PART I

ADMINISTRATION ROOMS

While books are the substance of a library and readers the object, how to bring them together is the key to arrangement of the plan; therefore the first consideration among rooms is here given to administration.

Except as otherwise specified later, the working rooms ought to be put in the center of the library, in order of processes for handling books and serving readers, and ought to be in the most direct connection possible with each other, with stacks and with reading rooms. Here centers good planning.

Always remember what economy lies in close connections, concentration, and short distances.

Every saving in communication may mean an attendant saved, and a smaller pay-roll.

“Ease and smoothness of administration are to further public service or lessen expense.”—_Bostwick._[228]

“They must be in sequence, so that books may be (1) received; (2) catalogued; (3) prepared; (4) shelved, without jumping around from one part to another.”—_Idem._[229]

See excellent article by W. K. Stetson on centralized administration, 36 L. J., p. 467.

In his article on Library Buildings, in the U. S. Public Libraries Special Report of 1876,[230] Justin Winsor pictures the preliminary operations of preparing books for the reader—the first steps of administration, as carried out in a large room, surrounded by stalls connected by tramways for book boxes, and supervised by a superintendent from a raised platform in the centre, who directs the successive operations and operators, all under his eye.

This arrangement persists, but except so far as it governs packing and unpacking, is now usually separated into different rooms, all made parts of a suite, connected either horizontally or perpendicularly, and served by special lifts and elevators.

Such rooms for a large library are here described in separate chapters. In smaller libraries practically the same operations are compressed into fewer rooms.

Trustees’ Room

In very small libraries none is necessary; nor need one be set aside, as the library grows larger, until other more necessary rooms are provided for. The trustees as a body do not meet every day, and their committees only meet an hour or so at a time, so that they can well use one of the staff rooms whose occupants can temporarily get busy elsewhere, or use special rooms only occasionally used.

In growing libraries, when rooms have to be set aside for any purposes which do not require constant occupation, any one of these can be used for trustees. Their meetings, and those of their committees, are generally held in late afternoon or evening, when it would not interfere with intermittent processes or infrequent readers. It has always seemed to me that a Local History room would be an excellent refuge for trustees in a building where space had to be economized, especially as local history is a proper function for a small library with either an active librarian, or an active local society, or both.

When the library gets larger, it is well to consider that the trustees represent the public which owns the library. They are usually selected with care for what is held to be the most honorable position in town. They serve without pay. In character, in prominence, in responsibility, in service, their board deserves prominent recognition in planning a building. As they will use their quarters less often than staff or readers use their rooms, they need not take up any space which is desirable for active departments. They can be put anywhere in the building where space can best be spared. But as they are sometimes elderly men, they ought not to be expected to climb many flights of stairs, and in buildings without elevators, should not have to go higher than the second floor.

In furniture and decoration, a deal of money has been wasted on trustees’ rooms. They ought to have a cheerful, cosey, dignified and comfortable room, but as no library ever has enough money for its actual needs, it is willful and sinful waste to devise massive and costly furniture (usually very uncomfortable) and splendid ornament, for the modest gentlemen (and ladies) who will spend a few hours there every month.

Good proportions, cheerful color, good natural and artificial light, a warm carpet perhaps, a ceiling not too lofty, comfortable yet not necessarily expensive furniture, with lockers or hat racks, even a fireplace if the architect thinks it would add to the effect of the room (here a fireplace would be most permissible); these will make an apartment where trustees can be at their best, wise, sensible, never contentious or captious.

Even then, it does not seem necessary to set aside an otherwise useless room entirely to a board which occupies it so seldom. Think if it cannot be put to some special use, for clubs, or if that would desecrate it, to housing some special collection not likely to be wanted at the hours of board meetings. By all means shelve it round about—there is no decoration in a library like books in good binding, even in bright cloth covers,—and let it be one of the semi-public rooms, to be shown with pride; or sparingly used by those readers or students who deserve to be ranked as users with trustees.

Librarian’s Room

Though the delivery room be the center of service, the librarian’s room is the center of direction. Whether it should be close to the delivery room or to any special department, depends first upon the size of the library, then upon its class and methods. Sometimes it is thought well for the librarian not only to be in close touch with his staff, but to be accessible to the public. If he does not wish to use his time entirely as an information clerk, a position may be assigned to him quite apart from staff or public rooms, on any floor. Modern systems of tube or telephone (which should always be liberally provided to keep all departments in close call), will sufficiently overcome distance to enable him to summon to his room anyone he wishes to see. Champneys even suggests an extra exit as an escape from bores, if they succeed in getting in.

