Special Collections Materials Research Articles

Shelving Special Collections Materials by Size

Shelving Special Collections Materials by Size

Acquiring Artists’ Books at Art Book Fairs: Dynamic Collection Development Practices

Strategies for acquisitions in art and special collections libraries require multiple modes and methods. Over the past decade, art book fairs have emerged as an exciting and worthwhile venue for collecting artists’ books and other special collections materials such as zines, posters, and ephemera. Art book fairs occur internationally, and the attendance of librarians at these events continues to rise with the overall popularity of the fairs. Despite this growth, there is a lack of professional literature in the field that documents and examines how and why art librarians utilize art book fairs for collection development, especially for acquiring artists’ books. In response, the author distributed an online survey in the fall of 2020 and conducted a literature review to further this research. This article considers the inception of art book fairs and presents the findings of the online survey and literature review. To conclude, the author reflects on the useful qualities of art book fairs for collection development and community building.

Exhibits in Archives and Special Collections Libraries. By Jessica Lacher-Feldman. [Review

In 2008, to provide continuity across the profession and acknowledge skills needed for effective stewardship of special collections materials, the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) approved Competencies for Special Collections Professionals. This document explicitly contends that those responsible for special collections materials must be “committed to promoting the appreciation and use of special collections materials to a variety of audiences. . . . ” and “skilled in planning and implementing programs and publications that promote and interpret collections, such as exhibits. . . . ” Indeed, at one time or another, most archivists and special collections librarians face curating a display or exhibit. Despite this, modern resources on exhibit preparation geared to special collections are lacking, leaving staff to glean guidance from general library exhibit publications or to turn to colleagues in the museum field for the most current materials on exhibits. Jessica Lacher-Feldman’s book, Exhibits in Archives and Special Collections Libraries, attempts to fill this void in the literature.

From the Margins to the Center

AbstractSelf-publishing is a topic not typically discussed in the literature classroom, yet it can provide an opportunity to highlight voices and works from the margins, think critically about the publishing methods, and promote the study of the book as a cultural artifact. This article provides a case study on using special collections materials to teach undergraduates about self-published American literature. It includes suggestions about how to find and select materials, details about facilitating a discussion and a hands-on activity on the topic, and recommendations for adapting these ideas for other teaching contexts.

Guidelines for borrowing special collections materials for exhibition: A draft

Guidelines for borrowing special collections materials for exhibition: A draft

Accessing Web Archives: Integrating an Archive-It Collection into EBSCO Discovery Service

Effective collaboration between archives and technical services can increase the discoverability of special collection materials. Archivists at the University of Dayton Libraries began using Archive-It to capture websites relevant to their collecting policies in 2015. However, the collections were only made available to users from the University of Dayton page on the Archive-It website. Content was isolated in a separate platform and was not promoted to users. Working together, the team of archivists and technical services librarians incorporated the web archive collections into the Libraries’ EBSCO Discovery Service (EDS) discovery layer. A local data dictionary was created based on OCLC’s Descriptive Metadata for Web Archiving report (2018), and metadata was added at the seed and collection levels. The result was indexed content on a single, user-friendly platform. The web archive collections were then marketed to the University of Dayton community, and statistics were generated on their use.

