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Librarians and archives date back to the ancient world, some as early as 3000 BCE.
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Over 15,000 tablets were discovered ar Ebla, dating back to about 2000 BCE.
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A church directive was sent to various monasteries in 814 CE, providing one of the earliest explanations and rationales for cataloging library collections.
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As early as 1300, the Sorbonne had amassed as extensive collection of library books on religion, science, medicine, and law, donated by theologians and their supporters.
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Gabriel Naude published one of the earliest textbooks on collection development, in 1644
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During the Thirty Year War (1618-1648), the University of Heidelberg's library was stolen and sent to Rome, because books symobolized the power of the aristocracy and the Catholic Church.
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Rev. Thomas Bray, who is sometimes calls the "Father of American Libraries", served as a missionary in Maryland. While there, he was shocked by the poverty, ignorance, and immorality among the people. He started a society to raise money and send books to America. The society created 39 libraries.
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In 1751, Quaker Merchant James Logan used his 4,000 volume collection to start a public library in Philadelphia.
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Between the years of 1790 and 1850, almost 1200 social libraries were established.
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In 1885, Melvil Dewey was hired as head librarian at the University of Columbia, to reorganize the library's collection according to his new classification system, the Dewey Decimal System, a system that is still used in 135+ countries today.