Where his position is to be, in the building, it is for the librarian to decide, provided the trustees approve him sufficiently to keep him to run the new building. He is to run it, and he ought to have the place which will let him run it most easily, according to the methods he may wish to follow. No one else should compel him to go where he will be hampered by any discomforts.

As to arrangements and furniture, there will be needed such tables as the size of the room may allow, such chairs as the occupant may require, as well as enough for visitors, wardrobes for his clothes, closets for his stores (see list of stores which may be needed in a stationery cabinet—_Duff-Brown_[231]), private toilet room, a space (usually) for a small fireproof safe for his and the trustees’ valuable immediate papers, such wall shelving as he may require for his personal books and bibliography, telephone and tube space handy to his seat, a keyboard for keys, and enough free floor space for such revolving bookcases and such floor cases as he may further require, not to forget passage room for visitors.

As to location, so as to arrangement, the librarian should here have a free hand, however much he must yield his preferences elsewhere. It is his room, and should be a part of his individuality. To allow this to him, is the first and longest step toward good administration during the whole life of the building.

In England, a private residence is often provided in the building for the librarian, but seldom or never in America.

=Ante-room.= In a library of some size, a comparatively small room, or even two or three low rooms are very much better for the librarian than one large, high room. If there is an assistant librarian or private secretary, he needs a separate room, and if there is to be a private stenographer, she can share this outer room, and either part of it, or still another room can be assigned to staff or public, waiting for their turn of admittance. Indeed, a suite of three not very large rooms is quite ideal, especially as many of the librarian’s impedimenta can be distributed over the larger shelf and closet space available.

=Heads of Departments.= In a large library with departments, each of their heads should have his own little room or rooms, according to his duties and the bulk of his records, close to the center or edge of the groups of rooms he is to manage, with such tube and telephone communication as will place him in close touch with the librarian, with his inferiors, and with such other departments as he aids in serving.

Other Staff Quarters

Staff work is divided by Bostwick[232] into,—

_Administrative_, which would cover librarian, his assistants, and heads of departments.

_Contact with the public_, including those of advisory, educational, or disciplinary duties.

_Clerical_, subordinates in offices and catalog departments.

_Buying and distribution_, including those engaged in preparing and circulating books.

_Care of Building._

This would indicate a group or number of rooms for each class, the “administrative” (already treated) and “buying and distribution” somewhat clustered, the “clerical” and “contact with the public” distributed among the others, and the “care of building” generally centered in the basement.

In addition to these classes or groups, a general room or rooms will be needed in a large library for staff meetings, staff lectures and staff training school. One large room should serve alternately for all such purposes, especially if divided by sliding or folding partitions to make of it either a large or small room as desired. Special audience or school furniture is needed here.

Public Waiting Rooms

These are not wanted in small libraries, where the space left in front of the delivery desk will provide for casual visitors as well as for those waiting for books.

In large libraries, it is well to provide a place where visitors can rest and have the privilege of talking, and where members of the staff may see friends, if necessary. This is best near the main entrance. Indeed, a vestibule demanded by the architecture can be utilized as such a room, and if it can also be made a show room for book rarities and curiosities in glass cases, a museum for statues, busts and portraits, and a general porter’s hall and information office, it will justify its existence and relieve the working rooms in the library of many embarrassments. Here, also, may be bestowed grand staircases and all cumbrous architectural features that cannot be wholly barred out.

Such very public rooms, as distinguished from what might be called service waiting rooms like the librarian’s ante-rooms and the space left before the delivery desk for the applicants who have sent in slips and are waiting for their books—are better outside of the partitions of the working library. The latest plans for the Brooklyn central library provide, on a triangular lot, for an apex which seems to fill this need and some architectural features, without seriously infringing on working or service areas.

Stenography Rooms

=Staff.= Besides the private typewriter of the librarian, there will be others in large libraries for heads of departments (indeed, wherever there used to be a clerk or secretary, there must now be a machine), and a number in the catalog suite, ranging up into the tens or twenties, as more or less books are being put through various processes. These all may be called staff stenographers.