Expanding Access: Renovating Quaker & Special Collections at Haverford College

Expanding Access:Renovating Quaker & Special Collections at Haverford College Sarah M. Horowitz and Mary A. Crauderueff Quaker & Special Collections at Haverford College will reopen September 3, 2019 after the completion of a renovation. This 18-month project transformed Haverford's library, preserving historic portions of the building while adding brand-new spaces. Quaker & Special Collections will reopen with a new reading room, which provides easy access to curatorial staff; a classroom with 30 seats and flexible furniture to allow for a wide variety of teaching activities; processing space; an exhibit gallery; a conservation lab; and climate-controlled secure stacks. These new spaces will allow for the growth and expansion of Quaker & Special Collections programming, including extensive engagement with classes across the curriculum, student-curated exhibits, and research fellowships. The philosophy behind the renovation was to infuse light, technology, and access to collection materials throughout the entire library building. Thus, two seminar rooms, in which faculty teach semester-long classes, are equipped with locking cases. These cases can be used to house materials from Quaker & Special Collections selected by faculty in concert with curators. Throughout the semester, faculty teaching in these classrooms can bring out materials from the cases as they are referenced in class, rather than only being able to engage with original primary sources during a single instruction session. The main gallery space, located near the Quaker & Special Collections reading room, will host two exciting exhibits during the 2019–2020 academic year, both curated by students. Our opening exhibit on incunabula, or 15th century printing, was curated over the course of a summer internship by a rising Haverford senior; the spring exhibit will be curated by a first-year writing seminar exploring borders and borderlands in literature, and will focus on abolition and slavery. Display walls in several areas of the library allow students, classes, and student groups to display their work without needing to create a formal exhibit. The radical access and exciting possibilities inherent in these new library spaces will enable students to deepen their engagement with primary source materials across the curriculum and throughout their careers at Haverford. [End Page 66] Expanded access is not limited to the spaces which will soon be opening. During the renovation, Quaker & Special Collections staff processed approximately 700 linear feet of archival materials in 300 collections, including materials from the 1670s through 2016. Topics include: war resistance and relief work, family papers, literary organization papers, education-related papers, Quaker Meeting records, and Haverford College history, including student organizations like the Wom*n's Center, student scrapbooks, class governance materials, Board of Managers and Corporation records, and more. Collections with new or expanded access include the Lewis Benson collection, parts of the Philadelphia and Baltimore Yearly Meeting records, the papers of Richard Thompson, a Vietnam War medic and CO; Marlis Gildemeister, who volunteered with the American Friends Service Committee after World War II, Quaker educator Joan Countryman, the Tract Association of Philadelphia records, the Bible Association of Friends records, and a collection of Emlen and Mifflin family papers. The official dedication of the Lutnick Library will take place on the afternoon of Saturday, October 26, 2019. The festivities will include the printing a commemorative broadside, pop-ups with the opportunity to view and handle new acquisitions and collection highlights in Quaker & Special Collections, opportunities to explore digital projects based at the Haverford Libraries, and the curatorial talks for our exhibit "Who Created the New and Copied the Old: Printed Books of the Fifteenth Century," which features materials from The David Wertheimer, Class of 1977, Collection of Early Printed Books. The reopening of Quaker & Special Collections also means that our Gest Fellowship and Scattergood Fellowship are being offered again. These fellowships provide support for researchers to work with Haverford's unique collections. More information is available at www.haverford.edu/library/quaker-special-collections/fellowships, and an announcement in late 2019 will proceed applications due in early 2020. These fellowships also bring greater access to Quaker & Special Collections materials not only through providing dedicated time for researchers to study them, but also through their infusion into the scholarly discourse when this work is disseminated. The reopening of Quaker & Special Collections at Haverford...

Implementing RightsStatements.org at the University of Miami Libraries

INTRODUCTION Library digital collections have historically contained unstandardized and often inadequate information regarding copyright status in the item-level metadata. The development of RightsStatements.org, international recommendations for describing rights status, provides an opportunity for libraries to improve their rights metadata and educate users about copyright for digital objects. DESCRIPTION OF PROGRAM This paper reports on a two-year project at the University of Miami Libraries to implement RightsStatements.org. Two librarians, who did not previously have a background in copyright issues, performed a copyright analysis of all 58,000 objects in the libraries' digital collections and developed workflows for updating rights metadata. Workflows for developing new digital projects were also updated to incorporate rights considerations more comprehensively throughout the process. CONCLUSIONS AND NEXT STEPS The copyright assessment project uncovered several challenges for analyzing the copyright status of digitized archival and special collections materials, including the need to periodically reevaluate materials as more content moves into the public domain in the United States. The project also reinforced the importance of risk management when planning digitization projects for online access. Project outcomes are discussed, as well as implications for other libraries considering implementing RightsStatements.org.

