Henry E. Bliss

Who was Henry E. Bliss?

Henry Evelyn Bliss was the author of a classification system he called Bibliographic Classification which is often abbreviated to BC and is sometimes called Bliss Classification. He was named one of the 100 most important leaders in the field of library and Information science in the 20th century by American Libraries in December 1999, which praised his “subject approach to information” as “one of the most flexible ever conceived.” Despite these praises, Bliss was “met with apathy and even derision in his efforts” during his lifetime. His classification system was generally disregarded in favor of other more established classification systems such as the decimal classification created by Melvil Dewey and the Library of Congress classification system, causing “more than one author” to label him as a, “prophet without honor.” Although Bliss was an American, his system was more popular in British libraries than in American libraries. A second edition of the system has been developed in the United Kingdom in 1977. Several volumes have been published.