ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

Preservation News

Jane Hedberg

Jane Hedberg prepares this column for the College Libraries Committee, Commission on Preservation and Access. Submissions may be made to: Jane Hedberg, Wellesley College;JHEDBERG@WELLESLEY.EDU.

AIC has new brochures

The American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (AIC) has published two brochures which begin a new series called Caring for Special Objects.

The first, Caring for Your Home Videotape, was written by Debbie Hess Norris, with Peter Adelstein, Dierdre Boyle, Connie Brooks, Alan Lewis, Jim Lindner, and Paul Messier. It covers recording practices, handling and storage procedures, environmental conditions, disasters and reformatting, and includes a resource list of publications and organizations. The second, Caring for Your Photographs, was written by Deborah Derby, with M. Susan Barger, Nora Kennedy, and Carol Turchan. It covers storage enclosures, handling, environmental conditions, housekeeping, disaster preparedness, and solutions to common concerns. It also contains a bibliography.

Both brochures are available free-of-charge from AIC, 1717 K Street, NW, Suite 301, Washington, DC 20006; phone: (202) 452-9545; fax: (202) 452-9328; e-mail: InfoAIC@aol.com.

LC/Ameritech announce awardees

The Library of Congress and Ameritech have announced the ten National Digital Library Competition winners. The $600,000 in award money is to be used for digitizing historically significant American collections and making them available on LC’s American Memory Web site. The winners are Brown University, Denver Public Library, Duke University, Harvard University, New York Public Library, North Dakota State University, Ohio Historical Society, University of Chicago, University of North Carolina, and University of Texas at Austin. The winning projects are diverse in topic and format, but focus generally on regional history. For more information, consult the Web site at http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/award/.

LC mounts digital images RFP

The National Digital Library Program (NDLP) at the Library of Congress has mounted “RFP96-18, Digital Images from Original Documents, Text Conversion and SGML-Encoding” on its

Web site. The 206-page (printed) Request for a Proposal (RFP) states the specifications for raster-scanned digital images and/or machine-readable texts encoded with Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) which must be met by vendors under contract to the NDLP or LC’s American Memory project. A contract has been awarded on the basis of this RFP and any changes to the specifications, which are made during execution of the contract, will also be reported on LC’s Web site. The URL for this document is http:// lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/prpsal/coverpag.html. LC has a number of other interesting documents related to imaging on its Background Papers and Technical Information Web page. Among them is “Recommendation for the Evaluation of Digital Images Produced from Photographic, Micrographic, and Various Paper Formats,” prepared by the Image Permanence Institute (http: //lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/ftpfiles.html).

RIT offers photographs program

The Rochester Institute of Technology’s (RIT) Technical and Education Center of the Graphic Arts and Imaging, RIT’s Image Permanence Institute, and the George Eastman House are again offering “Preserving Photographs in a Digital World.” The week-long program covers both traditional photograph preservation and digital imaging of photographs. The faculty is comprised of nationally known experts James Reilly, Grant Romer, Franziska Frey, Douglas Nishimura, Debbie Hess Norris, and David Wooters. The program will be offered in Rochester, August 16–21, 1997, and next year from August 15–20, 1998.

The fee is $1,195 (travel, food, and lodging are extra). For more information, contact T&E Center Registration, 66 Lomb Memorial Drive, Rochester, NY 14623-5604; phone: 1-800-724-2536; fax: (716) 475-7000. ■