so, what is malacology, anyway? melissa bradshaw may 30-july 6, 2002
TRANSCRIPT
So, What Is So, What Is MALACOLOGYMALACOLOGY, ,
Anyway?Anyway?
Melissa Bradshaw
May 30-July 6, 2002
mal·a·col·o·gy \mal- -`käl- -jē\ n.:
e e
a branch of zoology dealing with mollusks—invertebrate creatures with soft, unsegmented bodies, many of which house themselves in shells.
About the Project
Arranged for May 20 to June 21
Lisa Rebori, Collections Manager
John Wise, Curator of Malacology
Goal: to create a finding aid and needs assessment survey for an estimated 600 volumes and housing for 400 Chenu prints
Houses the Burke Baker Planetarium, Wortham IMAX Theatre, Cockrell Butterfly Center, and three floors of natural science halls and exhibits
About the Museum
Founded in 1909Fourth most highly attended museum in the U.S.Most highly attended attraction in Texas (over two million visitors annually)
About the Museum
Permanent exhibits Astronomy
Space Science
Native Americans
Paleontology
Energy
Chemistry
Gems and minerals
Malacology
Texas wildlife
Largest malacology library in the U.S.
Used as a reference collection for the curator, researchers, and volunteers
Books do not circulate and most are not highly used
A volunteer librarian had created a list with most of the titles and had organized the library into sections
About the Library
About the Library
Began building the library inthe 1960sHad friends in the oil business who helped acquire much of the collection
Various malacologists and malacological organizations donate their collections to HMNSAppraised at over $400,000Almost complete set of prints by malacogist J. C. Chenu valuing over $40,000
Dr. Tom Pulley, curator of malacology and museum director
About the Library
Types of publications:Monographs
Multi-volume sets
Serials• Journals• Newsletters
Atlases
Catalogs
OversizeReprints
• Bound• Unbound
Voyages & ExpeditionsSet of over 400 prints by J. C. Chenu
About the Library
Dates of publication of volumes:1 from the 17th century (1684)39 from the 18th century (1731-1799)618 from the 19th century321 from the first half of the 20th century573 from the second half of the 20th century 5 from the 21st century (2000-2001)33 unknown (no printed publication date)
About the Library
It takes up roughly two rows of
compact shelving located in the Collections department
The books are in all types of formats and sizes and in many different languages
A number of items that are part of multi-volume sets have been commercially rebound in half-style leather
Chapter 1: OrganizationCut and pasted list from Word to Excel
Added titles to list
Changed organization of sections
Rearranged Atlases, Catalogs, Voyages & Expeditions, and Bound Reprints sections
Chapter 2: Labelling
I created bookmarks for each volume containing
Location on the shelf
Author
Title
Date of publication
I matched the bookmarks with the appropriate volumes
There was no previous labeling system for books
There were discrepancies and errors in the listBooks in a multi-volume set often had different publication dates and different authorsI constantly came across books that had not been added to the listThe final count of titles came out to 1,578
The bookmarking process took five weeks to complete because…
Chapter 2: Labelling
Chapter 3: Creating the Survey
I referred to “The Yale Survey: A Large-Scale Study of Book Deterioration in the Yale University Library” and sample surveys from students’ needs assessment survey projects for ideas
I created a sample survey and tested it on ten booksEllen had suggestions on customizing it better to fit the books in the collection
PreliminarySurvey
Tool
Chapter 3: Creating the Survey
The final survey tool contained…Bibliographic information
• Author• Title• Year of publication• Whether item is a first or special edition
Dimensions
Location on shelves
Structure
Final Survey Tool
32.5 26.7 5.8
Chapter 3: Creating the Survey
Condition of paper
Condition of binding
Leaf attachment
Leaf attachment condition
Environmental damage
Treatment needed• Minor• Major• Immediacy of treatment
For conservation treatment
Chapter 3: Methodology
Random samplingAlphabeticalEvery tenth book
Twenty percent of the collection (316 books)Only books from the Monographs & Serials sectionEnlisted the help of some Ecoteens (high school summer volunteers)
Chapter 4: Results
Of the 316 books surveyed…35 need conservation treatment (11%)
• 11 minor repairs• 24 major repairs
19 need phase boxes (6%)9 need pamphlet binding (3%)11 need commercial rebinding (3.5%)251 can be shelved as is (79%)77 have yellowing paper (24%)53 have brittle paper (17%)
Chapter 5: Wrapping Up
Reshelving/Combining sections“Books” and “Series” sections
“Fossil Malacology” section
New books
Wrote summary of project with results for Lisa and John
Would like to continue project and evaluate remaining sections (Periodicals, Newsletters, Reprints), the Chenu prints, and perform treatments
Many Thanks to…
Lisa Rebori
John Wise
Ellen Cunningham-Kruppa (for helping with a project I’d never done before!)
Chela Metzger (for helping identify those unfamiliar binding structures)
Karen Pavelka (for helping to land the project in the first place)