> We received a professionally constructed wooden cabinet for slide
> storage (with thousands of slides for which we have found other
> homes). My question, is this type of cabinet an okay choice for long
> term storage of our own slide collection. The interiors of the
> drawers are unfinished wood.
The short answer to this is no. Wood offgasses acidic vapors, some
woods much worse than others. I recommend you check the following
reference for a good discussion of this problem:
Hatchfield, Pamela. 1995. Wood and wood products. Pp. 283-290 in
Rose, C.L., C.A. Hawks, and H.H. Genoways (eds). Storage of Natural
History Collections: A Preventive Conservation Approach. Society
for the Preservation of Natural History Collections (SPNHC).
--John
John Simmons
Natural History Museum
University of Kansas
Lawrence, Kansas