Personnel

Rebecca Metois is our Summer Conservation Intern here in Preservation Services from the 27^th of June till the 19^th of August 2016.  She has just completed her first year of bookbinding at the North Bennet Street School in Boston. Rebecca has a library degree from Simmons College and a M.F.A. in painting from San Francisco Art Institute and she is very excited to be here.

Welcome Rebecca!

Personnel Announcement

I am happy to announce that Elizabeth (Lizzie) Curran has accepted the position of Assistant Conservator in Preservation Services and will start on April 25^th, 2016. Lizzie comes to us from the Huntington Library in San Marino, California where she was a Conservation Technician and was responsible for working on a variety of material. Lizzie was also a summer intern here in Preservation Services in 2013, and is a graduate of the North Bennet Street School in Boston focusing in Bookbinding. 

Deborah Howe

Personnel Update

I am pleased to announce that Lauren Melgoza has joined Preservation Services as Preservation Assistant. Lauren is responsible for commercial binding, assisting with new book processing, supervision of student employees, and support of the various Book Arts Workshop publicity and outreach efforts.  Lauren's last position was at Colorado Mesa University, Tomlinson Library, in Grand Junction, Colorado where she was responsible for serials processing, binding, and e-resources.

Welcome, Lauren!

Written by Barb Sagraves

Personnel Announcement

Tracey Dugdale, Preservation Assistant, has accepted the position of Electronic Resources Specialist in Acquisitions Services effective Sept. 15.  Even though her new workstation in Acquisitions is less than 50 ft. from her desk in Preservation we will feel the loss of her special skills.

Tracey can get anything done -- and if she can't she knows who can!  She serves as our blog wrangler and keeps the blog, Preservation, and Book Arts web pages up to date.  She handles commercial binding for Baker Berry Library and processes the binding for other libraries.  She hires and trains our students to do book repair  and shelf prep.  You can visit the Preservation Assistant position posting to get an idea of all the responsibilities.

It is a pleasure to work with Tracey and I am delighted that Dartmouth College Library is not losing her.

Best wishes Tracey!

Assistant Conservator: Position Vacancy

Dartmouth College Library is seeking a collaborative and proactive Assistant Conservator to become an integral part of Preservation Services in support of their mission to conserve the Library’s physical collections.  In coordination with the Library’s Collections Conservator, the Assistant Conservator assists in the management of the daily workflow and production in the Conservation Lab.  The Assistant Conservator will perform conservation treatments on rare and special collection material ranging from simple to complex; develop and implement procedures and guidelines to manage work flow for material involved in digital production projects; assist in training practicum students and conservation interns; assist as consultant in exhibit preparedness for library materials.

RESPONSIBILITIES: Performs conservation treatment on rare and unique library materials, generally those requiring individual treatment. Materials include: books, manuscripts, albums, maps, and other flat work. Digital liaison for collection treatment workflow; accountable for treatments, developing and overseeing conservation workflow for all material needing treatment before and/or after digitizing; plans and coordinates projects with Collections Conservator, Special Collections staff, and the digital production team.

APPLICATION: Review of applications will begin as of August 24, 2015 and will continue until the position is filled. Applicants chosen for an onsite interview will be expected to bring a portfolio of work. For the complete job description and to apply online go to: http://jobs.dartmouth.edu and reference position # 0111201

Personnel Update in Preservation Services

At the end of July, Stephanie Wolff will be leaving Preservation Services. Stephanie has been part of Preservation Services since 2006, starting as a Conservation Technician and then promoted to Assistant Conservator. In her role, she has accomplished much and has significantly contributed to the care and treatment of the valuable materials housed within the library. I am sad to see her go, but happy for her as she moves forward to pursue her love of the book arts and teaching. She will focus on book arts curriculum and how content through research can inform expression and creativity.  If she is teaching in your area I highly recommend taking her class. We wish her the best as she begins this new chapter.

Stephanie has perfected the art of box making
and has made  hundreds of clam shell boxes
for our special collection material. Here
is a sample.

Written by Deborah Howe

Kress Conservation Fellow Tessa Gadomski arrives!

In August we announced that we were recipients of a Kress Conservation Fellow grant from the Foundation of the American Institute for Conservation, funded by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation. grant.

On September 8th, Tessa Gadomski, started her Fellowship. Tessa, recently graduated with a Master of Science in Art Conservation from the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation, with a major in Library and Archives Materials. Along with this degree, she has also completed a Certificate of Advanced Study in Preservation from Simmons College, Graduate School of Library and Information Science. Her undergraduate degree is from the University of Delaware receiving Honors with a Bachelor of Arts in Art Conservation, her second major was Art History with a minor in Chemistry.

