Number Scramble!

Reading call numbers is a science-almost-art like quality that gets lost on many readers. Most folks tend to only read the beginning and the end of something, but miss the middle entirely. However, the middle often contains the most important bit of information. Such is the case with call numbers.

For some reason the beginning number after the letter(s) tend to get read this way. Here are some examples of books I have found located under this logic. First will be the call number I was looking for matched with the call number where I found it. In most cases these call numbers are located a couple sections a part, but others there was quite a bit of distance between the two.

E446 .H27 2007 shelved as E444 .H27 2007

HD57.7 .B373 2006 shelved as HD58.7 .B373 2006 (for some reason this happens all the time for these books)

HX239 .B47 2006 shelved as HX236 .B47 2006

PN3435 .L4 shelved as PN3355 .L4

PS3563.O8749 L68 2003 shelved as PS3553.O8749 L68 2003 (this happens ALL the time for all PS’s)

Of course, it would always be a good idea to look for these sort of mix-ups in other letter ranges as well such as that PS one, look for it in the same way in the PR section because it does happen (though coincidentally, I don’t have a current example…see a future posting).

So, case in point, try to mix up the numbers in between because sadly, those are the numbers that will get scrambled or worse another number will get substituted.

Happy Searching!