Paper conservators, professional

Oince most of my readers are not professional textile people at home among tabby weaves, compound silks, ikats, and double-cloth, I try to keep my textile terminology simple. I mention some of the problems we face in working with ancient textiles, some of the answers we have come up with, and the solutions for which we are still searching. It seems chemists have shown a bit of favoritism to painting, metal, and paper conservators and not to the textile conservator. Those in textiles do need chemical help, and I hope we can work together more closely in the future. 

The New England Document Conservation Center, or NEDCC, was founded six years ago by the New England Library Board, with the help of start-up funds from the Council on Library Resources. The purpose was to provide paper conservation services to libraries, historical organizations, and public records offices that could not afford in-house laboratories. The idea was that a shared resource could eliminate wasteful duplication of equipment and make available on a regional basis the skills of professional paper conservators. It was expected that after a start-up period, the Center would be self-supporting through fees for its services. 

Lack of availability of trained conservation staff has been a perennial tribulation for the Center. The number of professional paper conservators in the country is woefully limited, and most of these are well situated in institutions that value them highly. The list of paper conservators certified by the American Institute for Conservation numbers fewer than forty, and of these, there are only a handful whose expertise is in library conservation. In hiring staff, we are in competition with subsidized institutions, such as museums and large research libraries, which can offer higher salaries, leisurely working conditions, and lucrative moonlighting opportunities. It took more than one year for NEDCC to recruit a new Senior Conservator to head our laboratory, and nine months to find an appropriate Book Conservator. 

Paper conservation, as known today, is new to Spain. Until a few years ago, custodians of the nations records on paper and parchment could only despair at the deterioration taking place. The restorers—craftsmen, in reality—scarcely were trained to tackle the broad problem. The pleas and warnings of those who wanted something done went unheeded. Here and there individual authorities sought professional help from abroad, but results proved minimal. In 1969, a dramatic change took place. Conservation was raised from the empirical to the scientific level. The breakthrough a law that provided for a centralized agency to restore the nations archival and library materials, determine the causes of deterioration, and train personnel to carry out these tasks. 

When you are creating your resume and cover letter, how these documents look and feel are as important as what they say. When applying for most jobs, you want your cover letter and resume to convey a highly professional and somewhat conservative image. To achieve this, you will have to choose the right paper, select the right resume format, and decide whether or not to add a touch of color in order to make your resume stand out. Resumes that stand out in a positive way are the ones HR professionals and recruiters read first. 

Such procedures would be considered to be appropriate, though not necessarily adequate, by most professional conservators. They look forward to a time when all aspects of the preservation needs of an item can be satisfied by safe treatments. So far, conservation scientists have not been able to help with answers for some very serious problems no research to date, for example, has provided guidelines as to how to prevent slight color changes in paper or media resulting from the application of alkaline solutions to arrest decay of the paper support. 

Trimble, S. W, Lund, S. (1982). Soil conservation and the reduction of erosion and sedimentation in the Coon Creek basin, Wisconsin. USGS Professional Paper 1234. 

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