Tessa has worked are the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian Institution Archives, the Weissman Preservation Center of Harvard and Heugh-Edmondson Conservation Services in Kansas City Missouri which specializes in restoration of works of art on paper and photographs.
One of her intern appointments was at University of Delaware, working on Russian Icons. She created a reproduction of a Russian icon using traditional materials and techniques, and then participated in conserving a Russian icon from the University of Delaware Museum’s Collection.

While here at Dartmouth Tessa’s focus will be to address and perform conservation needs of Rauner’s Iconography collection. This collection within Special Collections has over 1,300 cataloged items that include printed images, glass slides, original art on paper and other media, photographs, albums and digital files. A particularly significant subcategory of the collection is focused on the history of Polar exploration.

Tessa is well prepared for such a project with her broad background and wide experience, not only will we be able to advance the work needed on this collection but we will be able to learn from Tessa and glean new techniques and ideas she can share from her conservation experience.

Tessa is original from Albany, New York, so she is very happy to be back in the northeast closer to her family.  Welcome Tessa!

Written by Deborah Howe

Personnel Announcement

Michael Grant, a student of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts has begun a ten-week internship in Preservation Services.  Michael is pursuing a Masters in Moving Image Archiving and Preservation; in partial fulfillment of that degree he must complete three internships.  Over the course of the summer Michael will inventory and assess the condition of 16mm and 8mm films collected by the college in order to help Peter Carini, the College Archivist, determine which films should be added to the permanent collection of the College Archives.

Welcome Michael!

Personnel Announcement

I am delighted to announce that Jenny Brice will be Dartmouth College Library’s first Digital Preservation Librarian effective May 12, 2014.  Jenny joins us from the Bay Area Video Coalition in San Francisco, California where she is Preservation Coordinator.  In that capacity she supports the development of the Dance Heritage Coalition Dance Preservation and Digitization Project, a digital repository of video documenting America’s dance history.

Jenny also manages the AV Artifact Atlas, an on-line tool that aids in the identification and documentation of errors created during analog recording or digital transfer.

Jenny has an undergraduate degree in Comparative Literature from the University of California Berkeley.  She received her Masters of Library and Information Science from the University of Pittsburgh with a Preservation Specialization.   Jenny also has worked as a conservation technician for the University of Pittsburgh Library and the New York Public Library.

I would like to thank my colleagues on the search committee (Bill Ghezzi, Paul Merchant, Jr., Jay Satterfield, and Becky Torrey) for their insights and dedication to our task.  This position is funded from the Manton Foundation Endowment that supports the Dartmouth Digital Library Program.

Barb Sagraves, Head, Preservation Services 

Welcome Sara!

The library has a history of interaction with students from the Center for Cartoon Studies, which is not surprising since it is located just over the Connecticut River in White River Junction, Vermont. Every year a new group of talented and creative students arrive to attend classes. Currently we have a graduate from this program working full time in our department and the Library has hired a number of graduates over the years.

Two years ago we hosted a small workshop for one of the Cartoon Studies classes and taught some basic bookbinding techniques. More recently we hosted a class here teaching wrappers. In this class one of the students took a shining to the conservation lab and what we do here, and in an effort to fulfill her independent study requirements contacted me to see if she could come here to lean about conservation and book structure. So long story short, Sara Sarmiento, a second year student started September 13th,(good luck for us!), and will come one day a week till her term ends in December. We are fortunate to be able to offer these learning opportunities for students and we are happy that Sara took the initiative to seek us out. Welcome Sara.

Written by Deborah Howe.

Digital Preservation Librarian - position opening

I am delighted to announce the new Digital Preservation Librarian position. The Digital Preservation Librarian will play a key role in preserving Dartmouth College Library's collections by enhancing the Library's capacity to preserve and provide access to all our digital materials both commercially acquired and locally produced.

This position is critical to support the long-term preservation of the Library's collections, and to increase our engagement with the difficult issues surrounding very long term retention of digital data. The position is funded from the Manton Foundation Endowment that supports the Dartmouth Digital Library Program.

A fuller description of the position may be found at: https://searchjobs.dartmouth.edu/postings/20445

Personnel Announcement: Conservation Intern

Please welcome Lizzie Curran as the Preservation Services Summer Conservation Intern. Lizzie has completed one year in bookbinding at North Bennet Street School in Boston and is a graduate of Bennington College where she focused on visual arts, specifically drawing and painting.  While Lizzie is here for the next eight weeks she will focus her time learning about conservation practices within a library context and will explore a variety of conservation treatments. As a side, she grew up on a horse farm in Concord, Mass and loves avocados.