Special Collections: What are They and How do we Build Them? (1)

An organization needs to consider a number of preservation issues when building a special collection. The level of control one can exert over these issues will vary, but they can have a direct impact on the integrity of special collection materials. This presentation will briefly deal with concerns related to the types of materials being collected; room and location considerations; environmental conditions; and pest and mold issues. Many of these are interrelated, so this is not a truly systematic process. Rather, one will probably find it necessary to go back and forth among these topics.

Secrets of the Night: The Discovery and Preservation of a “Lost” Silent Film

Secrets of the NightThe Discovery and Preservation of a "Lost" Silent Film Brock Silversides (bio) and Christina Stewart (bio) A collection of sixteen films was donated to the University of Toronto's Media Commons in November 2016. It was a modest assortment and initially, apart from the fact the films were all silent, seemed unremarkable. However, during the collection processing, it soon became clear that some items were indeed extraordinary and deserved wider public exposure.1 Media Commons is a department of the University of Toronto Libraries that was established to gather, preserve, and make available for study and research Canadian and international historical and contemporary culture and history through media-based archives, microforms, and circulating audiovisual productions. The role of audiovisual productions and documents in the transmission of knowledge at every level has been long established, and interest in and usage of these resources in numerous fields are now accepted as an integral part of scholarly and journalistic research. The primary mandate of Media Commons is to support the curriculum of, and research in, the various disciplines taught at the University of Toronto. The department serves the faculty, staff, students, and alumni as well as the general public. It is divided into three sections: The Audiovisual Lending Library acquires and circulates published (commercially released) film, video, DVD, and multimedia, both fiction and nonfiction. The primary selection criteria are faculty requests for a title to be used in class or for research projects, the systematic acquisition of acknowledged "classics," important Canadian titles, and items that add to the depth and breadth of the holdings. Microforms acquires and makes available microform publications. These include, but are not limited to, rare, out-of-print, and antiquarian books; pamphlets and periodicals; runs of newspapers; archival collections; and dissertations. Media Archives acquires, preserves, and makes available archival and special collection materials of Canadian and international significance relating to the audiovisual and media communities and popular culture. Materials include, but are not limited to, historical and contemporary film/video production, radio and television advertising, electronic and nonprint journalism, broadcasting (both radio and television), photographic arts, and popular music production. The Media Archives section has in particular accumulated an array of archival collections that document the artistic, financial, legal, and production and distribution activities of individuals, organizations, and corporations. It includes collections from independent filmmakers like Ron Mann (documentaries about popular culture), larger companies such as Lionsgate Entertainment (feature films and television series), broadcast executives/visionaries like Moses Znaimer (CITY-TV, Much [End Page 132] Music, IdeaCity, Vision TV, Zoomer Media), news anchors like Peter Mansbridge (CBC's The National), collectors like Colin Geddes (feature films from Hong Kong and Taiwan), animation companies like Nelvana (television cartoons), and distributors such as Rocco Mastrangelo (feature films from Italy) Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Secrets of the Night. Frame grab. Silhouette of the murderer's hand and gun. Courtesy of Media Commons, University of Toronto. Media Commons staff possess expertise in the selection, arrangement, description, and preservation and conservation of film, audio, and media materials. The department has a dedicated cold vault for long-term storage—the only one in a Canadian university—and an array of film, video, and audio playback equipment that allows it to access almost any audiovisual format. The aforementioned collection of silent films—six features, nine shorts, and one cartoon—was donated to Media Commons by Richard Scott of Mississauga, Ontario. His father, James Scott, was an accountant at Eaton's department store in Winnipeg from the mid-1930s to the late 1940s. During much of this period, Eaton's had a diverse lending library of 16mm films, much like a Blockbuster outlet in more recent years. Shortly after World War II, the store decided to discontinue the service and offered the films to its employees. The Scott family took at least sixteen silent films. [End Page 133] Scott recalls watching these in his basement as a child in the 1950s: Initially our Dad ran the projector, but he later taught us both [Richard and his brother Wayne] how to operate it with proper slack above and below the sprockets, and proper tension on the spring driven take...

