Preservation of clippings

Linda Most <most [at] kravis__org> writes

>I have in my collection ten storage boxes of newspaper press
>clippings which date back to the mid 1980s.  Some are mounted on
>bond paper using various types of clear tape and some are filed as
>clipped.  We have made the management decision to begin immediate
>preservation photocopying of this collection and will probably scan
>the copies into digital storage in the near future, but there is a
>part of me that hesitates to discard the originals, brittle and
>yellow as some are becoming.

Linda's query has already evoked excellent responses. I will only
add a non-archivist note: "in the future" when digital access
distinguishes the service of archives the definition of the
custodial institution may include the possession of the source
original. Realizing that clipping files invite discard even extends
the implication of this consideration. If valid, the concept of a
continuing role for the source original, almost, even, reintroduces
preservation concepts such as "deacidification".

Gary Frost
Library Conservator
BookLab, Inc.
Austin, Texas

                                  ***
                  Conservation DistList Instance 12:50
                 Distributed: Tuesday, December 8, 1998
                       Message Id: cdl-12-50-015
                                  ***