Even in libraries of moderate size, where there is a possibility of gifts or other growth which will require special cataloguing, it is wise to leave room in the cataloguing suite for extra stenographers, when suddenly wanted.

=Public.= There is also needed in large libraries, provision in private study rooms for readers or authors, and some special rooms for public stenographers on call, ready for extra staff or readers’ demands for copying, dictation, or anything legitimately connected with the use of books. Such rooms are among those to be placed on mezzanine floors or in a special wing or corridor. Like music rooms, they ought to be built with sound-proof or sound deadening floors, walls and ceiling; for readers who are not dictating are often and excusably sensitive about the clicking of others.

Place for Catalog Cases

This chapter covers the space to be allowed in rooms for the catalogs themselves.

Very large libraries require whole rooms for catalogs alone, usually one room for the general card catalog and another for the Library of Congress cards.

In all but very large libraries, card catalogs for the staff and for the public must be provided for in some way. They can be separate, but the form most economical of space is the double-ender set into the wall between cataloguer’s room and delivery department, with drawers which can be pulled out from either end. The obvious inconvenience is that they may be wanted at both ends at once. Notwithstanding this, they are much used, to save space if not labor.

A nice problem in planning is the placing of card-catalog cases not too far from the delivery desk, where they will not interfere with other uses, and where they will get ample light. The most usual way is to set them against partition walls, with space in front for a narrow table to which drawers can be moved and rested during use.

Another convenient arrangement is to make a sort of floor case, a wide table in the middle of the floor, with catalog cases back to back on top, leaving a ledge on each side and at the ends, where the table projects.

Stools are used with these rather than chairs, mainly because they take up less room and are not used for long periods.

The English books speak of other styles of catalogs, but we use no other form except (rarely) different kinds of printed catalogs, which are kept loose on tables or desks.

As to floor space required for catalog cases, see that heading later on. Placing them is a nice and critical question of planning.

Note that a Library of Congress card-catalog room separate is called for by the Brooklyn Public Library.[233]

Cataloguing Room

In small libraries, cataloguing has to be done in the librarian’s rooms or at the delivery desk. In larger libraries one large room or a suite of rooms is needed, and requires careful planning by an experienced librarian. Ample light is naturally the first requisite. North light is most regular and less glary, but is somewhat cold and cheerless. Large windows, or what is practically one window along one side of a room, the windows running up from the level of the tables clear to the ceiling, are best. The working tables (better single or double desks perpendicular to the windows) should occupy the window side, with service tables (trestles will do) in the next space. Then floor cases for bibliography and books in transit, also perpendicular to the light, and wall cases beyond with a ledge, will conveniently furnish the room. If, as usual, the different processes of handling books are performed in this room, not only cataloguing proper, but selection, ordering, accessioning, shelf-listing, collation, labelling, numbering, and marking or covering, must be foreseen, in due succession. A lift at one end from the packing room should bring the books, to follow the order of work, over bins, or tables, or desks, or shelves, leading either to the delivery desk or the stack. One room is often not enough—a suite of rooms is required, perhaps up and down stairs. (Do not be tempted to use circular stairs; they are criminal; see under that head, p. 177.) See the John Hay Library plans, for a central “stack,” so to speak, of such rooms, planned for speedy and economical service.[234]

For order of work, see Winsor,[235] and Bostwick[236] who enumerates other processes. This suite is a cosmos in itself, for which no architect unadvised could possibly arrange.

Even with an expert librarian to advise, the local librarian and the local corps of cataloguers ought to be consulted, and their methods and tastes should be heeded. An irritating incidence of light, an awkward stretch or carry to the shelves, a clumsy arrangement of desk-surfaces or window seats, might disconcert the best of cataloguers, and so far spoil the building.

See view of the cataloguing room in the Library of Congress, L. C. Report for 1901, p. 224.

Delivery Room

This is the department, under our American system, which in all libraries should be on the ground floor, and as short a distance as possible from the front door. In small libraries, it should be the center of the ground floor space, where that whole floor, and the top or foot of such stairs as there are, can be supervised by one attendant. Miss Marvin[237] locates it approximately as 12 feet (minimum) from the door, 16 to 20 feet “to the rear shelves,” but this of course depends on the size of the building.

Oscar Bluemner[238] thinks that the counter, the catalog, and applicants need not take up more than 10 × 15 feet in a small library.

