STAFF CLUB.

At the annual meeting of the Staff Club in May, the following officers were elected: President, Alice M. Jordan; Vice-President, Marian W. Brackett; Secretary, Marion A. McCarthy; Treasurer, Mary A. Reynolds; members of the Executive Committee, Mary F. Curley, Edith Guerrier.

There was a large and interested response in answer to the letter sent to Club members by the Executive Committee in June, for the purpose of ascertaining what special activities the Club wishes to undertake. One hundred and twenty replies out of a possible one hundred and forty were received, the subjects checked being as follows: Current events, 79; Music, 68; Book reviews, 62; Dramatics, 48; Coöperative buying, 40; Dancing, 27; Writing, 19. Committees have been appointed to consider the best way of conducting these activities, and reports of these committees will be given at the first fall meeting, October 24th.

There will also be submitted at this meeting, for action by the Club, an amendment to the Constitution whereby everyone in the regular day force of the Library is made eligible for club membership.'

BENEFIT ASSOCIATION..

The regular meeting of the Benefit Association was held in the Lecture Hall on October 3, at 5.15 p.m. The various committees made progressive reports. A rising vote of thanks was extended to the Committee on Pensions for the work that they have accomplished so far. Mr. John J. O'Brien, of the Bindery, was elected to the entertainment committee to fill a vacancy thereon. The attendance was small, and, as usual at this hour, no one was present from the branches.

Miss Morse, of the Relief Committee, reports that eight members. of the Association are at present on the sick list. Mr. George V. Aker and Miss Mary

Boyle, linotype operators in the Printing Department, are both absent, Mr. Aker recovering after a serious operation, and Miss Boyle suffering from an accident incurred while on duty. Mrs. Joanna Doiron, of the Bindery, met with an accident in Montreal; Miss Anna Doonan, of the Shelf Department, is convalescing from an operation on her throat; Miss Margaret Keenan, of the Branch Department, is suffering from a severe cold; Miss Annie M. Twomey, of the Issue Department, is expected back soon, after

a

nervous breakdown; Mr. Charles Murphy, of the, Engineers' Department, is in hospital, suffering from neuritis; and Miss Anna Dolan is still absent from her duties.

LIBRARY LIFE is glad to learn that all these members of the staff are on the road to health again. Miss Julia R. Zaugg, of the Special Libraries, returned to her post on October 9, after a severe attack of typhoid fever.

THE SPECIAL LIBRARIES ASSOCIATION OF BOSTON. At the annual meeting of the Special Libraries Association of Boston in May, the following officers 'were elected: Miss Harriet E. Howe, of Simmons College Library School, President; Mr. Edward H. Redstone, Librarian of the State Library, Vicepresident; Miss Margaret Withington, of Simmons College Library School, Secretary; Miss Mildred Bradbury. Assistant librarian of the Harvard School of Landscape Architecture, Treasurer.

It was voted that Mr. Belden, Librarian of the Boston Public Library, be made an honorary member of the Association. He is the only member that the Association has honored itself by thus admitting to its ranks.

The next meeting of the Association will be held at the Treadwell Library of the Massachusetts General Hospital, on Monday evening, October 23, at 8 o'clock; the subject of the meeting will be "Hospital Libraries."

THE PENSION SYSTEM.

In any attempt at an explanatory resumé of the Pension Act, it is selfevident that a regard for space must preclude an exhaustive detailed story. The best that one can be expected to do is to take the salient features, and try to throw upon them such light as may be.

The editor of LIBRARY LIFE has offered to extend the use of some space in future numbers to the answering of questions submitted by those seeking information on moot points, or perhaps a more detailed statement of some particular phase not fully treated in this article. Just now it seems pertinent to devote most space to the application of the Act to those now in the service who are nearing the retiring age, and who are the greatest beneficiaries, since to them it means practically a gratuitous pension.

