Tag Archives: movediary

Move Diary: Week 6

Dear readers, take note: it’s now the end of Week Five of the move, and we’re pretty sure we’re all going to have massive and amazing biceps come Winter Break.

This is because our manuscript collections are taking up residence in our new compact shelving. This kind of shelving moves on rails, so the shelves can slide together (in a safe and controlled way) or be cranked apart to access the shelves’ contents.  Here’s a video of Kat Stefko, our Head of Technical Services, demonstrating how they work.

So we’ll be cranking these shelves, filled with boxes of manuscripts, open and closed several times each day, to retrieve materials for patrons, to find materials to answer reference questions, to reshelve things, to pull materials for class visits . . . .

We hereby promise that we will not challenge any visiting researchers to arm wrestle. Unless they want to.

Onto other things! We have—and we really can’t believe this—ONE WEEK until we reopen. Over the course of the week, several things have been checked off the reopening “to do” list, and many more are on their way to being completed.

Our talented exhibits staff worked on the installation of one of our opening exhibits, “Languages of Anatomy: From Vesalius to the Digital Age,” which will be on display in the Chappell Family Gallery and features materials from our History of Medicine Collections.

Photo by Amy McDonald.

Display case showing 3-D printed prosthetic hand made by DukeMakers.
Display case showing 3-D printed prosthetic hand made by DukeMakers. Photo by Amy McDonald.

Books were returned to the refurbished bookcases in the beloved Biddle Rare Book Room.

Books being shelved in the Biddle Rare Book Room.
Photo by Amy McDonald.

And we finished moving our flat files (an enormous amount of work) and started moving historical medical instruments from the History of Medicine Collections, as well as our early manuscripts.

Moving HOM's medical instruments.
Moving HOM’s medical instruments. Photo by Rachel Ingold.

 

Moving HOM's medical instruments.
Moving HOM’s medical instruments. Photo by Rachel Ingold.

In the photo above, the long box at the right holds HOM’s late 16th or 17th century amputating saw. Here’s what it looks like out of the box, in case you’re curious:

Amputating saw from the History of Medicine Collections.

What else did we do? We practiced our teamwork by forming a bucket brigade to shelve manuscript collections.

University Archives staff bucket brigade!
University Archives staff bucket brigade! Photo by Amy McDonald.

We discovered, to our dismay, that we are not the most interesting people in the Rubenstein.

The Most Interesting Man in the Rubenstein
He is SO INTERESTING. Photo by Tracy Jackson.

And we found new challenges to test our librarian skills. This one is called “can we get all of the foam book rests to the new reading room in one trip?” (We did.)

Moving book rests.
Photo by Amy McDonald.

Look at these empty stacks in our temporary 3rd floor space! August 24th, here we come!

Empty stacks YAY!
Photo by Meghan Lyon.

 

Move Diary: Week 5

Week 5 feels  like it’s been a big one. The stacks are filling up with manuscript boxes and books and feel less cavernous and more cozy. By the numbers it’s been a big week too.  On Tuesday we hit an important milestone: 10,000 manuscript boxes landed in their new homes in the stacks.  It’s been a good week for our books too.  We’ve moved, Library of Congress-ified, and shelved nearly all 4,000 of our folios and all 20,000 duodecimos; octavos and quartos are next on our list.  Some new formats started moving this week as well: 100 drawers worth of oversize flat files moved and about half or our papyrus collection made the journey too.

We also want to invite everyone to our open house on September 10th!  You’ll have a chance to tour the new spaces and exhibits, meet and mingle with library staff, and learnhow the Rubenstein Library can support your research.  Check out the details here.

 

Archival collections back from offsite and awaiting their new homes. Photo by Tracy Jackson.
Photo by Meghan Lyon
Photo by Meghan Lyon
Sums up the Rubenstein move pretty well. Photo by Meghan Lyon.
Sums up the Rubenstein move pretty well. Photo by Meghan Lyon.
New exhibit on Duke University history!
New exhibit on Duke University history!
Exhibit cases have been installed in the Rare Book Room.
Exhibit cases have been installed in the Rare Book Room.
Henry's been on the job in Conservation Services for five days and he is already on Rubenstein Library move duty. Here is he helping move the papyri.
Henry’s been on the job in Conservation Services for five days and he is already on Rubenstein Library move duty. Here is he helping move the papyri.
gym 1 - kelly
From The Book of the Home. Photo by Kelly Wooten.
Some of those big flat files. Photo by Meghan Lyon.
Some of those big flat files. Photo by Meghan Lyon.
Inlaid leather cover on Slapstick and Dumbbell : a Casual Survey of Clowns and Clowning.
Inlaid leather cover on Slapstick and Dumbbell : A Casual Survey of Clowns and Clowning.

