60 years ago in March, 1952, the Policy and Personnel Committee of the London Public Library Board made the following recommendation:

that commissionaries be appointed and installed at a desk in the main lobby [of the Central Library]:

a.  to check all outgoing books, films, parcels, pictures. records, etc, to avoid losses and borrowing books without charging them [out]

b.  to act as building directors

c.  to check on undesirable transients in lobby and library divisions

d.  to check bags, parcels, etc.