois Fundis lfundis at weir.net or lfundis at verizon.net