The Small Easy: Budget-Neutral Digital Projects at Small Libraries

Small museum libraries with one or two staff members are inspired by the large-scale digital projects of bigger flagship institutions. How can one translate this inspiration to action with small means and few staff? Over the past year the Menil Collection Library has embarked on small-scale digitization projects that are budget-neutral but provide access to information and resources generated by the museum that were previously found only in the archives. From repackaging born-digital gallery guides and ephemera to capturing and cataloging finding aids and foundation documents, library staff are beginning to make the entire exhibition history available globally for the first time. Full surrogates of some Special Collections materials are now part of the scholarly record as well. This has not only made valuable information more accessible but also helped raise the library’s profile within the broader digital initiatives of the museum.[This article is a revision of a paper presented at the “Digitization and Preservation” session at the ARLIS/NA conference held in New Orleans, Louisiana, in February 2017.]

Improving Access and “Unhiding” the Special Collections

ABSTRACTThis article broadly reviews the issue of access in special collections and introduces several solutions for improving access to special collections materials. Drawing on literature and specific case studies, the author finds that special collections units have made great progress in making their materials accessible to researchers and users. A variety of access web and digitization technologies are outlined and discussed.

Disambiguating the Departed: Using the Genealogist’s Tools to Uniquely Identify the Long Dead and Little Known

The need to uniquely identify people with the same name will be as important in a linked data environment as it is in traditional library catalogs. Although older cataloging rules allowed multiple identities to share space in an authority record, the current rules are more stringent, requiring that all authorized access points for people to be disambiguated. While this task has been made much easier in recent years because of the amount of biographical material on the web, deceased and obscure people can pose a complex challenge. This is especially true for special collections materials, which are being given greater attention but which often deal with people who are long dead and little known. This paper builds on previous research in the use of online resources to perform authority work by providing an in-depth analysis of the genealogist’s toolkit and examining how freely available online genealogical sources can be used to find the types of distinctive information needed to create unique access points for people.

The Impact of Off-Site Storage on Core Special Collections Activities

A Review of:
 Priddle, C., & McCann, L. (2015). Off-site storage and special collections: A study in use and impact in ARL libraries in the United States. College & Research Libraries, 76(5), 652-670. doi:10.5860/crl.76.5.652
 
 Abstract
 
 Objective – To measure the use of off-site storage for special collections materials and to examine how this use impacts core special collections activities.
 
 Design – Survey questionnaire containing both structured and open ended questions. Follow-up interviews were also conducted.
 
 Setting – Association of Research Libraries (ARL) member institutions in the United States of America. 
 
 Subjects – 108 directors of special collections. 
 
 Methods – Participants were recruited via email; contact information was compiled through professional directories, web searches, and referrals from professionals at ARL member libraries. The survey was sent out on October 31, 2013, and two reminder emails were distributed before it closed three weeks later. The survey was created and distributed using Qualtrics, a research software that supports online data collection and analysis. All results were analyzed using Microsoft Excel and Qualtrics.
 
 Main Results – The final response rate was 58% (63 out of 108). The majority (51 participants, or 81%) reported use of off-site storage for library collections. Of this group, 91% (47 out of 51) house a variety of special collections in off-site storage. The criteria most frequently utilized to designate these materials to off-site storage are use (87%), size (66%), format (60%), and value (57%). The authors found that special collections directors are most likely to send materials to off-site storage facilities that are established and in use by other departments at their home institution; access to established workflows, especially those linked to transit and delivery, and space for expanding collections are benefits. 
 