In somewhat larger libraries the need of central location holds. The book shelves are generally behind the desk, one reading room (or two sober-reading rooms) on one side, another (or two where a certain amount of stir and noise may be expected) on the other. The space in front, from desk to door, should be planned for most of the stir and necessary noise, except that of open shelves. If there is a small vestibule separated from the delivery room by a glass partition, drafts and dust will be shut out, and a space allowed for the flutter of entrance and exit, leaving the space from door to desk for book applicants, querists, passage to other rooms, catalog case, bulletins, waiting, and such other uses as may be assigned to it.

Champneys[239] warns that the space here should be calculated for the maximum use at any time of day or evening, not for an average. Of course, so noisy a room cannot be reckoned on for any kind of reading, although if large enough such guides as directories, railway time tables, local maps, etc., might be used here to advantage.

Such a delivery desk should not be put in a room intended for study or quiet reading, unless perhaps in colleges, where stir may be expected as classes come and go every hour; but even here the entrances and exits should be put where the delivery desk stir and catalog use are on one and the same side, leaving the centre and other sides for readers, to be as undisturbed as possible.

In large libraries this delivery room can have more and roomier facilities, such as settees for those waiting for books. In the Providence Public, there is an Information desk on one side, a Registration desk on the other, near the front door. It should still be on the ground floor and not far from the outside entrance. More people flock here than elsewhere, and the less tramping through corridors they do, the better for them, the readers, and for the cleanliness of the premises. When other rooms or passages open out of the delivery room, a platform slightly raised for the desk will aid supervision.

=Light.= To get a sufficiently central position for delivery room and strong enough light on desk and catalog, seems to be, judging by inspection of libraries and plans, an especially difficult problem; but it should not be insoluble to a clever librarian and a bright architect.

The English plans do not help us much with ideas, for their system is herein different from ours. “Fewer people go to the lending department than to the reading room,” says Duff-Brown,[240] while with most of our American libraries all readers get to these rooms through or past the delivery room. And in a “barrier lending library,” as Champneys calls it, the counter is much longer than we use, even if there is no “indicator” to elongate it.

As the size, location and relative connections of the delivery-room largely determine the convenience of the whole building, the shape, capacity and practicableness of the delivery desk determine the excellence of this department. See p. 348.

Here the practical and ingenious librarian has his best chance in planning.

Janitor

The janitor in any library has important functions. In the smallest he is the only assistant, and can be of great service to the lone librarian in service, supervision and in substitution when she is away. In a library of any size he is housekeeper, not only assisting in handling books, but running the heating and lighting systems, superintending or performing all services of cleanliness, and often acting as special policeman in preserving order. He deserves a room of his own, even if it be a simple one in the basement. In large libraries he has a small residence suite, and is always on the premises as day janitor and night watchman. See Bostwick, p. 284, where he advises janitor’s private residence in all libraries except very small ones. But are janitor’s families always germane? I should say, only in very large libraries is it best to provide a janitor’s residence suite in the building. But in most libraries he has a home elsewhere, with only an office in the library. In this case he needs for himself only a table, tool bench, chairs, a closet for clothes and brooms, a box for tools, and a snug toilet room.

=Packing room.= Winsor[241] assigns this room to the basement, “a large hall, with raised platform in the center for superintendent, with stalls about the walls for successive processes, with rails running past them for book trucks.” But most of the processes he describes are now prosecuted near the catalog room or suite. The packing room is located in some convenient part of the basement, directly under the other administration rooms, with which it has direct communication by tubes and lifts. It should have a separate door to a carriageway, and in large libraries can have a package platform and freight doors opening out of it, for loading and unloading boxes of books.

The uses assigned to this room are generally packing and unpacking, central provisions for cleaning, light repairing of books and furniture, laying out for binder. Its furniture can be scant and simple: work tables or trestles against any free wall space, trucks, an adjacent closet or two, good windows on one or two sides, for light on processes, some shelves for laying out books in transit.

=Cleaning.= Here is a good central place for the paraphernalia of these operations, brushes, pails, cloths, and the like, not forgetting closets for the clothes of the scrubwoman.

See Bostwick on Cleaning.[242]

Binding and Printing

=Bindery.= Every library has to have a lot of repairing and binding done. Is it better to have your own plant on the premises or to contract to have it done elsewhere? E. R. N. Matthews[243] says that out of forty-seven English libraries he inquired of, twelve had binderies. He endorses the idea, having installed one at a new branch for his own system, in a separate building, with plant he enumerates, bought second hand for £50.

