Reference book reviewing

Before January 1938, no major journal in any of the three disciplines most concerned—English, Education, Library—had a department regularly devoted to Reference Book Review. Only those of us dedicated to the practice and teaching of Reference can experience the exhilaration of having, at last, not only a department, but an entire journal committed to Reference Book Reviewing, as is RSR. This editorial begins with a salute to the founders of Reference Services Review, continues with a condensed chronicle of a four‐decade crusade for the recognition of a Literature of Reference; and concludes with a statement on the art and science of Reference Literary Criticism today.