 In regard to core special collections activities, results indicated that public service was most impacted by off-site storage. The authors discussed challenges related to patron use and satisfaction. In regard to management and processing, directors faced challenges using the same level of staff to maintain two locations instead of one. Also, the integration of new workflows required additional oversight to ensure adequate control at all points of process. Static staffing levels and increased levels of responsibility impacted preservation and conservation activities as well. A central concern was the handling of materials by facility staff not trained as special collections professionals. In regard to the facilities themselves, a general concern was that commercial warehouses do not always provide the kind of environmental control systems recommended for storage of special collections materials. 
 
 Of the total sample group, 12 participants (19%) said their institution does not use off-site storage for special collections. When asked if this may occur in the future, four directors (33%) said they anticipate off-site storage use within the next five years. Lack of space was listed as the primary motivation. 
 
 Conclusion – Study findings provide evidence for what was previously known anecdotally: planning, coordinating, and managing off-site storage is a significant professional responsibility that will only grow in the future. As primary resources are integrated into research, teaching, and learning activities, the acquisition of special collections materials will continue to grow. Discussions regarding off-site storage workflows and strategic planning will continue as professionals seek compromises that meet the unique needs of acquisition, preservation, and public service.

Interlibrary Loan of Special Collections Materials: An Overview and Case Study

When the Annie Belle Weaver Special Collections, in partnership with the Interlibrary Loan department at the University of West Georgia's Irvine Sullivan Ingram Library, embarked on loaning original materials to other libraries, we did so with a lack of consensus from the special collections world at large, about whether lending special collections materials was a good practice or not, what to lend, and to whom to lend.The only consensus about loaning special collections materials is that there is no consensus, to rephrase the finding of the 2010 OCLC Sharing Special Collections Working Group survey.1 That survey, along with another . . .

Controlling Goods or Promoting the Public Good: Choices for Special Collections in the Marketplace

For the past few decades, many special collections repositories in the United States have charged licensing or use fees to those patrons who use or publish special collections materials for commercial purposes. In fact, about fifteen years ago the Rare Books and Manuscripts Section of the Association of College and Research Libraries charged an ad hoc committee, the Licensing and Reproductions of Special Collections Committee, to “create a reasoned and articulate defense of libraries’ right to charge licensing fees for commercial uses of their materials.”2 The Committee noted that, historically, libraries allowed scholars to publish freely from the content they . . .

Past or Portal? Enhancing Undergraduate Learning through Special Collections and Archives ed. by Eleanor Mitchell, Peggy Seiden, and Suzy Taraba (review)

