Kenneth Spencer Research Library

An unused stretch of wall space on the first floor of Spencer has become the new home to about fifty paintings formerly housed in the Kansas Collection and University Archives stacks. Following a visit to the collection storage area at the Spencer Museum of Art, Conservation Services staff installed a similar gridwall panel system.

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Left: Wall space for hanging storage. Right: Installation of gridwall panels.

The panels are much like ones found in retail stores for displaying merchandise. They come in a variety of lengths and widths, which make them very adaptable to the existing environment in which they are placed. The walls on which the panels were mounted were a bit less cooperative, as evidenced by the number and wear on the bits used in drilling process.

Large collection of drill bits used during the installation process.

Staff first attached painted wooden boards to the wall to reinforce the plaster surface. This also ensured that the hooks used for hanging the gridwall panels could be accurately fixed in place.

Installed gridwall panels.

Once the installation was complete, staff fastened d-ring hangers with short, pan-head wood screws to the frames or stretcher bars on the verso of the paintings. Although a few of the paintings were already equipped with hooks and wires, it was deemed more secure and stable to use the d-ring hangers for hanging on the panels. The use of a d-ring on each side of the frame/stretcher bar allows the painting to be hung from a pair of hooks. In this manner, the painting will not slide from side to side as it would when hung on a wire over a single hanger.

Left: Attaching d-rings to painting stretcher bar. Right: Painting with d-ring attached to hook, then to panel.

The paintings were then arranged salon-style, using the panel space as efficiently as possible. The paintings are now much easier to page for patrons. This is also a better storage environment for the items, as they are no longer standing on one side of their frame/stretcher bar or resting against one another.

Left: Paintings hung in place. Right: Tyvek drapery to protect paintings from dust and light.

As a final preservation strategy, the paintings have been draped in Tyvek. This material, best known for its application in house construction, is an excellent, light-weight covering to protect the paintings from dust and abrasion. In addition, we created a visual map of all the paintings to aid in paging them for patrons with the least disruption to the Tyvek drapery.

Roberta Woodrick
Assistant Conservator
Conservation Services

November is bringing good news for the storage conditions for many oversized, flat items in the Kansas Collection. After much planning and pondering, the existing wooden “cubby” storage unit has been dismantled to make way for flat file storage drawers often referred to as map cases.

Kansas Collection cubbies, full of collection material

Over time, paintings, other framed materials, and oversized architectural drawings had ended up in the cubbies for lack of a more suitable place to store these challengingly-shaped and often very large items.

Empty Kansas Collection cubbies

Student employees and staff worked to clear collections from the wooden storage unit. Some of the materials will return to the newly installed map cases, while others have moved to an area specifically made for hanging paintings and framed objects. Conservation Services staff then took apart the cubbies using car jacks, pry bars, and a sledge hammer. The original structure of the cubbies relied heavily on a slot-in-tab method of construction which made for a smoother deconstruction than if the unit had been held together primarily with screws or nails.

Partially dismantled cubbies

In a happy bit of up-cycling, a sculpture professor in the Art Department at KU collected the nearly 50-year old ply board to be used by students working in the Fine Arts and Design Schools. Facilities Operations staff leveled the area by installing tile over the bare concrete floor and then installed fifteen five-drawer sets of map cases.

New map cases for flat storage

Over the coming months, oversized and flat material–housed in appropriately-sized folders–will be placed in the new cases. This will not only provide a better storage environment for the items, it will also make the materials easier to page for patron use.

Roberta Woodrick
Assistant Conservator
Conservation Services

One of the jobs of Conservation Services is to ensure that the storage spaces in Spencer Research Library are suitable for  collections materials. We have placed thirteen dataloggers–plastic boxes smaller than the side of a credit card–around Spencer Library to take readings of temperature and relative humidity at thirty-minute intervals.

A HOBO datalogger that records temperature and relative humidity in Spencer Library spaces.

The information is analyzed in a special software, called Climate Notebook, and the graphs are stored in a central location on KU Libraries’ network so various library staff members can watch for unusual changes in their spaces.

If paper-based materials become too hot and humid, mold could flourish and damage collections. If a storage space is too dry and hot, embrittlement of organic collection materials like paper and textiles could result. Generally, the lower the temperature, the better for our library collections, but because these collections occupy the same space as people, we’ve set a compromised standard of around 70 degrees Fahrenheit and 50% relative humidity.

Some Spencer collections are stored in KU Libraries’ high-density storage facility, which is kept at around 50 degrees F and 35% relative humidity. In such a space, materials will last longer as rates of deterioration are slowed.

Whitney Baker
Head, Conservation Services

Soon, Spencer Library will unveil its latest exhibition, on the work of John Gould and his atelier. Conservation Services staff support exhibition design by helping the curators present the items in their best light. For bound volumes this work often involves the construction of a supportive cradle.

Many library conservation labs construct cradles and supports from Vivak, a transparent, cold-bendable, PETG plastic. Unlike the more traditional Plexiglas, Vivak can be cut on our board shear (no scoring required).

