If you're a librarian, or fan of libraries, December 10th is a very special day for you: it's Dewey Decimal System Day!
The Dewey Decimal System was created by Melvil Dewey back in 1876, and has gone through a few revisions since then. This system determines how librarians group and order books on the shelves, and helps them know exactly where to put books back.
Our librarian Deimosa remembered a very specific poster about the Dewey Decimal System when she was in school. It features a series of questions to consider about yourself and the world around you, and how those questions can lead you to one of 10 sections of the system. It's within that section that you can then find the book you're looking for.
To this day, this logic presented on this poster is how Deimosa explains the system to others! (She even talked about it on an episode of our Scholastic Reads podcast.)
Deimosa recently found the 1968 version of the poster in our Archives. After a little a digging through our poster collection (that's right, we have a copy of every poster our Book Clubs ever sold) we also found a 1985 reprint! (The difference is glossier paper, and slightly different colors.) So for this Throwback Thursday and upcoming Dewey Decimal System Day, check them out! (You can click the images to enlarge.)
1968 poster
1985 poster
Special thanks to Scholastic librarian Deimosa Webber-Bey for her help with this series!
Gina Asprocolas