Deborah Howe

Collections Conservator

Personnel Announcement: Preservation Services and Cataloging and Metadata Services

We are pleased to announce a change in Bill Ghezzi’s role and job assignment in the Library.  Effective immediately, Bill’s new title is Digital Production and Metadata Librarian.  Bill reports half-time to Barb Sagraves and half-time to Cecilia Tittemore.  This change represents a significant increase in Bill’s focus on work to support the Digital Library Program.

Since September 2012 Bill has been participating in a pilot project with a half-time assignment as Digital Production Manager in Preservation Services, and a half-time assignment as Cataloging and Metadata Services Librarian in Cataloging and Metadata Services.  Working together with Bill, we have assessed the impact of the pilot and determined that this division of Bill’s time, combined with his unique skill set, will help the Library move forward in fulfilling the ambitions of the Dartmouth Digital Library.  With this announcement, the pilot period draws to a successful close.

During the pilot Bill took over management of existing Digital Production Unit workflows including the complex Occom Circle Project, the long-term Photo Files Project, and has been responsible from the start for the Donella Meadows Project.  Bill has maintained his membership in the Digital Projects and Infrastructure Group (DPIG) and contributes his expertise as a cataloger and production manager to project planning and infrastructure development.  In the area of digital preservation Bill has been collaborating with Barb and Paul Merchant to develop a protocol for depositing masters and derivatives on the server for long-term storage.  Bill has worked with Ryland Ianelli and Barb Sagraves to ensure uniform application of digitization standards from project start-up.

This new position also includes an increased focus on defining standards and practices for metadata for Dartmouth Digital Library content, including local policies for object identifiers, and for ongoing management of library metadata.

Our thanks go to Bill for recognizing an opportunity for deep collaboration between our departments as the Digital Production Unit began to take shape, and we are extremely grateful to him for proposing this plan and seeing it through to a successful outcome.  Cataloging and Metadata Services will be making adjustments to assignments and priorities over the next few months to help support this important collaboration.  This change, together with the initiation in 2010 of the Text Markup Unit, managed by Mina Rakhra, represents significant support from Cataloging and Metadata Services for the work of the Dartmouth Digital Library. 

Cecilia P. Tittemore, Head, Cataloging and Metadata Services

Barb Sagraves, Head, Preservation Services  

Personnel Announcement

I am delighted to announce that Elizabeth Rideout, Project Technician, has been named the Andrew W. Mellon Fellow at the Northeast Document Conservation Center in Andover, MA.  Elizabeth will start her one-year appointment at the nationally known conservation center this June. 

Elizabeth has been a member of the U.S. Congressional Serial Set/ NewsBank Project Team since 2011.  She has been the lead technician for the last eighteen months and has been instrumental in keeping track and accounting for all the returning volumes as the project comes to a close.  Elizabeth has also been active in the Book Arts Program, leading workshops on a variety of book binding methods.

Elizabeth’s last day is Friday, May 31, co-incidentally, the official closing date of the eight year project.  This is a fabulous opportunity for Elizabeth and we wish her well on her next adventure.

Personnel Announcement

One of the great benefits of working at Dartmouth is that I am surrounded by very talented people and one of those talented persons is Elizabeth Rideout, Project Technician for the U. S. Congressional Serial Set Project.  This week Elizabeth is teaching "Calligraphy & Decorated Letters" at Penland School of Crafts.  Penland is located in North Carolina's Blue Ridge Mountains and offers students of all ages the opportunity to fully immerse themselves in studying crafts and creating beautiful things.

Elizabeth earned a diploma in hand bookbinding at the North Bennet Street School and has shown her work at numerous galleries in New England and the eastern seaboard.


Written by Barbara Sagraves.

American Antiquarian Society Fellowship for Stephanie Wolff

I am excited to announce that Stephanie Wolff, Assistant Conservator, has been awarded a Fellowship for Creative and Performing Artists and Writers from the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, MA. As a Deborah and Jay Last Fellow, she will undertake research at the Society concentrating on the twelve diaries of Anna Blackwood Howell (1769-1855) to explore the phenomenon of weather both in historic terms and its place in modern life. This is background research in preparation for an artist book.

This fellowship will allow Stephanie to reside on the AAS campus while she conducts her investigations. She will be away from Preservation Services March 4th through March 30th. For any inquiries normally requested of Stephanie, please contact Deborah Howe, Collections Conservator.

Please join me in congratulating Stephanie on her accomplishment!

Written by Barb Sagraves.

