[This article is in the midst of being written; expect major updates.]

This article shows images of each of the variety of cards used in the U.S. Copyright Office’s card catalogs from 1870 through 1977, identifies and compares the data fields included on them, and provides guidance for decoding abbreviations and other nuances.

The article is organized by each named set of card catalog drawers as used in the U.S. Copyright Office, namely:

• 1870 to 1897
• 1898-1937 Books, Graphic Arts, Music
• 1898-1909 Periodicals – Title/Claimant
• 1903-1937 Periodicals and Renewals Claimant
• 1909-1937 Dramas & Lectures – Title
• 1909-1937 Dramas & Lectures – Title/Claimant
• 1938-1945
• 1946-1954
• 1955-1970
• 1971-1977

Each card catalog drawer typically contains from around 1500 to 1800 cards.

General Guidance

Cards in each drawer are sorted by a key element of the work, usually either the title (in earlier card catalogs), author, claimant (“person claiming copyright”), agent of the author, or publisher (“printer”). Here are general sorting guidelines:

In general, each segment of the card catalog, all filing elements are divided into two alphabetized groups: personal names followed by corporate names and titles. Thus, for example, a researcher using the name or word White would find Alice White and Zachary White before White Lithographs, Ltd., and The White Monkey. The copyright records are subject to a lack of standardization in the romanization of names, cross-references, and other filing elements. A researcher should take into account any possible variant forms of names and titles. For example, cross-references may not be provided for entries cataloged under Chaikovskii and Tschaikowsky. 

https://www.copyright.gov/vcc/help.html#q10

In some cases, a cross-reference card (called a “Reference Card”) has been added that refers to the main card for a copyrighted work. For example, the main card may have the publisher’s name and the reference card, the author’s name.

• “Mac” and “Mc” are sorted in an intermingled manner; for example, [TBP]

See also: https://www.copyright.gov/vcc/card-guide.html .

Card Catalog, 1870 to 1897

The earliest copyright cards, starting in 1870, were handwritten on cards. These cards are organized in multiple ways. The earlier cards (up to around 1896) could have more than one entry per card, with each entry on a card associated with the header entry text, which could be initials of an author, the name of an author, or a keyword in the title of the work.

Until around 1910 with the adoption of Form A1, copyright claimants would submit information in a written letter to the Copyright Office. Clerks in the Copyright Office would enter the submitted information into ledgers, and then summarize them on copyright cards for the card catalog drawers.

Last Initial of Registrant’s Name

In the upper left of this card, above the line, the header entry text, “A. (S. M.)”, appears. This indicates that the author’s initials are S. M. A., with “A.” being the initial of the last name, which is used in sorting the card against others in the drawer. The “(S. M.)” is used to sort against others registered with a last name initial of “A.”, e.g. “A. (E. W.)”.

Below, “D. 1873” denotes that the work was copyrighted in 1873; “D” corresponds to the year, 1873 (A goes with 1870, B for 1871, C for 1872, on up to $$ for $$$$). The “D” is used in conjunction with the registration number, “7294”, since registration numbers were restarted at 1 on 1 January of each year. Therefore, this copyright number should be cited as “D 7294”.

“A. D. T. Randolph & Co. N.Y.” is company that entered (submitted) the registration of the work for the author, and in this and most cases is the publisher of the work.

Similarly, in the second entry for registrant, “A. (S. M.)”, “O. 1883” indicates that the work was registered in 1883 with a registration number of “O. 10478”, and the publisher is “D. Appleton & Co. –” where the “–” serves as a ditto mark for “N.Y.”, New York.

First Letter or Word of Title

Note the letter “A” at upper left above the line. In this case, “A” is the first word of the title of a variety of works that were registered from 1873 to 1879 on this card.

Hence, the first entry has “D. 1873”, registration number 3593 in 1873 (denoted as “D. 3593” to distinguish it from 3593 registration numbers in other years).

