Telephones and Tubes
These are most necessary for quick work. All libraries with more than one story, or even more than one room, can use speaking-tubes to advantage. They are inexpensive, and are easily put in while building. If installed at first, they need not cost much, and save many steps, if they be run only from the librarian’s desk to the janitor. For larger libraries, they can connect desk and stack, librarian and assistants, departments with each other. In stacks they are very serviceable, placed next the lift and running both to delivery desk and to janitor’s room. In still larger libraries some form of house-telephone will speed and simplify service, with an exchange desk, switchboard, and special operator.
Consult the local telephone company about the different styles and prices. You will perhaps be surprised to find how cheaply they can be set and run, even as compared with a speaking-tube system.
Dr. Richard Garnett recommends the telautograph for transmitting inquiries and orders,226 and also says,227 “In planning large libraries, it will be necessary to take mechanical contrivances into account to a much greater extent than hitherto.”
Less marble columns, fewer dadoes, and more tubes and telephones, would ensure a better working library.