Rules for a Dictionary Catalogue U. S. Bureau of Education Special Report on Public Libraries—Part II, Third Edition

"Rules for a Dictionary Catalogue" by Charles A. Cutter is a scientific publication written in the late 19th century. This work serves as a foundational text on cataloging principles and practices for libraries, particularly focusing on the systematic creation and organization of dictionary catalogues. The book outlines guidelines for various types of entries, including author, title, and subject entries, aiming to facilitate the information retrieval process for library users. The opening of this treatise introduces the reader to the essential purposes and methods of cataloging within library systems. Cutter emphasizes that different libraries serve various objectives and possess distinct requirements based on their collections and audiences. He begins to categorize dictionary catalogues into types—short, medium, and full-title—while providing a rationale for choosing specific methods of entry. Additionally, he sets the stage for an exploration of the fundamental principles of cataloging, acknowledging that this will inevitably vary by institution and inviting feedback from librarians to refine the proposed rules. (This is an automatically generated summary.)

Charles Ammi Cutter was an American librarian. In the 1850s and 1860s he assisted with the re-cataloging of the Harvard College library, producing America's first public card catalog. The card system proved more flexible for librarians and far more useful to patrons than the old method of entering titles in chronological order in large books. In 1868 he joined the Boston Athenaeum, making its card catalog an international model. Cutter promoted centralized cataloging of books, which became the standard practice at the Library of Congress. He was elected to leadership positions in numerous library organizations at the local and national level. Cutter is remembered for the Cutter Expansive Classification, his system of giving standardized classification numbers to each book, and arranging them on shelves by that number so that books on similar topics would be shelved together.