‘Til next week!

Move Diary: Week 2

Week 2 is wrapping up and we are all counting down to our first (but definitely not last) Rubenstein Move Happy Hour this evening!

What have we been up to this week? Well . . . .

First things first, literally. Here’s a video of Kat Stefko, Head of Technical Services, placing the very first archival box in our new stacks.

The shelves have started to fill up pretty quickly over the course of the week. And then it’s Technical Services’s turn to update the location information in our catalog.

Updating. And more updating.
Photo by Tracy Jackson.

We have found a couple of ways to keep ourselves motivated.

NUMBER ONE: So. Much. Candy.

So. Much. Candy.
Photo by Megan O’Connell.

Of course, we wash our hands carefully before we handle books or archival materials.

NUMBER TWO: Pieces of flair for our move aprons.

Move apron flair
Photo by Matthew Farrell.

Made with the Duke Libraries’ very own button maker! (And thanks to our student worker Elizabeth George for making these excellent buttons!)

Our move brain trust, led by indefatigable move coordinator Liz Adams, keeps us all on task.

Move Brain Trust
Photo by Amy McDonald.

Nooooooo, bad shark! Don’t eat the rare books!

Book Truck Shark
Photo by Meghan Lyon.

Seriously, this place is pretty cool and shiny. We can’t wait for everyone to come and visit in August!

Stacks as far as the eye can see....

Stop back next Friday for more photos!

Move Diary: Week 1

We made it through week 1! Here are some sights spotted by our staff as we got down to work:

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The first truck of books returning home from offsite storage. We brought 9800 print items back this week.
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Our old now empty hold shelves. We miss our researchers and can’t wait to see them again in August in our new space.
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One of our archivists, spotted through a tunnel of new compact shelving.
more-walkie-talkies-amy
Bevy of walkie-talkies. 10-4.
move-whisperer-amy
Our move coordinator/book cart whisperer channels Chris Pratt. We’re glad they’re just book trucks and not velociraptors.
frost-move-cart-paula
A little Robert Frost on the book trucks.
flagged-boxes-amy
Color coded boxes, ready to move.
rachel-removisng-stickers-liz
No detail is too small as labels were peeled off our new shelving and replaced with stickier ones.
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With new super-sticky stickers, we labeled roughly 1000 bays on three different levels in the new space, ensuring every box will have a clearly labeled place to live.
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Someone had a little fun with the (admittedly Carolina Blue) protective film on our new elevator.

 

The Great Art Move, or, How Few Can Really Be More

This week marked the final chapter of the Rubenstein Library relocation project of 2013, when the Library’s portrait collection was relocated from the Gothic Reading Room to the Rubenstein Library’s temporary space on the third floor of Perkins.   It was a poignant and, at moments, spirited end to a process that began many months ago.

GothicBlog

The portrait collection has been with the Gothic since the very beginning. Upon the library’s opening in 1930, the well-known artist Douglas Chandor was commissioned to paint portraits of The Duke Endowment trustees, Mary Duke Biddle and Nanaline Duke, and the architect and builder of the campus, Horace Trumbauer. These portraits were completed between 1930 and 1932 and hung in the Gothic, then functioning as the library’s general reference room.  Over the years, portraits of the University’s founders and presidents were added, along with those of other notable figures in the University’s history.  By the time of our move, 32 auspicious figures awaited the careful attention of the professional art handlers we brought in for this assignment.

Because of the scale of the room, scaffolding was needed to even reach the pictures.  After that came rebacking the canvases, vacuuming the gilded frames, and replacing the hanging hardware.  Finally, the portraits were ready for their voyage across the library and to their new spots, all purposefully selected to allow for their safe storage during the time of the Gothic’s renovation. 

While most of them are now in staff-only spaces, visitors who wish to see a particular portrait can do so by contacting the Rubenstein Library to make an appointment. Portraits of Washington, James B., and Benjamin N. Duke are hanging outside the Rubenstein classroom, and are viewable during regular Rubenstein hours without an appointment.

FewBlog

One painting, however, did not go so quietly to storage—a life-size, full-body portrait of President Few. It took scaffolding, ladders, and five people to remove him from his long-time rest, and once on the ground it became immediately clear that the portrait is nearly a half foot taller than the ceilings on the third floor of Perkins, where he was headed.  An alternative spot was needed and quick!  Thanks to the University Librarian, a suitable location was soon found.  President Few now greets guests on the main floor of the Library, immediately behind the Perkins reference desk.  It is perhaps fitting that the visage of the man who presided over the Gothic Room’s opening in 1930 was the last and most dramatic to take his leave from this room.

