Housing Library Collections

Back in the days when absolutes were all the rage, a book was a book and we all knew how many it took to make an effective collection in a community of a given size. Knowing this, we also knew how much space it took to house such a collection. For example Interim Standards for Small Public Libraries, published by the American Library Association (ALA) in 1962, allowed for building sizes ranging from .6 of a square foot per capita for populations between 25,000 and 49,999, to .8 of a square foot per capita for populations under 2,499. One of the essential ingredients in determining building size was the anticipated size of the book collection; ALA recommended two books per capita for larger libraries to four books per capita or more for smaller ones, with a minimum collection size set at 10,000 volumes. These formulations did not differ significantly from other sources, a fact which is hardly surprising since these standards were largely traceable to the work of the dean of all building consultants, Joseph Wheeler.