019 OCLC Control Number Cross Reference

The 019 tag contains the OCLC control number of duplicate records that have been merged and deleted from OCLC WorldCat by the "Duplicate Detection and Resolution process" or by OCLC staff. This can be useful to libraries because it allows an OCLC record to be found that has replaced one you may have in your catalog. It also serves as a way to know if a record you have in your catalog should be replaced by a newer one.

For example, The American Passport: Its History and a Digest of Laws, Rulings and Regulations Governing its Issuance was published by the US Department of State in 1898. Since it was added to the OCLC database it has previously had five different records. We can tell this because the current record (which is in the NHSL online catalog) has this tag in it:

019 _ _  ǂa 962538234 ǂa 1000947316 ǂa 1081115801 ǂa 1085915900 ǂa 1248041585

This tag has no defined indicators and contains only subfield a which is repeatable as many times as needed in the single 019 tag allowed in a record. 

This tag is specific to OCLC (but is part of NHAIS records because we get them from OCLC) and is not defined in MARC21. The differences in documentation were covered in the Introductory post for this series.

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Since this is the last Tuesday of the month it is time for the January 2024 Tuesday Tags Review Quiz. 

This is a 5-question self-check that will give you a chance to see how much you have learned about MARC tags this month (or where you may want to go back and re-read).