Happy 154th Birthday, Herbert Putnam!
Most of the books and other materials in the Hennepin County Library system are classified in the Library of Congress Classification (implemented by the Minneapolis Public Library system in 1969), but some remain classed in Dewey Decimal (implemented in the 1910s), and yet more are classed in the Putnam classification. What’s Putnam, you ask? The Putnam classification scheme, also known as the Minneapolis system, was developed in 1889 by Herbert Putnam, the first librarian of the Minneapolis Public Library.
Putnam’s system, written out in longhand by Putnam himself, was based on a similar system developed by a librarian named John Edmands for the Philadelphia Mercantile Library. Putnam’s simple system broke everything down into 23 alphabetical classes with corresponding sub-classes. What’s interesting about this system is the “zig zag” pattern in which the call number is read--you read the top line first, then zig to the letter in the middle of the second line, then zag back to the number at the beginning of the second line.
Confused? Learn more about the intricacies of the Putnam System from Andy Sturdevant’s MinnPost Stroll.
Putnam, born on September 20, 1861, served as head of the Minneapolis Public Library from 1888 to 1891. He became librarian of the Boston Public Library in 1895 and was appointed Librarian of Congress in 1899, a position he held until 1939 (he was the longest serving Librarian of Congress). In his role as Librarian of Congress, Putnam helped develop the Library of Congress classification system still in use around the world today.
Happy 154th birthday, Herbert! Thank you for helping to create our library system and for making books easier to find all over the world.
