NEH Preservation Assistance Grant: "Water, Water Everywhere"
The University Libraries received a National Endowment for the Humanities Preservation Assistance Grant. The grant was used to bring a day long program, "Water, Water Everywhere: Good Decision Making When Recovering Water-Damaged Paper Collections," to the University of Washington. The workshop was organized by the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts (CCAHA) in Philadelphia and was first presented in Philadelphia in March 2000. It was presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in October and at the Harvard University Libraries in December.
The Seattle workshop was held at the University of Washington on April 9, 2001. The goal of this one-day program was to provide a basic understanding of the decisions involved in organizing recovery of water-damaged paper collections. Tools for assessing damage, evaluating available resources, and selecting recovery methods were illustrated through lectures, slides, and emergency scenarios. Scenarios included small- to mid-sized emergencies involving a variety of paper-based collections. Priority setting, handling issues, and drying methods and procedures for recovering damaged paper collections were reviewed. Speakers were Betty Fiske, Paper Conservator, Winterhur Museum, Garden and Library and Glen Ruzicka, Director of Conservation, CCAHA. Librarians, archivists, curators, and collection managers in Washington involved in safeguarding paper-based collections and in their recovery during an emergency were invited to attend.