The San Rafael Public Library was founded in 1887. In 1898, the librarians began the library's first catalog. At the time, it was called a "Condensed Accession Book" and included rules and recommendations from Melvil Dewey himself at the beginning of the book. Below is a photograph of the first page of entries in San Rafael's first ever library catalog of books.
The first book in the San Rafael Public Library's collection was Arthur Conan Doyle's Rodney Stone.
New books were entered with the author, title, publisher, date of publication, number of pages, and more. If an item is crossed out, it means the book was withdrawn from the library's collection and an explanation for why is in the far right column. We still have #18 on this list: Etching and Etchers in the Library Director's office, withdrawn over 100 years ago!
These handwritten pages (we have four volumes!) were eventually typed up and bound as an official library catalog with an alphabetical list of authors, titles, and subjects. Handwritten notes were included as more titles were added after the typed volume was produced.
Imagine if our library catalog was still in this format--page after page--that only one person could look at at a time. Instead we have a great online catalog, accessible to anyone, anywhere, anytime. We certainly enjoy the modern day conveniences of digital cross-referenced databases, but we can also look back at the past and be amazed by the beautiful work (and beautiful handwriting!) of our predecessors.