I have doing more reading than writing lately. One of the many books that I am reading right now is Clare Beck's recent biography of Adelaide Hasse. Ever since I heard about this incredibly driven, hardworking and outspoken government documents librarian I have wanted to know more about her life and work. Adelaide Hasse became the first Superintendent of Documents at the U.S. Government Printing Office in 1895. She is known for creating the SuDocs call number classification scheme which is still in use in federal depositories today. She also happens to be from Milwaukee, Wisconsin though she began her career in California at the Los Angeles Public Library.

I knew that some librarians were involved in the suffragette movement, but I did not realize how actively the role of women in libraries and discussions about librarianship as a "proper profession" for women were a part of early debates about the direction of librarianship. I was stunned to read that in the19th century librarian's believed that "strict rule-based cataloging was suitable work for women, assumed to be good at details but not intelligent enough to exercise much judgment." (p.20)

I have heard a lot of disparaging remarks about cataloging and cataloger's but this assumption that cataloging does not require intelligent judgment, or the idea that cataloging rules should be created so that women would not need to exercise too much intellectual effort, is news to me. When I read this, it did strike me that cataloging is more about creating the ultimate set of rules that can be executed precisely and accurately, given any bibliographic work. A cataloger's good judgment is assumed. What is rewarded is how well you know the rules and can follow them. In contrast, programmer's are esteemed for discovering new methods, new algorithms and being clever about how they write code. Both professions are valued for their goal of increased efficiency, but programmers are rewarded for creativity whereas cataloger's are not.

I have only read the first two chapters. I am sure that I will have more to say as I get further along in the book.