This volume is a joint effort of the Research Materials Information Center (RMIC) of the Solid State Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Libraries and Information Systems Center at Bell Telephone Laboratories (BTL) Murray Hill, N. J. The Research Materials Information Center has, since 1963, been answering inquiries on the avail ability, preparation, and properties of inorganic solid-state research materials. The preparation of bibliographies has been essential to this function, and the interest in ferroelectrics led to the compila tion of the journal and report literature on that subject. The 1962 book Ferroelectric Crystals, by Jona and Shirane, was taken as a cutoff point, and all papers through mid-1969 received by the Center have been included. The Libraries and Information Systems Center of BTL has, over a period of years, developed a proprie tary package of computer programs called BELDEX, which formats and generates indexes to biblio graphic material. This group therefore undertook to process RMIC's ferroelectric references by BELDEX so that both laboratories could have the benefit of an indexed basic bibliography in this important research area.