“(Print)” appears in paretheses to the right of the registration number, indicating the the copyrighted work was a print rather than a book or other type of work.

The title appears next, as “– Number 1”, where the “–” acts as a ditto for the “A” at top; hence the work’s title is “A Number 1”.

At right is the name of the company that entered (submitted) the registration, “F. Korbel & Bros”, which is “F. Korbel & Bros” as publishers of the work. (Note that F. Korbel & Bros. has produced champagne since 1882.)

Additional copyright registration information appears below for other works starting with “A”. These are listed sequentially by year and copyright registration number on the card.

• “(Chart)” denotes that the work is in the form of a chart.
• “(Cut)” is a wood or similar cut.
• “(Mus. Comp)” is a musical composition.
• On other cards, the following abbreviations can be found:
• “(Lith)” for a lithograph.
• “(Mus)” for a musical composition.
• “(Paint)” for a painting.
• “(Photo)” for a photograph.
• “(Card)” for a printed card.
• “(Eng)” for an engraving.

The card above contains works with titles starting with “A. B. C.”. The long dash (“–“) in each line item refers to “A. B. C.”, e.g., “A. B. C. of funny animals” registered by McLoughlin Bros. on the next-to-bottom entry.

Note that the second column of some entries doesn’t have parenthetical phrases (like “(Lith)”) indicating the type of work. Instead, for example, one entry has “Squire’s”. This indicates that the title of the work is “Squire’s A. B. C. Method for Guitar”, registered by “A. Squire”. Another entry has “Nissen.”, which likely identifies the work’s author, and the rightmost column (in this case, “F. A. Davis”) identifying the work’s publisher, who may have entered (submitted) the copyright registration.

Note that these cards, unlike most later cards, do not have a hole punched through them. These cards were readily removable from card catalog drawers since no metal rod was used to secure the cards in the drawers.

Periodical Entries on a Multicolumn Card

This card lists numerous issues of a periodical, “A. B. C. Pathfinder & Dial Once a Week” by “New Eng. R. W. Pub. Co. Boston” (New England Railway Publication Company in Boston, Massachusetts) on a card from 1895 to 1896.

Note that “AA” is a code corresponding to the year 1895, and “B2” for 1896.

Each issue garners a unique registration number, such as “37468” for the first one on this card. That registration number is thereby denoted as “AA 37468” to distinguish it from “37468” registrations for other years.

In some cases, the issue number “30”, “31”, and so on up to “39” in column one, are entered on the card, and in other cases, the issue date, “Sep. 30”, “Oct. 7″, ” 14″ (meaning “Oct. 14”) and so on.

This card uses a different template of lines but has no preprinted text. Works are listed sequentially by year and registration number on this template, which provides two columns of space for writing in registration information.

This card from 1897 includes an oval ink-stamp with the registration number (“68136”) and registration date (“DEC 7 1897”).

Cards with Single Entries

Starting around 1896, each card contains information on a single work, rather than a set of works corresponding to the text in the header at top.

This card is preprinted with the work category (“Music”) at upper right, along with the entry sort order (“(title)”) and registration year (“1896”).

Handwriting is used to fill in the remainder of the information on this card.

The title of the work, “A B C No 26” appears as the header text above the line, which is used for sorting cards in the card drawer.

The registration number is “19118”.

The handwritten description “pfte 4 hds” is a cryptic abbreviation for “pianoforte 4 hands”.

The work is registered by “Mack”, which may be either the author, the publisher, or both.

This card includes preprinted fields and was produced with a date of “190” for works registered in the first decade of the 1900s, marked as form number “2-1901–4” in the year 1901.

While the top line is intended to be the “Author” name, on this card, the title of “A. B. C. (The) code.” is shown instead. The second line, preprinted with “Brief title”, is blank as used on this card.

