Conservation Services hosted a tour last week for Homecoming weekend. One of our attendees was a young girl about aged ten, who was really thrilled with what we do. She said the nicest thing, which Meg put on the board.
I’m buying everyone in the lab a cape.
The Conservation Unit was featured in the January/February 2010 edition of Duke Magazine. Included in the article are descriptions of the Conservation lab, the types of work performed by Conservation staff, and the different tools used.
Collections Conservator, Beth Doyle, discussed the Preservation department’s use of social media as an outreach tool in a recent feature on ALA’s Preservation Awareness Week website.
The Herald-Sun, recently featured Conservation in an article titled “Conservators Give New Life to Old Books.”
The gorgeous book on Erin Hammeke’s table is 21 by 14 inches, 3 inches thick, with gold tulle and white vellum binding. It dates from the mid-17th century.
An atlas from the Dutch publisher Blaeu, it has gloriously vivid maps of the British isles. It also has a number of tears, some discolorations and maybe even some mold. It’s Hammeke’s job to repair and fix it all.
“[The repairs] are pretty straightforward,” Hammeke said the other day as she delicately worked on a tear. “You mend it with Japanese tissue and research paste. It’s transparent, and flexible. You just have to test all the colors to see if they are water soluble.”
Hammeke is one of five remarkably skilled technicians working in the conservation department of Duke University’s Perkins Library. They are responsible for keeping the library’s 6 million books and millions of other items in working condition for both current and future users, and for rehabilitating works that have suffered from decay or in some cases, disaster.
Read more: The Herald-Sun – Conservators give new life to old books
Winston Atkins, Preservation Officer for Duke University Libraries, offers tips and suggestions for storing newspapers from the recent historical election and inauguration. View details at the library’s YouTube site or read more from the Duke Office of News and Communications.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqkEY8ITUBw
Duke’s Working at Duke series interviewed Erin Hammeke, Special Collections Conservator. This series highlights a day in the life of Duke employees. In the video, Erin shares details about the items she repairs and preserves as a conservator for Special Collections.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDNbU-XW300&
The fifth annual Edible Book Festival occurred on April 1, 2010. The Office of Communications posted a video on Duke Today.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asExZUxvKsQ&
The latest issue of Duke Libraries Magazine has hit the virtual bookshelf with “Notes from the Underground.” The people of Preservation, Conservation and the Digital Production Center are highlighted along with some favorite projects.
Enjoy!
Neil Offen of the Herald Sun came to interview us last week. You can see his wonderful story about us in the June 24, 2010, edition. And yes, the banana book gets mentioned (we know you love that book).
We got mentioned in Duke Today’s story about the Tin Foil Men popping up on campus. Yes, we are slightly obsessed about these. We love whimsy, and chocolate. But that’s a completely different post.