Reading Roundup

I'm starting a recurring blog post called "Reading Roundup" to share some reading that you may find interesting. These links will be at least tangentially related to books, preservation, conservation and libraries. Here is the first installment. Enjoy!

The Devil's Tale "Celebrates Banned Book Week." Share your banned book story with them.

The Chronicle of Higher Education asks whether digitized books "feel like a library" in "Digitizing The Personal Library."

Also in The Chronicle of Higher Education, "What Are Books Good For" questions when books became the enemy.

In The Library With A Lead Pipe (one of my favorite library blogs) ponders how to collect meaningful data about our instruction efforts in their post "Articulating Value in Special Collections."

Parks Library Preservation at Iowa State has a nicely written ode to Carolyn Harris and Paul Banks, leaders in our field. Read "Thank you Paul and Carolyn, et al," Then tell your favorite teacher or mentor how much they mean to you.

And finally over on Work of the Hand , our former staff member and student, Henry Hebert, is blogging about what he is learning in the book binding program at the North Bennett Street School this semester.

Image from Duke University Libraries Ad Access, click on image for details.

Word Cloud: 2010 Conservation Program Report

binding book cases collections committee completed conservation created damaged database department digital documentation duke erin exhibit general goals handling head hours imaging improve lab level libraries map mary materials meg member perkins posts preservation process rbmscl repairs request scrolls services special staff ten things training transfer transition treatments work years

created at TagCrowd.com

It's Better Than Christmas!

I love the new fiscal year, it's like Christmas in July or September. We got our yearly order of pamphlet binders this week. What do two tons of binders look like? Like a big ol' pile of presents waiting to be unwrapped.

My fabulous student Anne unpacked and inventoried these in about two hours. Our shelves are fully stocked with brand new, shiny binders which means we can now get back to the business of preparing pamphlets for the shelf. Yippeee!

Yes, I'm irrationally exuberant about supplies. I'm the same way with paste recipes and statistics, just ask anyone in the lab.

Where Art and Libraries Meet

I had the good fortune to again be called upon to help the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University install some books for their new exhibit "The Vorticists: Rebel Artists in London and New York, 1914-18". The show opens on September 30, 2010, and runs through January 2, 2011.

Artwork from several institutions will be on display including some from the Manchester City Galleries. I got to meet and work with Sarah Rainbow, Collection Care Officer, who was there to oversee the installation of their artwork and that of the Victoria and Albert Museum. We conservators love to talk shop, and I really enjoyed talking with Sarah about her job. Of course, working with everyone at the Nasher is always fun, and this is going to be a really wonderful exhibit. I encourage you all to see it when it opens.

I had a few minutes after I was finished to see the current exhibits on display. "The Record: Contemporary Art and Vinyl" is a must-see (through February 6th, 2011). There is a combination of artwork that uses actual vinyl as part of the artwork, or uses the form of the discs or sleeves as inspiration. Some of the sculpture was fun, and there is mixed media, paintings, and video installations.

What most piqued my interest was the wall of records that you could choose and play yourself. What a great way to bring interactivity to your exhibit. I wonder if we could do something similar with our exhibits. Has anyone experimented with including interactivity with library exhibits in this way, beyond the guest/comment book? Let us know, we would love to hear about it.

Banks/Harris Award Nominations Sought

Nominations are being accepted for the 2011 Association for Library Collections & Technical Services (ALCTS) Paul Banks and Carolyn Harris Preservation Award. The deadline for nominations is December 1, 2010.

Banks/Harris Preservation Award:

The award was established to honor the memory of Paul Banks and Carolyn Harris, early leaders in library preservation. The award, $1,500 and a citation, sponsored by Preservation Technologies, L.P., is given to a professional preservation specialist who has been active in the field of preservation and/or conservation for library and/or archival materials. Winners will be chosen based on: leadership in professional associations at local, state, regional or national levels; contributions to the development, application or utilization of new or improved methods, techniques and routines; significant contribution to professional literature; evidence of studies or research in preservation; and training and mentoring in the field of preservation.

Send nominations, a formal statement of nomination that provides a strong rationale for the nomination by addressing how the nominee meets the criteria for the award, letters of support for the nomination and a complete resume for the nominee to:

Hilary Seo, chair, Banks/Harris Jury

Iowa State University

441 Parks Library

Ames, IA 50011-2140

hseo@iastate.edu

For more information about the award and past recipients visit the Banks Harris page.

Further questions about the award are welcome and may be directed to any of the committee members:

Beth Doyle, b.doyle@duke.edu

Jake Nadal, jnadal@library.ucla.edu

Lene Palmer, lenep@gmu.edu

Hilary Seo, hseo@iastate.edu

Peter D. Verheyen, pdverhey@syr.edu

Saving Serials

The Head of Acquisitions brought these over after they discovered the books were damaged during shipping. According to her, these would be very difficult to replace so she wanted us to save them if we could. As you can see, these got pretty squished, and the black smudge indicates maybe they got caught in some mechanical thing. They were very bent and had a lot of little page tears.


I put them in the press for a very long time, giving the pages the opportunity to flatten out and stay that way. Then, as any good manager will do, I delegated the treatment to Mary, my talented Senior Conservation Technician.

It took a lot of work and patience, but she fixed all the tears in the text blocks. She also saved the decorative covers and overlaid them onto new boards. If you look closely you can tell something happened to them, but they look so much better than they did when they came in.

TRLN Bookbinders: Paper Case Binding

Our group has been studying paper case bindings. These come in a remarkable array of styles and were popular in the 18th Century. They are very close in structure to limp vellum bindings which date back to the 14th Century. They are fast to make and depending on the paper you use for the cover they can be a cheap but very durable binding.

We found a great array of samples from our collections to study. What I am realizing as we study these historic structures is that binders of all centuries seem to make it up as they go along. There are the canonical exemplars, the forms that have survived and were popular in their day, but the details show us that every binder did things a little differently. There is no one way to make a paper case, in fact there are several. You can lace the supports in or not, you can adhere the paste downs or not, you can adhere the turn ins or make yapps. Or not.

Likely this is due to the availability of materials, the popular methods of the day and who taught you. Judging from my own work, I also suspect there are so many variants because you make mistakes and need to fix them. Along the way you discover a better or quicker way to do things then adopt those "fixes" and pass them on. I like knowing that I'm just one in a long line of binders that never do things quite the same way twice.