This is true, because under the Act, the City recognizes a moral responsibility for past service, and this responsibility, known in financing the Act as the "accumulated liability," is the obligation of the City to treat those already in the service exactly the same as if they had been paying from the time they entered the employ of the City. Thus those who are now of the

MP12: 11.17.22: 750.

retiring age may retire with as much allowance to their credit, without having had any pay deductions, as one in the future who has been in the service the same length of time, and has been paying throughout that time. It is this obligation of prior service without pay on the part of the beneficiaries that is to make the cost of the system so great during the early years of its operation. In no case will a pension greater than 50 per cent. of the salary, based on an average of that received during the last five years, be granted for prior service.

In consulting the percentage tables published with this article, which were compiled by the actuary employed by the Finance Commission, it will be noted that certain groups of employees take a longer time to reach a given percentage of wage for pension than certain other groups. It was claimed by opponents of the bill, when it was under discussion, that this was an unfair discrimination. This is not so, since the provisions of the bill simply take advantage of known actuarial facts and apply them in a scientific. way, so as to do full justice to all. For instance, it is known that, as a general principle, the expectation of life is longer in women than in men. Likewise it is known that certain groups of workers among men have a shorter expectation of life than certain other

groups, and that the same thing is true in the case of women workers.

Among the men, policemen, firemen and laborers, having a shorter expectation of life than clerks and school teachers, reach a given percentage of their wage in less time than members of the latter groups; and among women, mechanics and laborers bear the same relation to female school teachers and clerks.

The justice lies in the fact that, whereas laborers and kindred groups take less time to reach a given figure than do clerks, etc., they live fewer years afterward, so that the clerks, female school teachers, etc., enjoy their pension over a longer period after receiving it. These provisions are based on known actuarial data, which are in use in every-day life insurance and annuity policies.

The age of compulsory retirement is seventy. Thirty days after the Act becomes operative, all employees seventy years of age, who become members, are automatically retired. Employees now in the service, seventy years of age or

over, but who do not become members of the system, may remain until February 1, 1926, when all such employees who are not members of the system will be retired. This provision does not apply to veterans of the Civil War, the Spanish War, the Philippine Insurrection, and the World War, nor to members of the judiciary.

The minimum age for voluntary retirement is sixty. City employees, other than policemen, who do not wish to retire at sixty, but whose retirement has been requested by the head of their department, may appeal to the Retirement Board and be heard.

What it all means to those now in the Library may be set forth briefly thus: Beginning February 1, 191, you contribute four per cent. of your wages to buy an annuity. The amount of this annuity is matched by the city upon your retirement, thus doubling the earnings of your savings. You are credited with all the time you have been in the service, just as if you had paid during the entire period. You may join the system or not, as you choose.

27.9 30.2

25

23.5 25.5

30

19.1

35 40

14.8

20

25

30

35

40

63.1

54.2

45.3

36.7

26.3

28.9

If you do not wish to join you must notify the Retirement Board in writing to that effect, within sixty days after February 1, 1923. If you do not join within the next year, you lose all beneits accruing from prior service. This proviso (Section 5) gives to each of us the feminine privilege of changing our mind, and a year in which to do it.

Entrance into the system is optional with you, but it becomes obligatory with all who enter the employ of the city or county after February 1, 1923.

The money you contribute, with its earnings, is yours as long as you live, or your estate's at your death, up to the time you become a pensioner. All claim to the return of your contributions ceases as soon as you accept the first payment of your entire retirement allowance. Your retirement allowance is the sum of your annuity and pension. combined.

If you are a beneficiary under any other form of pension allowed by the city or county and wish to become a member of this system, you must say so in writing. You cannot at the same time be a member of this system and a participant in any other pension system allowed by city or county.

You may accept a lesser pension than you are entitled to, and provide for the difference being paid to wife, minor child or dependent parent.

In case of accident incurred in the line of duty, which results in total disability, the pension paid is equal to three-fourths pay, based on the last year's salary.

In case of the death of an employee from any cause in the line of duty, a death benefit is paid, consisting of the payment to his legal representative of the sum of his contributions, and to his dependents of a pension equal to onehalf his pay, based on the last year's salary.

