Volume 11, Number 3
Apr 1987

News

Where Is Teleprint?

Teleprint, a company that provided mail-order photocopies of out-of-print books, seems to have disappeared. Both telephone numbers have been disconnected; the telephone company does not have any number for Lincoln Gray or the company in Charlottesville, Virginia, and nail is returned W the post office as unforwardable. The Editor has sent a letter of inquiry to the office in Richmond that registers corporations in the state, but no reply has been received yet.

Other companies providing the same or a similar service are: LBS/Archival Products, P.O. Box 1413, Des Moines, IA (1-800-247-5323); and Binding Unlimited, 2730 Alpha St., Lansing, Ml 48910.

Half-Price Lodging For AIC Convention

Pacific Bed and Breakfast is a reservation service for bed and breakfast places in the Northwest. It even acts as an agent for bed and breakfast places in Vancouver, which is in Canada. Rates for single rooms start at $25 per person, American, and range up to $49. At least one of the guest-hones and inns on their list is within five blocks of the AIC convention hotel. PBB's telephone number is 206/784-0539. Other reservation services, 170 of then across the United states, are listed in a directory that can be had for $3.00 from Sweet Dreams & Toast, Inc., P.O. Box 4835-0035, Washington, DC 20008. The directory is scheduled for updating about June 15.

Address For Mid-Atlantic Preservation Service (Maps)

MAPS was described on p. 33 of the March issue, but its address was not given. That address is: MAPS, Lehigh University, #8A, Bethlehem, PA 18015 (215/758-5076). MAPS is headed by Lee Jones at present.

Students Selected For U.T. Institute

The Institute of Fine Binding and Book Conservation at the University of Texas has chosen the students for this year's classes. The May-June session, devoted to fine bookbinding, will be taught by James Brockman, president of Designer Bookbinders (until May 1987). Attending will be:

Carolina A. Veenstra
Martha Little
Ann Repp
Paula Marie Gourley
Don Sanders
Bob Inge
Priscilla A. Spitler
Nora Ligorano
Mary Baughman

The July-August session, on book conservation, will be taught by Anthony Cains, director of the conservation workshop of the Trinity College Library, University of Dublin. Attending will be:

Gary Frost
Martha Little
Maria Fredericks
Glen Fukunaga
Laura Wait
Pan Spitzmueller
Nora Ligorano
Eleanore Stewart

What Happens To All The Conservation Treatment Reports?

A year or two ago in the AIC Newsletter there was a brief exchange of letters, reporting difficulties in locating records of conservation work done earlier on certain works of art. If the reports were given to the customer, they were likely to be lost, or not sold with the work of art; if retained by the conservator, they were likely to be lost when the conservator died, sold his or her business, or retired. Yet they are important, theoretically at least. The AIC's Cede of Ethics stresses keeping of good treatment proposals and reports, and no one can become a Fellow of AIC without submitting sample reports for evaluation.

As a way of tackling this problem, the American Institute for Conservation has obtained a matching grant of $7,327 from the NHPRC for a feasibility study to determine the most appropriate approach to the archival preservation of conservation treatment records in the United States.

Perhaps a central repository will be the answer.

IADA Board Meets

The board of directors of IADA (independent counterpart of the Book and Paper Group of AIC) met in Tübingen in October. They anticipate a 30th anniversary celebration for the organization at the Sixth International Graphic Restoration Day next October, and strongly urged, as they have urged before, that means of communication among members be established so that members can receive information while it is fresh and have a forum for themselves. (Imagine going 30 years without a newsletter!)

IADA is one of four German professional organizations for conservators, and presumably the only one for book and paper conservators. The IADA directors considered a plan to form an umbrella organization for all four organizations. This organization could represent all professional conservators, set standards, and deal with questions of professional training, something like AIC does. They agreed that training should consist of a three-year program with an 18-month internship and a half-year period for writing a thesis and preparing for exams. They will examine the experiences of such programs in Denmark, Holland and Austria.

Finally, the directors resolved to become more active on the international scene and possibly even join ICCROM, ICOM IFLA IIC and IPC. (They apparently did not consider joining AIC).

(One of the four professional organizations in Germany is the Deutschen Verband freiberuflicher Restauratoren, the German equivalent of AIC' s Conservators in Private Practice.)

Checking Up On Suppliers Of Acid-Free Materials

Library Hotline, which does not normally carry news on preservation, reported in its January 12, 1987, issue that bookplates, folders and other paper-based materials sold as acid-free or "non-acidic" turned out to be acidic when tested with Merck pH indicator strips. That report was based on a University of Iowa report; in turn, it was reported in The Deckled Edge (Baltimore Area Conservation Group) for Spring, where the Editor found it. Since the issue seems to have caught everyone's attention, perhaps this is a good time to remind everyone that the best ways to measure pH are the pH meter, the cold extraction test (for paper on the alkaline side) and the hot extraction test. Spot tests and indicator strips do little more than tell you what ball park you are in.

On the other hand, the findings reported may be reflecting a deceptive practice of paper marketers that has been too widespread for too long, namely, to call something "acid-free" if its pH is 6.0 or higher, instead of 7.0. Anything below pH 7.0 is acidic, no matter what the catalog says.

Insect Pest Identification Service

When safer, more specific methods of control of insect pests has replaced use of broad-spectrum poison sprays, it becomes necessary to identify the species causing the infestation before anything is done about it. The Getty Conservation Institute is providing identification services free of charge, with the aid of a reference collection assembled for it by Canton Koehler, an entomologist at U.C. Berkeley. It contains adults, immature insects and frass of common insect pests. Send pest sample to Jim Druzik for initial identification and processing, at the Getty Conservation Institute, 4503 Glencoe Ave., Marina del Rey, CA 90292-6537. If possible, it should be in a vial of alcohol and intact: little features like length of antennae are sometimes the key to identification. Specimens cannot be returned.

Airdex Address Changes

The address given on p. 70 of last October's issue had the street address wrong, and they have also changed their suite. The correct address is: Airdex Corporation, 2700 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 1770, P.O. Box 460088, Houston, TX 77056 (713/963-8600). President Don R. Hartsell said in a recent letter that the cost of drying books in place on the shelves using Airdex's dehumidification method can be as little as 1/6 the cost of removing, freezing, drying, restoring and reshelving than,