October 1999
Newsletter #33
 

Library Begins Off-Campus
Storage

The Humanities Go Online

Finding the Right Index

Library Research Guides
Now on the Web

Literature Online

Videotapes Now Circulate

Deacidification Stops
Damage to Books

Library Databases available
Off Campus

Student and Faculty
Technology Guides Available
 

The Library has begun to deacidify or otherwise restore significant books published during the “acidic age,” the period from about 1860 to 1990 when the paper manufacturing process left paper-destroying acids in the paper of printed books. Deacidification is one of several techniques used to preserve important resources for future generations of scholars and students.

An examination of the Library’s collections in 1995 found that fully 80% of the books were published during the “acidic age.” All of these books, even if they do not currently show the symptoms, are potential victims of embrittlement as light, heat, and moisture combine to activate the acidic deposits. In addition, the Library’s emphasis on collecting materials from around the globe requires that we acquire books from countries in which acid-free, “long-life” paper is uncommon.

To preserve these at-risk materials, volumes with enough flexibility and paper strength are chemically treated to remove the components of further acid formation. No harmful chemical residues remain in the paper. This deacidification process cannot restore strength or flexibility to deteriorated paper, but it will halt further damage, thus extending the life of the treated volumes.

In Spring 1999, the Library selected books for treatment by consulting authoritative subject bibliographies, testing the acid level of all books in selected class numbers, and identifying unusually constructed or formatted volumes to demonstrate that books throughout the collection will benefit from deacidification. Among the interesting results of the selection process was the discovery that not necessarily all of the volumes within a collection of a given author’s works were published on acidic paper. For instance, the early volumes of the Thomas Jefferson and James Madison papers were published on acidic paper, while later volumes adopted the acid-free paper first available in the late 1970s. After the deacidification process, the early volumes should last as long as those originally printed on acid-free paper.

[PICTURE OF SUE MARTIN AND DICK ROSS in paragraph above]

[PICTURE CAPTION: Susan Martin, University Librarian, reviews books selected for deacidification with Richard Ross, Assistant University Librarian for Collections Management.]

Fifteen hundred volumes have been treated thus far. A little white dot above the call number label marks books that have been either treated or tested as non-acidic. A label inside the front cover marks those that have been treated. Without such marking, treated and untreated volumes appear the same to the user.