Title: Committee Files, 1923-1975, 1979-2004
Arrangement
Arranged alphabetically by committee name and alphabetically by subject title or chronologically thereunder
Administrative History
The ALA Council created the Catalog Section in 1900 (1); one of its early projects in cooperative cataloging was a precursor of the LC printed-card service (2). Regional meetings, first held in 1923 produced a number of affiliated regional groups whose interests were eventually represented by a standing committee within the section (3). In 1940 the Catalog Section became the Division of Cataloging and Classification, with responsibility for arranging programs to interest catalogers, classifiers, and bibliographers in libraries of various sizes and types, and with the goals of maintaining and improving standards in classification and cataloging as well as giving impetus to the discussion and study of cataloging and related problems in its affiliated regional groups (4). With the reorganization of ALA of January 1, 1957, the division became one section of the newly-formed Resources and Technical Services Division (5), and the regional groups were subsumed under the Council of Regional Groups, representing all areas of interest in the RSTD (6). CC's purpose is "To contribute to library service and librarianship through encouragement, promotion of, and responsibility for those activities of the Resources and Technical Services Division of the American Library Association relating to the cataloging and classification of library materials in all types of institutions" (7).
Sources:
1. ALA Handbook, May 1903, p. 9.
2. ALA Handbook, 17 (1923), p. 217.
3. ALA Handbook, 24 (1930), p. 395.
4. ALA Handbook, 1941, p. H-45.
5. ALA Bulletin, 51 (1957), p. 862.
6. Ibid., p. 867.
7. ALA Handbook, 1988-89, p. 140.