In small libraries it is easy to decide; nothing except simple repairing by the janitor can be done at home. Whatever has to be done from time to time can be sent out on contract. In view of the space taken up, the bulky and noisy machinery, the cost and trouble of selecting and storing stock, the danger of labor troubles and fires, and the bad odors of glues, the ownership of a bindery would naturally be put off until it can be proved to be a great economy in time and money. Champneys,[244] following Duff-Brown,[245] says that “Binderies are not required except in very large libraries.” I say from considerable business experience, save yourself cost, risk and trouble, by not trying the experiment.

If you must have a bindery, a good place for it is the basement, in or next to the packing room, where books are being handled. Some authorities suggest the attic, but it seems to me that the quiet and top light of the upper floor make it too valuable for finer purposes, to be spared for such “base mechanical use.”

Every sizable library ought to have at least a bindery repair-room or nook for repair work in the janitor’s or packing room, where one or two skilled workmen or girls of your own staff can do light repairs, pasting and the like. But this is the limit of work in the building wisdom requires you to provide for.

See M. W. Straight, “Repairing Books.”[246]

See E. R. N. Matthews, “Library Binderies.”[247]

See H. T. Coutts, “The Home Bindery.”[248]

=Printery.= So with printing. Very large libraries may have a complete outfit, but, as Bostwick says,[249] “a library of any size may well have a small outfit for printing letter heads, envelopes, cards, pockets, book plates, etc.” This may be in the same room as the bindery down below. If to be installed for the first time, and the librarian has not had personal experience, a practical binder and printer should be consulted as to space, light and fittings required.

Miss Marvin writes to me, “I have liked a suggestion made by Mr. Doyle, architect of the Portland (Or.) Public Library. He feels it a mistake to plan for all administrative work and storage of books not frequently used, in the central library, built on expensive land with no space to spare.... I have never known a public library practical enough to build a warehouse on inexpensive land near the edge of a town for the storage of books, or the receipt of books on which clerical work is to be done before distribution to the branches.... These details for school collections, traveling library collections, and other clerical work, as well as binding, repair, etc., had just as well be removed from the central library, and the space there used for reading rooms and necessary offices.”

[See Matthews’ mention of a central bindery in a branch in England.]

This is worth considering, provided the need of removal is urgent. There are administrative questions to be considered, however, besides cost of land or construction; such as service, care, carriage, etc.

The larger the building, and the more stories, the more opportunity there is, by exercising economy of space and cleverness of arrangement, to find room there for these distributing functions, which are easiest controlled under central supervision and close to the books.

One thing I would never do—consent to such removal until every superfluous architectural area, in vestibules, corridors, staircases, etc., had been eliminated, and the building reduced to its lowest possible denomination for necessary central work.

Room for Service of Branches

In large libraries, room must be provided for laying out, shipping and receiving books for branches, deliveries, traveling libraries and all other kinds of outside activities. How much space these may require may be inferred from the fact that the Travelling Library office of the New York Public Library has a stock of fifty thousand volumes and seventeen employees.

It should either have direct shipping doors, or should open into the packing room, with good access to the shipping facilities there.

Besides tables, desks and shelving for the general use of superintendent and clerks, with corner for telephones to the branches, etc., and to other departments of the main library, there will have to be bins for such dispatch service. As the books come here from the stack, nearness to it, or some form of mechanical connection with it, will save much time. Here, as in so many other departments of every new large library, is opportunity for individual planning.

See Winsor, P. L., 1876, 470. ” Bostwick, L. J., 1898, p. 14. ” L. J., 1898, Conf. 98, 101. ” Cole, U. S. Ed’l Rept., 1892-3, Vol. 1, p. 709. ” Wilson, R. E. P. L., 1901, p. 275. ” Duff-Brown, pp. 350-356. ” Sutton, C. W., 6 L. A. R., 67.

