Conservation
Posts related to the Conservation Department
April 29, 2021
When last I mentioned Joseph Priestley’s copy of John Blair’s Chronology and History of the World from Creation to the Year of Christ, 1788, the...
February 25, 2021
While iron gall ink was an incredibly popular ink from the 4th to the 20th centuries, it is now known to have damaging effects on...
October 7, 2020
Sometimes a project arrives in the conservation lab as a mystery. It might be damaged, so in order for the cataloguers and librarians to safely...
August 26, 2020
Joseph Priestley, a chemist who isolated oxygen and several other gases, was also a teacher. His focus on pedagogy led him to create some of...
April 3, 2020
Willman Spawn Conservation Intern Joanna Hurd spent only two weeks at the American Philosophical Society before the novel coronavirus sent everyone home, but in that...
January 24, 2020
I met one of my favorite collection items at the APS on the day I interviewed for my job as assistant conservator. Patrick Spero, the...
August 29, 2019
I recently opened a folder to find a photograph mounted onto a paper board and broken into eight pieces. This photograph is from the Victor...
August 13, 2019
Tapes that stick with the touch of a finger—masking tapes, packing tapes, clear Scotch-type tapes, duct tapes—are one of the conveniences of modern life. Conservators...