Personnel Announcement

I am pleased to announce that Tracey Dugdale will be joining Preservation Services on March 25 as the new Preservation Assistant. Tracey comes to us from the Norman Williams Public Library in Woodstock, VT where she was Director of Youth Services. She has been active in the Vermont Library Association and currently serves as the vice president of the Youth Library Sections Committee of the Vermont Department of Libraries. Tracey is also a skilled custom wooden puzzle maker and is the owner of Lucretia’s Pieces.

Tracey will be responsible for training our student employees in both conservation treatments and shelf processing. She has a strong technical background and will be our TeCoR rep and serve as our department blog wrangler. We are excited to have her on our team.

Welcome Tracey!
Written by Barbara Sagraves.

Congratulations, Stephanie!

It is with great pleasure I announce that Stephanie Wolff has been promoted to Assistant Conservator. A major responsibility of this new position is to be the conservation digital liaison, which will manage workflow and treatment assessment for conservation work needed in response to digital projects. In addition Stephanie will be further integrated into the evaluation and treatment of special collections material.

Stephanie joined Preservation Services full time in May of 2006. Since then she has trained numerous students to perform routine conservation treatments and has treated extensively, items from special collections. In 2011 she received her MALS degree from Dartmouth, with her studies focusing on “the book”. In addition to her preservation duties, she is an instructor in the Book Arts Workshop.

Please join me in congratulating Stephanie.
Written by Deborah Howe.

To Great Teamwork

Almost ten years ago John Cocklin, Economics and Social Science Data Librarian, was contacted by Readex (a division of NewsBank Corporation) to borrow a small number of volumes from the U. S. Congressional Serial Set. They were digitizing their microfilm edition of the Serial Set and wanted to scan color images from our printed copies in order to enhance the product they were developing. On the success of that initial loan, Readex approached John about a collaboration of a much greater scope. A full color digital edition of the American State Papers (1789-1838) and the U. S. Congressional Serial Set from 1817-1980 using Dartmouth’s paper copy.

(See The U.S. Congressional Serial Set Project for a summary)

This would be a major undertaking and involve collecting, conserving, transporting, and re-shelving over 14,000 volumes. The joint venture began in 2005 and was projected to be completed in 4 years. For a variety of reasons, including expanding the project to include other publications and staffing ebb and flow, it has (happily from our view) doubled in duration so that we are in the 8th and final year.

Scholars have benefited from the digitized Serial Set, and the ability to search the full-text of the contents has led to new discoveries. An example is the number of women who served as men in the War of 1812 and the Civil War. The Serial Set contains a larger number of petitions to Congress for pensions from these women, indicating the practice was more prevalent than previous research had indicated.

The success of the joint project is in large part due to teamwork. In the early stages, there were almost daily emails or phone calls between the project managers and key project staff. As the normal rhythm took over, the need for daily communication lessened but is still there. Readex staff might identify a missing scan and Dartmouth staff will track it down in the stacks to verify if it exists. If a Dartmouth patron needs to borrow a volume that is at Readex, we know they will have it back in Hanover within twenty-four hours.

Every year the project team members gather to talk about what is working, what could be improved, and what we see happening in the coming months. We’ve gotten into the habit of each taking turns hosting the event. When the Readex team comes to Dartmouth they are able to check on the physical volumes and double check the item count in order to adjust their benchmarks. When we visit Readex we are able to touch base with the scan operators and provide training updates on book handling. As the Library’s digital program has taken shape, we have learned useful project management tips from our Readex colleagues. Our last project meeting was at Readex in Chester, VT and focused on winding down the project sometime in April 2013.

Teamwork – something to celebrate.

Written by Barbara Sagraves.

Welcome (Again), Ryland!

I am happy to announce that effective November 5 Ryland Ianelli will start as the Manton Digital Production Technician. Ryland has been a member of Preservation Services since October 2011 when he was hired to work on the U. S. Congressional Serial Set Project and various digital production projects. In the last year Ryland has worked on Occom Circle, Photographic Files, and produced optical character recognition (OCR) text for the forthcoming Japanese Press Translation Project.

Ryland has a Master of Fine Arts in Cartooning from the Center for Cartoon Studies and a Bachelor's degree in Art History from Reed College. Prior to coming to Dartmouth he had several years of experience working as a Collection Assistant in the Reed College Visual Resources Collection.

The digital production technician is a two-year temporary position in the Digital Production Unit of Preservation Services funded by the Manton Endowment Reserve. I’m delighted to have Ryland full time in the Production Unit.

Bill Ghezzi
Interim Digital Production Manager