Reviewed by: Past or Portal? Enhancing Undergraduate Learning through Special Collections and Archives ed. by Eleanor Mitchell, Peggy Seiden, and Suzy Taraba Anne Bahde Past or Portal? Enhancing Undergraduate Learning through Special Collections and Archives, ed. Eleanor Mitchell, Peggy Seiden, and Suzy Taraba. Chicago: Association of College and Research Libraries, 2012. 320p. $60 (ISBN 978-083898610-3). Instruction in special collections and archives environments has been gaining attention in recent years, evidenced by a steady increase in the literature on instructional case studies using primary source materials, as well as increased activity within the ALA Connect community called Special Collections Teaching Strategies, and the Reference, Access, and Outreach Section of the Society of American Archivists. Despite this increased attention, the literature on instruction with original materials remains relatively limited, and compared to information literacy literature, only modestly offers best practices for pedagogy or programmatic models. With the publication of Past or Portal? Enhancing Undergraduate Learning through Special Collections and Archives, editors Eleanor Mitchell, Peggy Seiden, and Suzy Taraba have improved this environment dramatically, essentially doubling the literature on instruction in special collections and archives with this fantastically useful collection of case studies. The book includes nearly fifty case studies exploring the direct use of special collections and archives materials in undergraduate education. The work is divided into four complementary sections, which effectively categorize each contribution. Section one, The Artifact, presents case studies that focus on teaching the materiality of unique materials, either in single class sessions or full courses. With just one or two exceptions, the contributions in this section emphasize rare books or manuscripts, including two interesting projects integrating the book arts into undergraduate class sessions. Notable in this section is Michael Paulus’ essay, “What is Primary: Teaching Archival Epistemology and the Sources Continuum.” This continuum is an intriguing concept that “provides a framework for exploring and conceptualizing the primacy of sources,” and will be of enduring use to librarians, archivists, and historians teaching the complex issues that primary sources can raise. (p. 77) Section two, The Pedagogy, focuses on creative pedagogical methods for unique and original materials, in class sessions, course modules, or full courses. Several case studies in this section present inventive techniques for engaging disciplines that can be more challenging to attract and involve with special collections materials, such as creative writing, biochemistry, [End Page 423] microbiology, psychology, and music. One particularly compelling project from New York University asked computer science students to build an integrated digital archive site featuring a catalogue of digitized primary sources as well as a narrative exhibit element. A fine example of strong pedagogical collaboration between humanities teaching faculty, special collections librarians, and archivists, this adaptable project can yield both an original product for students’ capstone portfolio and a digital resource for the library. Section three, The Program, is a shorter section that includes wide-ranging, multidisciplinary programmatic models for integrating primary source-based curriculum at the institutional level; for example, book history programs (Oberlin College and University of Wyoming), and an undergraduate curriculum program based on the holdings of a digital library (University of California). An especially innovative contribution from Sarah Horowitz and Jamie Nelson at Augustana College describes a faculty stipend program to encourage use of primary source materials across the curriculum, an effort which has drastically increased both instruction sessions and student use of collections. The final section, The Work, demonstrates the integration of students into the fundamental description, access, or outreach work of special collections or archives departments. Examples of student-curated exhibitions, blogs, and even collections are featured in this section, along with ideas for student-led processing and digitization projects. The case study on undergraduate research partnerships at Lafayette College, described by Diane Shaw, showcases the remarkable range of internal projects accomplished by Lafayette’s Excel Scholars, academically talented students who gain real-world skills and knowledge through a program of experiential learning in the special collections department. Through this program, the department makes a meaningful contribution to the teaching and learning mission of the university, and generates products that improve access to holdings and enrich outreach efforts. The only negative aspect to the book is its organization scheme within the table of contents. Here...

Conservation Documentation in Research Libraries

Conservation professionals are ethically bound to produce and preserve conservation documentation. The research described in this paper investigates conservation documentation methods and practice in academic research libraries. The author conducted a literature review and developed and implemented a survey to both record current conservation documentation practices and to assess the potential use of the MARC 21 field 583 (Action Note) for recording, accessing, and preserving conservation documentation. Bound materials, in particular special collection materials, are the primary focus of the survey. The survey and follow-up interview responses support integrating conservation documentation into the MARC 21 field 583. Methods of doing so are presented and discussed.

Special Collections, Primary Resources, and Information Literacy Pedagogy

Literature suggests that teaching Information Literacy (IL) as an intellectual framework, rather than a set of computer-based tools, can be challenging for numerous reasons. At the same time, other articles describe the unique value of using hands-on investigations of special collections materials to facilitate the development of critical thinking skills and IL in discipline-specific contexts for upper-level students. This article reports on a collaboration between an IL instructor and a special collections librarian to create a hands-on special collections experience for entry-level IL students. We found that exposing these students to these materials can improve their IL and research skills. We explain our methods for designing and assessing such class sessions, and report on our results with students.

Accessibility of digital special collections using screen readers

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to discover whether digitized materials from special collections libraries can be accessed using screen reader technology.Design/methodology/approachThe researchers looked at 69 US academic library web sites from the ARL in 2011 to determine whether textual materials sampled from their digitized special collections were readable with screen reader technology.FindingsThe researchers found that 42 percent of the sampled digital collection items are screen‐readable, while 58 percent are not readable.Research limitations/implicationsScreen readers are not evaluated against one another for effectiveness with digital collections. Library web site pathways to digital special collections were not evaluated with screen readers.Originality/valueThis is the first study to examine the accessibility of digitized special collections materials to persons using a screen reader.