Note that the date of “Nov. 5, 1896” is given on the line preprinted with “2 copies received to complete copyright”, while the next two lines (‘1 copy “A,” received to complete copyright’ and ‘1 copy “B,” received to complete copyright’) are left blank. The bottom two lines, however, are filled in: ‘Copy “B” delivered to order division’ as “June 11, 1900” and ‘Copy “A” delivered to order division’ as “Mar. 14, 1901.”

Earlier Copyright Listed on a Later Preprinted Card

The card is preprinted with a date of “191” for use in the decade of the 1910s. However, it was filled out with information for a work registered in 1875, “A B C Buch für Sonntags- Schuler Zweite Auflage” (in German; translates to “A B C Book for Sunday School Second Edition”) by “Ev. Rev. Buch-Austalt”, with registration number 10541 (it is to be determined whether this number is sequentially numbered in 1875 or in the 1910s.). The card is stamped with the signature of “Fred’k W Ashley”, the “Chief, Order Division”, on “OCT 29 1912”, 37 years later.

Reference Card

This Reference Card, organized by the title of the work, provides a cross-reference of the copyrighted work, “Adagio cantabile. (3 pezzi, no. 2) (For organ)” composed by “Bossi, C. Adolfo”, to a separate card, “Ricordi (G) & co.” (Giovanni Ricordi & Company Ltd. in London), who was the publisher of the work.

Library of Congress Cards for Older Registrations

This card contains entirely preprinted information about a book by “Adams, Abby Merrill” called “Sense in the kitchen – A guide to economical cooking”, published by “A. S. Hunter”, which was copyrighted in “1881” with registration number “9894”.

This card was produced by the Library of Congress for use in its card catalog though here it appears because it was included in the U.S. Copyright Office copyright card catalog drawers.

“TX715.A215” is the Library of Congress catalog number. “iv, [5]-338 p.” notes the number of pages with Roman numerals and regular numbers. “19cm” identifies (to be determimed). (The number “8-15594” with a dagger: to be determined.)

1898 to 1937 U. S. Copyright Cards

In this range of copyright cards, cards are entered and sorted using the copyright registrant’s name rather than the title. Person names with first name initials, e.g., A. L. Parker, are sorted before those with full first names, e.g., Agnes McCall Parker. Individual person names are sorted prior to the names of companies. For example, Albert Cadien Parker, Albert E. Parker, and so on up to Willard Parker and Wylie Apton Parker are sorted together in the drawer labeled “PARKE-PARKER_Z” prior to Parker & Burton, Parker & Hinkley, Parker Brothers Inc., and so on, in the subsequent drawer labeled “PARKER_A-PARKYN”. However, there are exceptions; for example, a card for “Arthur L. Parker” appears along with the company names.

1899 Copyright Card As Used in 1899 (at least)

Copyright Card As Used in 1900 (at least)

Note the inclusion of “Class A” on the card. Classes were introduced in 1900. [Add link to article on copyright class categorization.]

Copyright Card As Used from 1901 to 1904 (at least)

Copyright Card As Used in 1907 to 1908 (at least)

Copyright Form A1 As Used in 1910 to 1911 (at least)

Starting with this form, copyright registrations were submitted by the claimant to the Copyright Office using copyright Form A1 (for new works) or Form A2 (for revised or republished works). These forms evolved from year to year, as shown and described in the sections below.

On this form, the top part (above the double lines) was reserved for use by the Copyright Office. The remainder of the form (both sides) was prepared by the copyright claimant or an agent/representative of the claimant, or the publisher (also termed a “printer”).

Note that a vast majority of game rules or instructions were produced in the form of sheets of paper or leaflets; these were categorized as books in the copyright system.

Copyright Form A1 Used in 1911 to 1912 (at least)

On this version of the form, the section reserved for use by the Copyright Office appears below the fold in the center. These forms were folded in half and then punched with a hole for placement in a card catalog drawer; a long metal rod goes through all of the holes to keep the card secure within the drawer.