Post contributed by Kat Stefko, Head of Technical Services, Rubenstein Library.

The Move by the Numbers

After a month of intensive activity, the largest and most complicated phase of the Rubenstein Library move wrapped up, and we bid farewell to William B. Meyer, our wonderful library movers, on Feb 12.  In the 24 days that these 15 movers were onsite they relocated more than 30,000 linear feet of rare books, manuscript collections, university archives, pamphlets, and other material to both our temporary library and the Library Service Center.

Map Cases
Our map cabinets in their new home

We are excited to report that we have a considerable amount of our collection up in our new home on the 3rd floor of Perkins:

  • 17,600 linear feet of books, manuscripts, university archives and other collections
  • 39 map cabinets
  • 4-volume, double-elephant edition of Audubon

The movers transported 836 large blue trucks of material to our offsite Library Service Center!

  • The team at LSC has already ingested 148,727 items!  Thank you LSC team!!

Please note that due to the HUGE amount of material sent to LSC, some items are still being processed into their system.  As such, it may take longer than usual for some materials to be pulled..   Researchers are encouraged to contact the Rubenstein Library to confirm that their collections have arrived before coming to the reading room.  Please call the Rubenstein Library at 919.660.5822 or send us a message. Thank you to all our patrons, researchers, colleagues, friends and fans for their continued patience and support as we finalize the Rubenstein Library move!

But that’s not all!

Although one phase of the move is complete, there is still plenty of work and moving to be done between now and the start of the Rubenstein Library Renovation.  We are still prepping our newspaper collection for transport to LSC, and we still need to move the art collection, including the portraits in the Gothic Reading Room.  Stay tuned for more updates as we complete these projects.

Last but not least, you can always relive the exciting events from the last 6 weeks anytime on our blog:  http://blogs.library.duke.edu/rubenstein/tag/movediary/

 

Post contributed by Molly Bragg, Collection Move Coordinator.

 

 

Game Day

The big game — UNC vs. Duke — may be tonight at Cameron, but we’ve been preparing for weeks with our school-colored Big Blues. Normally, we use these carts to transport library materials around the Triangle. Lately, these carts have been helping us get Rubenstein collections to the LSC as quickly as possible.

Rival library trucks battling it out during the move.
Rival library trucks battling it out during the move.

Although our move is wrapping up this week, we would like to remind researchers that materials may still be in transit and that delays in retrieving our collections may continue for the next few weeks as we ingest everything into the LSC. Please continue to contact Research Services as early as possible if you are planning a research visit to the Rubenstein Library so that we can be sure to have what you need on hand when you arrive.

Audubons on the move

One of the last (but not least!) collections to move during our Big Move was our set of John James Audubon’s Birds of America. The Rubenstein Library is fortunate to have a complete double elephant folio set, published between 1827 and 1838. Only 120 sets are known to exist. Our conservation staff was on hand yesterday as the movers carefully lifted and transported the very heavy Audubons to their temporary home. We’re looking forward to them being back on display after the renovation.

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Birds of America folios in their cases in the Rare Book Room.
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Safely storing the Birds of America until after the renovation.

Can’t wait until after the renovation to see these great books? The University of Pittsburgh has digitized them.

Week 5 is Done!

We have rounded the final turn and are in the homestretch of our collections move!  Consequently, we’re seeing a lot more of this:

Empty shelving in our former stacks.
Empty shelving in our former stacks.

And of this:

Folio volumes from the History of Medicine Collections, in their new shelf locations.
Folio volumes from the History of Medicine Collections, in their new shelf locations.

And a lot less of these!

Trays used to move and store our books. The need to put more and more of them together: almost gone!
Trays used to move and store our books. The need to put more and more of them together: almost gone!

Standing Up (and Kneeling) for Our Collections

It’s week five of our collections move, and the Rubenstein is a flurry of activity.  We won’t sit down until all of our collections are moved!

Joshua Larkin Rowley and Noah Huffman: too busy checking materials into our new stacks to find a chair.
Joshua Larkin Rowley and Noah Huffman, too busy checking materials into our new stacks to find a chair.

 

The oversize items in our flat files may lie down, but we won't rest yet.
The oversize items in our flat files may lie down, but we won’t rest yet.

 

We'll all be ready for a futon (but not the book variety pictured here) when the move is completed.
We’ll all be ready for a futon (but not the book variety pictured here) when the move is completed.