Chapter 1: The Legacy of Paul Otlet

In March 2012, Google entered into a partnership with the Mundaneum, a museum located in Mons, Belgium. This partnership significantly revived interest in Paul Otlet, often recognized as a foundational figure in the development of the Internet.

Paul Marie Ghislain Otlet (1868–1944) was a Belgian lawyer and bibliographer, celebrated for his contributions to modern information science. Over nearly five decades, he devoted himself to compiling a comprehensive bibliography, amassing an astonishing 15 million entries, including books, magazines, newspapers, photographs, and more. His influential texts, "Traité de Documentation" (1934) and "Monde: Essai d’universalisme" (1935), detail his philosophies on information organization.

Otlet's vision extended to the collection and categorization of universal knowledge. He developed the Universal Decimal Classification system to systematically arrange information and established the "Repertoire Bibliographique Universel" (Universal Bibliographic Repertory), which served as an information retrieval framework utilized by libraries worldwide until the advent of Online Public Access Catalogs (OPAC).

In his pursuit of universal access to information, Otlet believed that such accessibility could foster amicable relations among countries and pave the way for global peace. He and his colleague, Henri La Fontaine, also a Belgian lawyer, engaged with the League of Nations (the precursor to the United Nations) and the International Institute of Intellectual Cooperation, which eventually evolved into UNESCO. La Fontaine was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1913.

In 1895, Otlet and La Fontaine initiated a project to create a repository for their documentation work, envisioning a "Palais Mondial" to be situated within the Palais du Cinquantenaire, a notable government building in Brussels. Although architect Le Corbusier was initially commissioned to design a Mundaneum building in Geneva, the project ultimately remained unrealized.

The Mundaneum was officially opened in 1920 at the Palais Mondial, serving not only as a hub for information retrieval but also as a beacon for cultivating a culture of peace and understanding globally. Aspiring to catalog every published book, the Mundaneum housed over 15 million bibliographic cards organized using the Universal Decimal Classification system, alongside magazine articles, photographs, and more.

Otlet initially envisioned a research service where inquiries could be sent via telegraph to the Mundaneum. However, the sheer volume of materials made them challenging to reproduce or lend out. He later proposed employing micro-photography to archive bibliographic data on microfilms.

In 1940, during the German occupation of Belgium, Paul Otlet encountered Hugo Kruss, the former head of the Prussian State Library. Kruss, part of a Nazi cultural task force tasked with seizing valuable artworks and books, dismissed Otlet's collection as mere clutter, despite recognizing the utility of the card catalog system. Otlet urged Kruss to preserve the collection, but soon after, German soldiers evacuated the Palais Mondial, destroying approximately sixty tons of material.

Following this, Otlet relocated the remainder of his collection and continued to quietly work towards restoring it, all while further developing his concept of a global information network. Unfortunately, he became increasingly isolated, passing away in December 1944 shortly after Brussels was liberated.

For years, Otlet's collection lay scattered across Brussels. As Belgium struggled to recover from the war, his contributions faded from memory, save for the efforts of the "Amis du Palais Mondial," a group of volunteers dedicated to preserving his legacy. In 1967, Australian student Boyd Rayward became intrigued by Otlet's work and began to investigate the remnants of the collection, leading to his doctoral dissertation, "The Universe of Information: The Work of Paul Otlet for Documentation and International Organization," and a biography that sparked renewed interest in Otlet's contributions.

By the mid-1980s, Belgian scholar André Canonne launched a campaign to restore the Mundaneum. In 1998, the new Mundaneum, dubbed "The Web Time Forgot" by the New York Times and "Paper Google" by Le Monde, was inaugurated in its current location—a renovated department store in Mons, Belgium.

Chapter 2: The Mundaneum Today

For additional insights, refer to:

• The origins of the Internet in Europe: Collecting, indexing & sharing knowledge
• Art or Archive? The Mundaneum’s photographic heritage put to the test of time
• Mundaneum Streetview