"God Almighty Hates a Quitter"                    17

Memoir. Shortly before she came to Columbia she had been asked
to pick up the work on the Guide to the Study and Use of Refer¬
ence Books, two editions of which had been prepared and pub¬
lished by Miss Alice B. Kroeger, who died in 1909. At the same
time she was asked by the Library Association to prepare an
annual survey of reference works to be published in its Journal.
These tasks she assumed, and when she came to Columbia in
February of 1911 she brought them with her. For the Guide to
Reference Books, an indispensable aid to the librarian and re¬
search worker (known currently as "Mudge," just as gathering
bibliography in preparation of a paper has been referred to among
Columbia students as "mudging"), she compiled a supplement to
the second edition and then brought out in 1917 a third edition,
a fourth in 1925, a fifth in 1929, and a sixth in 1936. To complete
the story there are to this sixth edition four supplements, the first
prepared by Miss Mudge and the others by Miss Winchell, who
is likewise the author of the seventh edition which appeared, in
considerably revised form, in 1951.

Miss Mudge's work on this Guide, together with the annual
review of new reference works, strengthened her work as refer¬
ence librarian by giving her an incomparable knowledge of the
literature, while her work as reference librarian afforded constant
suggestion for improvement in organization or critical comment
in the Guide. It helps one to understand how, in the first few years
of her work as reference librarian, she was able thoroughly to re¬
organize and enrich the reference collection in the Library; and
at the same time it may help to explain that uncanny sense of
where to look for the answer to a given question and that detailed
knowledge as to what sort of question might properly be asked
of a given reference work, which were the wonder and despair of
all who availed themselves of her services.

Not satisfied with the accomplishments indicated above. Miss
Mudge taught reference librarianship and bibliography, at first
for two or three years in Summer Session and later as Associate
Professor in the School of Library Service, from 192710 1938 and