Comfort Rooms

=Rest and Lunch.= In England always, and oftener here than formerly, even in small libraries, a room or rooms are provided for the relaxation of the staff. “Especially for women, humanity and a wise economy prompt comfortable rest rooms, as they are not as uniformly in robust health, and are more subject to sudden indisposition.”—(_Bostwick._[250]) In view of the good these can do, in refreshing attendants, and keeping them in the building, as well as the fact that such rooms can be tucked into space not really needed for anything else, and also because of the moderate expense of fitting them up, it seems a great pity to cut them out of plans, as I have known building committees to do from false ideas of economy. A room for rest and lunching, a tiny “kitchenette” adjoining, with gas stove, one room if you can for men, another for women; or in smaller libraries a common room for a library mess, will do a deal toward infusing an _esprit de corps_ into the whole staff. A timely cup of tea will soothe the nerves and stimulate the jaded to renewed vigor. This is so much a matter of housekeeping that the advice of the ladies of the corps can wisely be taken as to equipment, including store closet. They can be trusted to get everything needed into little space, at little cost.

See article in _Public Libraries_[251] on “Comfort in a Library,” where it is said a room 6×6 can be made to serve.

=Wraps.= As far as clothes are concerned, the staff have got to be given cleanly and satisfactory places to leave hats, coats, umbrellas and overshoes during working hours. These should be in the basement, or some place not so far through corridors as to have much tracking of mud. If they can be afforded, ventilated wardrobe cupboards, with a shelf above low enough to hold the prevalent style of ladies’ hats, a box below for rubbers, and interval enough between for a long wrap or fur coat, should be provided for each person; private cupboards for all private rooms; staff cupboards in the staff rest room, each one with lock.

For the public, a convenient umbrella stand (automatic locks will improve it), and rubber pigeon-holes near the entrance will prevent dripping around. There are various makeshifts—racks for hats under chairs, coat rails behind chairs, or at the end of tables (see Tables, p. 344, and Chairs, p. 346) or hat racks in passages, and the like. In the larger libraries, where coat rooms become necessary, they can be slipped into narrow rooms under staircases or in passages near the vestibule.

“Every reading room should have hooks or trees for coats and hats, and stands for umbrellas.”—_Eastman._

“In small libraries coat rooms should open from the delivery room, overlooked from the desk.”—_Marvin._[252]

=Lavatory.= Need of frequent wash bowls on all floors has been spoken of elsewhere. A common lavatory for women and a separate one for men, open both to public and staff, is a great convenience, and may render fewer separate wash bowls necessary,—a desideratum as far as cost goes, for plumbing is a great expense, and part of planning is to concentrate and reduce to a minimum “stacks” of plumbing. For this reason water fixtures on separate floors should be superimposed rather than scattered.

Sanitary Facilities

These must be furnished separately for men and women of the staff, but whether or not they need be provided for the public is a question both here and in England. Miss Marvin[253] is positive that public toilet rooms are a great nuisance, and should be omitted always, at all events from the main floor. Burgoyne[254] reports opinion divided, but thinks them advisable where a separate attendant can be afforded. Is it not mainly a matter of size and location? Large libraries must provide them for large throngs; libraries of medium size must offer some refuge for serious readers who have to spend many hours over their books; small local or branch libraries, whose users live not so far away, may omit them. The trouble and expense are against them, convenience and health are in their favor. If the park board or public health authorities will provide them somewhere near, the problem is solved. Where they can be avoided in small libraries, and where children throng, much trouble of personal oversight will be saved. If they must be installed, here is certainly a problem to be solved in convenience, separation, and casual supervision of entrances and exits.

Vehicles

Automobiles can be ranged at the curb in front of the library; they lock or care for themselves. Hitching-posts in rural districts will tether horses. Bicycles, not so much in evidence as they were once, may be left in racks in front, or in some place provided for them in lobby, or inside the rear entrance in the cellar.

In a large library, with courtyard, or even without, an inclined approach to the basement is possible. In St. Louis it runs from one street corner, down along a side of the building, then turns into an open underground entrance to the basement. Such a passageway takes from the street the library’s vehicles for branch service, etc., and if there is space inside, and the surrounding streets are narrow, it might well give safety for visitor’s vehicles.

Duff-Brown[255] thinks bicycles are best housed outside. Champneys[256] says, “don’t allow them in corridors.”

In busy thoroughfares of large cities, or, indeed, in small cities in this age of street Juggernauts, provision may well be made for safe ingress and egress for decrepit readers near the curbstones. Some forethought, taken by architect in conjunction with street-car officials, would land many users in the new building without much of the flurry and danger which often hovers over the approaches.