Volume 11, Number 8
Dec 1987

Events in the News

• In their November 11, a "Do and Tell" meeting with demonstrations of techniques and equipment, members of the Hand Bookbinders of California saw demonstrations of leather paring machines, conservation boxes, sewing without a frame, mitered corners and knives.
• "Slow Fires: On the Preservation of the Human Record," an award-winning hour-long film about the continuing loss of the world' s printed heritage through the deterioration of paper, will be released in December. Viewers in New York City will see it first over WNET at 10 pm Thursday December 10, and the rest of the country will see it at 10 pm (e.s.t.) Friday December 11. It is likely to be reshown, or shown starting Saturday or Sunday, by some local stations; consult your local TV listings. This is the same fin that is available for purchase in both a short and a long version, on videotape of film from the American Film Foundation (July issue, p. 85).
• In 1988, an Agreement on Cooperation in Library Affairs sponsored by the American Council of Learned Societies will provide for Soviet-American cooperation on preservation. There will be a seminar in the U.S. on "exploring access to library resources through technology and preservation" and an exchange of conservators. James H. Billington, the new Librarian of Congress, helped negotiate this agreement.
• At the Midwinter Meeting of the American Library Association, the Curators and Conservators Discussion Group (of the Rare Book & Manuscripts Section) will discuss collation methods used by conservators and try to come up with a collation formula they can recommended for general use. Conservators and anyone else who is interested may come; contact Cathy Henderson, HRHRC PO Box 7219, University of Texas, Austin, TX 78713. The meeting will be sometime between January 9 and 14.
• Betty Lou Chaika will continue teaching bookbinding (adhesive and nonadhesive structures) and decorative paper-making in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, her new home. The first series of lessons starts January 27 and the second February 24, sponsored by the Artschool at Culbreth School. Contact her at 280 Hillside Drive, Chapel Hill, NC 27514, 919/929-0753.
• A long symposium on preservation in museums, February 15 through March 19, will be held in Canyon, Texas, as part of a national program described on pp. 18 and 50 of this Newsletter last year. They don't call it preservation, perhaps because they don't want to be confused with the preservation of historical buildings. It is called "Collections Care in History Museums." Scholarships are available. Contact Collections Care Program, Texas Conservation Center, P.O. Box 967, W.T. Station, Canyon, TX 79016.
• Next July the Institute of Archaeology at the University of London will again give a series of intensive short courses (usually five days) on conservation. Of the 35 or so courses, those of possible interest to book and paper conservators are: Conservation of Photographic Material, Conservation of Leather and Hide, Pigments and Media, Textiles Conservation, Identification of Fibers, and Conservation of Archival and Library Material. Write Summer Schools, Institute of Archaeology, 31-34 Gordon Square, London, WC1H 0PY, England.
• The International Congress on Archives will take place in Paris, France, on August 22-26, and will focus on conservation of non-paper records: microfilm, optical discs and electronic records. One of the papers will be on the special problems in tropical countries, by Eric Turner of Sierra Leone. Write Monsieur le Directeur du XIe Congrès International des Archives, 60, rue des Francs-Bourgeois, F 75141 Paris, Cedex 03, France.
• TAPPI will have a Paper Preservation Symposium October 19-21 in Washington, DC, which will focus on the application of paper sciences and technologies to the management and administration of archive, library, and museum collections. Speakers will be members of Congress & engineers and scientists who plan and manage the papermaking and graphic arts industries. The symposium is being given for "planners and decision-makers, particularly archivists, binders, conservators, engineers, librarians, printers, publishers, and scientists involved in production, dissemination, use, storage, or preservation of books, records, works of arts, and other cultural materials on paper." Contact Wayne Gross, Conference Coordinator, TAPPI, 15 Technology Park, P0 Box 105113, Atlanta, CA 30348, 404/446-1400. The information sheet does not give the registration fee. TAPPI is the Technical Association of the Pulp and Paper Industry.