Cutting a piece of Vivak on the board shear.

Once the sheet is cut, the locations for bending are transferred from a paper template to the Vivak sheet. Vivak comes with a protective plastic film that is left in place until the final installation to prevent scratching of the soft plastic.

Transferring marks from a paper template to the Vivak.

The plastic can be bent by hand, but we use a sheet metal bender to make the process easier. Plexiglas requires heat to bend, so we are happy to avoid that step and the accompanying fumes that result. Making cradles with Vivak is much quicker and less toxic.

Bending the plastic using a sheet metal bender

A finished Vivak cradle.

Vivak is not as sturdy as the Plexiglas we used to use, but if stored properly cradles can be reused for multiple exhibits.

Whitney Baker
Head, Conservation Services

As the 2014 Summer Conservation intern, I performed treatment on the University’s collection of Peggy Hull Deuell, America’s first female war correspondent. This part of the Kansas Collection is comprised of a wide variety of materials: newspaper clippings from the 19th-20th centuries, manuscripts dating from 1774, photographs, oversized items such as maps, transparent documents, and scrapbooks.

A significant portion of time was taken to wash and alkalize the very brittle and disheveled collection of newspaper clippings. During the weeks performing treatment, I became very familiar with Peggy’s style of writing; her sassy personality and strength of character were true elements in her journalism. As the only records of her reporting, these newspaper clippings are important testaments to not only her personal struggles, but also to the relationship she had with readers of the numerous newspapers she wrote for (including the El Paso Morning Times, Chicago Tribune, New York Daily News, and Cleveland Plain Dealer).

Though Ms. Hull was born in Bennington, Kansas (in 1889), she was hardly the typical Midwestern girl of the late 19th century. She was independent, intelligent, and very restless. It’s surprising then, that she never graduated high school and was intended to settle down and study pharmacy. This path did not last long; with the family’s subsequent proximity to Fort Riley and its soldier population, and Peggy’s eagerness for change, she soon discovered a new career in the form of journalism. The rest you could say, is history.

Peggy Hull [Deuell] in WWI uniform, 1917. Kansas Collection, Call Number RH MS 130. Click image to enlarge.

It was a rocky start for Peggy, who struggled to become recognized in an incredibly male-dominated field. In fact, it took Peggy about 10 years and travels all over the world to finally become an accredited war correspondent. Through her journeys across the U.S., to the Mexican border, and to Paris, London, Siberia, and Shanghai, she was teaching people about the war, current events, and even her everyday life.  It was Peggy’s determination, unrelenting optimism, and quirkiness that I found most exciting about this collection.

My favorite articles are those that interact with the reader: where you can really get a sense of Peggy, the person behind the journalist. Also quite lovely are the assortment of letters between Peggy and unknown correspondences (or rather, named yet unfamiliar). One such letter was even imprinted with what I believe to be Peggy’s lipstick! The smell was still quite intense, and I could just about imagine Peggy sealing the letter with a kiss (something I imagine she’s done for her three husbands)!

Amusing piece written by Peggy Hull Deuell. Peggy Hull Deuell Collection,
Kansas Collection, Call Number RH MS 130. Click image to enlarge.

Though the process of washing, repairing, and even reading Peggy’s newspaper clippings was intensive and often very entertaining, my favorite conservation treatment with this collection was of the oversized items. The flexibility of the project allowed me to spend time performing more in-depth treatment on a small selection of posters. One of the pieces is an article Peggy wrote about news in Siberia; the document had been pasted to a canvas, which was subsequently painted on the reverse. Over time, the newsprint became very brittle and discolored from both the adhesive and acidity of the material, resulting in a badly damaged article. To treat this object, I first removed dirt from the surface of the paper and then immersed it in a tray of water. After about 5 minutes of soaking in the bath, I was able to carefully separate the newsprint from the canvas. As suspected, the newsprint was extremely fragile and had broken into many pieces over its lifetime.  The canvas backing was discarded and the article was rewashed and alkalized in a separate bath to reduce its acidity. Then, after being dried and pressed flat, I undertook the tricky process of lining the article; in other words, I adhered a thin Japanese tissue to the back of the object in order to add strength and allow for the reattachment of its many pieces. Only when the pieces were reunited could I begin the process of toning papers and filling in missing areas to the overall document. Once treatment was completed, the article could be safely handled and more easily read.

Before, during, and after treatment of a clipping from the Peggy Hull Deuell Collection.
Kansas Collection, Call Number RH MS 130. Click images to enlarge.

Treatment of the Peggy Hull Deuell Collection was very successful, and I had a wonderful summer working between the Watson and Spencer Research Libraries. Peggy’s collection is also one of the many fantastic features that facilitates our study of war history, and in particular, helps to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. I do think that Peggy would be quite proud of her collection as well!

For further reading about Peggy and her adventures, I highly recommend The Wars of Peggy Hull by Wilda M. Smith and Eleanor A. Bogart, a book written with the consultation of this very collection!

Amber Van Wychen
2014 Summer Conservation Intern, Stannard Conservation Lab