In consulting the percentage tables published, it should be borne in mind that they apply approximately and that it is doubtful if any individual case will work out exactly as set forth in them. Each case is a separate case, and will naturally show some slight variation one way or the other. J. W. K.

IMPRESSIONS OF A TRUSTEE.

On Beacon Hill is a lawyer's office which was once, evidently, the drawing-room of a Boston dwelling-house. The walls are white-panelled, the furniture, solid old mahogany; there is a grate fire, and an early American lamp, cunningly wired. Against this background one finds a very modern business man, Mr. Guy W. Currier, recently appointed trustee of the Boston Public Library.

Though Mr. Currier has attended but three trustees' meetings to date, he knows a good deal about the workings of the Library. He is enthusiastic, too, about the fairness of the Librarian in his dealings with a large and far-flung force. Mr. Currier is aware how difficult it is for the Central Library and the Branches and Reading Rooms really to know each other. He believes,

however, that the Staff Club will eventually succeed in solving this problem.

The new trustee speaks highly of the spirit of the Library employees and their loyalty to the institution. He believes that vacancies which occur should be filled from the present staff, whenever possible, and that every opportunity should be given the employees to fit themselves for advancement. Like the other members of the Board of Trustees, he is interested in suggestions for courses of instruction which come from members of the staff.

Mr. Currier is of the opinion that business men do not realize the importance and usefulness of the Public Library. The scholar we have always with us, but the Library must go after the man of business and tempt his interest with material which will be helpful and easily accessible. Another practical approach to business men is through the talks on the Library and its resources, which are given to the secretarial classes of Simmons College and Boston University. When the students of these classes become secretaries, they will be able to suggest to their employers how the Library can help them in their work. Mr. Currier is strongly in favor of a Business Branch library in the down-town section of Boston, and is doing all he can to enlist the interest and sympathy of Boston business men.

M. E. P.

LANGDON LAURISTON WARD.

It is not easy to realize that three months have passed by since we heard the voice or footfall of one who was long the friend of all of us. Langdon Ward was with us last on Saturday, July 29, and when his day's work was over we knew of no reason for thinking we should never see him again. The next day, Sunday, he went to Bedford to make arrangements for his annual vacation, which was to begin on Thursday of that week. He spent most of the day in Bedford and returned to Boston in the afternoon, but did not reach his home; for, while waiting in

the subway he was stricken with cerebral hemorrhage, and the rest of his life was a time of only partial consciousness. He was taken to the Eliot Hospital, where he died August 15. His funeral, which was held in St. Paul's Cathedral on the afternoon of the 17th, was in charge of the Rev. Edward T. Sullivan, D.D., and was largely attended both by his associates in the Library and by others who had known him.

Mr. Ward was born in Boston, June 25, 1858, the son of Langdon Storer and Ellen (Spalding) Ward. He was a student in the Latin School, whence he passed to Amherst College, to be graduated in the class of 1879. After graduation he studied and practised law for a time, but it seems quite natural, considering his strongly-marked Puritan antecedents, that his mental and spiritual impulsion should shortly turn him from the law to the ministry. As his father was for years the treasurer of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, it was again quite natural that he should begin his theological course at Andover Seminary. There he broke in some degree with his inherited Puritanism, and soon left Andover to receive the larger part of his training in divinity at the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, from which he was graduated in 1884.

He did not, however, long remain in the active work of the ministry. Perhaps, like that of many clergymen of his day, his thought tended more to sociology than to theology. At any rate, in 1896, he became connected with this Library, taking charge of the Broadway Extension Station. In this first and not prominent position the purpose of his long preparation began to show, and from it his main work of life opened out; for in 1898 he was promoted to be Supervisor of the numerous branches, reading-rooms and stations of the Library. Thenceforth he held this post as if destined for it, giving it through twenty-four years the fruit of all his endowments and acquirements. His work was accomplished, like that of fine machinery, without sound of friction. His manifold duties, whether the