highlights from the collection (part 5)

Its been several months since the last highlight and one might say its long overdue.
Here, an unintentional collection of library cards. Each remained, long after its obsolescence, tucked in a book I borrowed or bought. I like that they show a range of data-recording technology--from hand-written to type-written, rubber stamp to various arcane punch card configurations. Each of the printed cards gives off a blustery officiousness with their "do not remove"-s and their penalties. The red-edged card at upper right is positively bristling with overly involved methodology and procedure.

The "Alluring Problem" with its red accent and boldly graphic star is irresistible but I think my favorite is the small printed and punched ticket at lower left. The holes give a delicate visual syncopation to the printed statements which, although they are emphatically not, remind me of a haiku.

There's something quietly affecting about the card on lower right. Each month and year stamped and noted, each entry a remnant of long-ago readers whose paths crossed ever so lightly at that point--with that book. Had that card lain dormant in the back of Fashions in American Typography, in the basement of the Brooklyn Library, since June 29 or so, 1950, until I requested it be retrieved?

Am I waxing too poetic-- too precious --to think of each of these little pieces of paper as a small lifeline, an attempt to safeguard their charge when released out in the world?