History: Turn of the 20th Century

• Anecdotal evidence of loan practices dating back to mid-1800s

  • Madison University Libraries (Hamilton, NY): lent books to “gentlemen of reasonable character”
  • Also Boston Library, Williams College, Holy Cross, Yale, Brown, New York Society, more

• Handful of exemplary services

  • Surgeon General’s office (index, loans)

• “It would expedite and increase the efficiency of inter-library loans if some common catalog of the books and serials thus available could be kept at a central point in the states…” G.F. Danforth, Librarian, Indiana University *

• * Lib J 24:156, 1899