Here's a true confession of a small museum director! We routinely receive
"gifts" of all kinds of artifacts, documents, textiles, etc. About a year
ago I opened a bag of books to discover silverfish. Of course we have no
freezer or isolation room either. But...a wonderful volunteer is the seafood
manager at a local grocery. Yup, we sealed the books in several layers of
plastic and he put them in the walk-in freezer. (I had previously inspected
the freezer...it's wonderful...no smells. And of course the items are placed
so they have no contact with any food items. 

Perhaps you also have a friendly grocer who could freeze your books. :-)

Becky Fitzgerald
Susquehanna Museum

-----Original Message-----
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf
Of Kendra Derrer
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 10:54 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: mold inside books

I have a group of volunteers who come every Tuesday to
catalog.  This week I had them start on some books
housed inside a bookcase.  As the volunteers went
through several of the books they noticed many of them
had mold inside.  Because we currently have no storage
facility at all, we are storing everything inside the
house in acid-free boxes or in the case of the books
back inside the bookcase.  We have no freezer or
isolation room to put the books in.  My question is
should we continue to catalog them?

Kendra
Far West Heritage Association


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