MELVILLE LOUIS KOSSUTH DEWEY

 Born December 10, 1851

 Shortened his name to Melvil Dewey.

*Keenly interested in simplified spelling, he shortened his first name to Melvil as a young adult, dropped
his middle names and, for a short time, even spelled his last name as Dui.

 Came from a poor family and grew up in Adams Center, New York.
 American librarian and educator.

*Dewey was a pioneer in American librarianship and an influential figure in the development of libraries
in America in the late 19th and early the 20th century. He changed librarianship from a vocation to a modern
profession.

 He attended Alfred University and Amherst College, from which he graduated with bachelor's and
master's degrees.

*Immediately after receiving his undergraduate degree, Dewey was hired to manage Amherst's library
and reclassify its collections. He came up with a system of decimal numbers used to classify a structure of
knowledge first outlined by Sir Francis Bacon.

 "Father of Modern Librarianship".

*Because:
 He invented the Dewey Decimal Classification when he was 21 for library cataloging.

*He was a student assistant in the library of Amherst College when he invented this. His work created
a revolution in library science and set in motion a new era of librarianship.

What is the DDC System?

The Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) system is the world’s most widely used way to organize
library collections. The DDC constantly updates to enable better discovery across any topic in multiple
languages. Because the DDC is easy to use, you can increase the visibility of your materials quickly and
efficiently. Dewey copyrighted the system in 1876. This system has proved to be enormously influential and
remains in widespread use.

 Secretary of the University of the State of New York and director of the New York State Library
 Founder of the The Library Journal, American Library Association and the country's first School of
Library Economy

*In 1877 Dewey moved to Boston, where he founded and became editor of The Library Journal,
which became an influential factor in the development of libraries in America, and in the reform of their
administration.
*He was also one of the founders of the American Library Association, of which he was secretary
from 1876 to 1891, and president in 1891 and 1893
*In 1883 Dewey became librarian of Columbia College, and in the following year founded there the
School of Library Economy, the first institution for the instruction of librarians ever organized.
  Responsible for the development of library science in the United States
 Died in Lake Placid, Florida, on December 26, 1931 from a stroke.
 Seven decades after his death, he is still primarily known for the Dewey Decimal Classification
system, the most widely used library classification scheme in the world.

ANNIE GODFREY DEWEY (1850-1922)

 Hosted the Lake Placid Conferences with his husband Melvil
 Helped in the organization of the study of home economics for schools and universities

Lake Placid
Melvil Dewet and his first wife, Annie Dewey, developed and founded the Lake Placid Club in 1895,
a resort for social, cultural and spiritual enrichment in the Adirondack Mountains. They also helped organize
the Olympic Games there.
The Lake Placid Club was a private institution with a policy of excluding Jews and other minorities.
Lake Placid also acted as a conference center hosting meetings promoting reform movements,
such as the September 1899 conference on "home science" chaired by Ellen Swallow Richards, a pioneer
of what later came to be called home economics. Mr. and Mrs. Dewey acted as host and hostess for the
conferences.
These conferences lasted for ten years, from 1899-1908. From the beginning, the purpose of the
Conference was to promote the study of the home and the problems of home life. The importance of the
home to the individual and to society was often stressed in these early meetings, and it is interesting to
note, the term “home economics” was used at the very first meeting. These meetings had a great deal of
influence in promoting home economics in the schools.
Late in his life Dewey helped found the Lake Placid Club as a health resort in New York state

PHILOSOPHY

Melvil Dewey: “Those who can make the home all it should be will contribute more to the basic needs of
life than even teachers, ministers and editors.”

Annie Godfrey Dewey: “The things of the spirit, the invisible forces which make men great, are developed
by education, evolution, sound judgment, and constructive measures – and that the supreme factor in such
development is the home.”

Nevertheless, at least two of Melvil Dewey's speeches to the conferences seemed to support the home
economists' claim to a relationship between the home and the rest of society. At the eighth conference he
delivered an address on "The Trend Toward the Practical in Education" in which he declared the relationship
between home and society, proclaiming, "The scientific study of food and clothes and shelter, of personal
and home hygiene, of home training, reading and other forms of education and recreations, in short of all
those things that pertain to the home, is the greatest problem with which the race now has to deal. It is a
corner stone on which the best in civilization will be built."