The history of the Dewey Decimal Classification System (DDC) hearkens back to the very beginning of the modern library movement in the nineteenth century. The classification scheme’s progenitor was a man named Melvil Dewey who was born to a poor family in upstate New York in 1851. ¹ His full name was Melville Louis Kossuth Dewey, but he was a man who supported language/spelling reform and had his named shortened to just Melvil Dewey. He even tried to have his family name further shortened to Dui. ² In this he failed, but this is only one failure amongst his many successes. Dewey had a profound effect on the library movement in America. He originated the DDC in 1873 and had it published and patented in 1876. There has been some speculation that Dewey synthesized ideas from a number of sources and coordinated them into a unified system. There is some evidence to suggest that Dewey may have been introduced to the idea of a decimal classification by a pamphlet written by Nathaniel Shurtlaff in 1856. ³  The DDC may also have been partly adapted from a scheme that William Lorrey Harris had formed from a structure expressed by Sir Francis Bacon, and refined by the German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel. ⁴ Regardless of where the scheme emerged from, however, Dewey was the first person to properly expand on and define his ideas concerning a classification that placed books into a relative order based on disciplines rather than an alphabetical order, or one that simply identifies a shelf space for a specific book. The DDC was the first timely modern system that introduced features like relative locations and a relative index. This allowed books to be placed in stacks based on their relationships to one another, and freed libraries to begin more freely organizing their libraries. The system grew from its first edition in 1876 and has been translated into over 30 languages, and is in the process of being translated into other numerous languages. These languages include: Arabic, Chinese, French, Greek, Hebrew, Icelandic, Italian, Korean, Norwegian, Russian, and Spanish. ⁵ As an example of DDC’s popularity it is currently being used in 95% of all regular school and public libraries, as well as 25% of the academic college and higher institutions, and 20% of the special libraries in the U.S. ⁶ While the DDC was Melvil Dewey’s most significant creation it was not his only creation. He also helped to establish the very first library school at Columbia University in 1887, ⁷ and worked to allow women admittance to the program. Dewey also helped establish the American Library Association in 1876, and became the director of the New York State Library until 1906. ⁸ Melvil Dewey finally died in 1931, but not before helping to clearly establish the significance of librarians, their profession, and the cataloguing system that still bears his namesake.

The DDC has been through numerous editions and expansions in its 120+ year history. The first edition for the DDC emerged in 1876, and totaled some 42 pages. By 1932 over 13 editions had emerged, and it had grown to include tables and some 1647 pages.⁹ The most recent edition to emerge was the 21^st edition in 1996 with some 899 pages for its relative index of subject headings, as well as 515 pages for its tables, and some 2205 pages for its schedules. Spanning some four volumes DDC 21 totalled some 4037 pages, and DDC 22 is due to be released in 2003. There are currently alternatives to the full four volume set available in an abridged printed DDC which is much shorter, but that does not extend to as much depth as the full set. There are also online versions of the DDC named ‘Web Dewey,’ and ‘Abridged Web Dewey.’

The DDC uses primarily Arabic numerals, as well as the Latin alphabet to create Cutter/Sanborn numbers for greater specificity. It is divided into hierarchies of disciplines. There are ten main disciplines or classes that are broken down further into ten divisions each. Each division can be broken down in to 10 sections. There are some sections that have still not been assigned, or have been reassigned in previous DDC revisions. All together, this forms a set of approximately 1000 sections of knowledge. It is important to note that it is possible for subjects to appear in more than one class. A book on mathematics could appear in the 372.7 section, or in the 510 section depending on if the book were a monograph instructing teachers on how to teach mathematics, or a mathematics textbook for children. There are also occasions where number building using one of the seven tables created in the DDC is necessary. The tables include:

-         Table 1: Standard Subdivisions

-         Table 2: Geographic Areas, Historical Periods, Persons

-         Table 3: Subdivision for the Arts, for Individual Literatures, for Specific Literary Forms

-         Table 4: Subdivision of Individual Languages and Language Families

-         Table 5: Racial, Ethnic, National Groups

-         Table 6: Languages

-         Table 7: Groups of Persons ¹⁰

An example of where the tables may be used would be a book of poetry written by various poets from around the world. It may require the reference and utilization of several tables to construct appropriate call numbers. The DDC call numbers can be easily reduced to less specific numbers depending on the needs and size of the library. Large libraries with specific cataloguing; however, can have very long DDC call numbers at times.

The DDC is continuously undergoing updates, even on a weekly basis, and enjoys a status of being one of the most widely used classification systems in the world. Some of the places it is not widely used are Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union which uses the Universal Decimal Classification system instead. ¹¹ The UDC was based on the DDC, and was produced with Dewey’s permission around the turn of the century. The DDC, which is published by Forest Press, became a part of the Online Computer Library Centre (OCLC) in 1988. ¹² The system is also maintained by the Library of Congress (LOC), and within the Decimal Classification Division in LOC there is located a Dewey Editorial Office. ¹³ The office assigns 110,000 DDC numbers to catalogued works annually, and prepares modifications and expansions to the DDC schedules. ¹⁴ In the more recent versions of the DDC there has been a strong effort to remove American and Christian bias and to make the DDC more applicable to other religions and works from other regions around the world. The DDC, together with LOC, WorldCat, OCLC, and the Marc 21 format are making efforts towards rendering as many of the world’s monographs, periodicals, and information materials available in as many different formats as possible for use by anyone and everyone.

    1.      Forest Press, “A Biography of Melville Dewey,” 2003,    <http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about/biography.htm> (24 March 2003).

    2.      UIUC, “Biography of Melville Dewey,”2003, <http:/gateway.library.uiuc.edu/library/circ/tutorial/biography.html> (24 March. 2003)

    4.      Ibid., 182.

    5.      Forest Press, “Introduction to the Dewey Decimal Classification,” 2003, <http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about/about_the_ddc.htm> (24 March 2003).

     6.      Forest Press, “About Dewey and OCLC Forest Press,” 2003, <http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about> (24 March 2003).

     7.      Ibid.

     8.      Forest Press, “A Biography of Melville Dewey,” 2003, <http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about/biography.htm> (24 March 2003).

     9.      Mona L. Scott, Dewey Decimal Classification, 21^st Edition: A Study Manual and Number Building Guide,  (Englewood, Colorado: Libraries Unlimited, 1998), 10. 

     10.  Mona L. Scott, Dewey Decimal Classification, 21^st Edition: A Study Manual and Number Building Guide,  (Englewood, Colorado: Libraries Unlimited, 1998), 29-32.

     11. Russell Sweeney, “The International Use of the Dewey Decimal Classification,” International Cataloguing and Bibliographic Control v. 24 (October/December 1995): 61.

     12.  Forest Press, “About Dewey and OCLC Forest Press,” 2003, <http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about> (24 March 2003).  

     13.  Forest Press, “Introduction to the Dewey Decimal Classification,” 2003, <http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about/about_the_ddc.htm> (24 March 2003). 

     14. Forest Press, “Introduction to the Dewey Decimal Classification,” 2003, <http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about/about_the_ddc.htm> (24 March 2003).

PART  1
SECTION 1
SECTION 2
SECTION 3      SECTION 4

PART  2
SECTION 1
SECTION 2
SECTION 3      SECTION 4

PART  3
SECTION 1
SECTION 2