Note the struck-out text where the form asks to “State whether native born or naturalized citizen, or permanent resident of the United States:”.

Each copyright application was required to be accompanied 2 best copies of the actual work as a mandatory deposit; these copies were not necessarily required to be submitted at the same time as the application, but shortly thereafter. Typically, mandatory deposit books were incorporated into the collections of the Library of Congress. However, the Copyright Office typically did not retain deposited copies of game rules and instructions; in early years such as on this card, the copies were returned to the claimant, as indicated by the ink-stamped notation at lower right: “Copies Returned SEP 10 1912 Bk. D. 14 P. 320”.

As noted in the description of side 1 of Form A1, each card was folded in half, a hole punched through it, and the card was inserted into a card catalog drawer and held in place with a metal rod.

Given that the card was folded in half, card catalog users were not able to view side 2 of the card when secured in the drawer with a metal rod. Only Copyright Office personnel were permitted to remove such cards to view both sides.

March 1920 Edition of Copyright Form A1

February 1922 Edition of Copyright Form A1

February 1923 Copyright Form A1

July 1926 Copyright Form A1

July 1927 Copyright Form A1

January 1928 Edition of Copyright Form A1

July 1928 Edition of Copyright Form A1

July 1929 Edition of Copyright Form A1

July 1930 Edition of Copyright Form A1

July 1930 Edition of Copyright Form A2 (Reissued Works)

July 1931 Edition of Copyright Form A1

July 1933 Edition of Copyright Form A1

July 1934 Edition of Copyright Form A1

July 1935 Edition of Copyright Form A1

August 1936 Edition of Copyright Form A1

Reference Card, Unknown Date

Copyright Form A2

(Used if “the work is a new edition or republished”.)

Finding Game Copyrights

“Directions for …”

“Rules for playing the game of…”

“Instructions for …”

“Game of …”

“…” “rules”

Size of Work

On this card, the notation “8°” identifies the size of the item (in this case, a book), namely, an octavo, which can vary in size but is generally 6 inches wide by 9 inches tall. (Reference)

The abbreviation “pp.” stands for “pages”.

Notes to Organize

“unp.” stands for “unpublished”.

“fo.” stands for “folio”, a book size.

4to: quarto, a book size.

8vo: octavo, a book size.

illus.: illustrated

obl.: oblong – https://cdn.loc.gov/service/copyright/hprcatcard/18/98/19/37/MA/CL/EL/-M/AC/LU/RE/18981937MACLEL-MACLURE/CC18981937MACLEL-MACLURE.0419.jpg

“SEE DOUBTFUL FILE” stamp (on Sky, the aviator’s game https://cdn.loc.gov/service/copyright/hprcatcard/18/98/19/37/PA/RK/ER/_A/-P/AR/KY/N/18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN/CC18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN.0124a.jpg) https://cdn.loc.gov/service/copyright/hprcatcard/18/98/19/37/PA/RK/ER/_A/-P/AR/KY/N/18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN/CC18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN.0201a.jpg

“Card made by H. B. H.” stamp (on same)

“Return Copies To Claimant” stamp (on same)

“Copies Returned” / “MON ## ####” / “Bk. D. _____ P. _____” (on same)

“EX. E. L. W.” on multiple cards including https://cdn.loc.gov/service/copyright/hprcatcard/18/98/19/37/PA/RK/ER/_A/-P/AR/KY/N/18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN/CC18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN.0127a.jpg

“* See I.C. file.” typewritten on card – https://cdn.loc.gov/service/copyright/hprcatcard/18/98/19/37/PA/RK/ER/_A/-P/AR/KY/N/18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN/CC18981937PARKER_A-PARKYN.0218a.jpg

“6 Point” stamp: https://cdn.loc.gov/service/copyright/hprcatcard/18/98/19/37/MA/CL/EL/-M/AC/LU/RE/18981937MACLEL-MACLURE/CC18981937MACLEL-MACLURE.0800.jpg