On Display: Documenting the Library's History

The State Library’s 200th anniversary might have been in March, but the celebration of our history continues in April with items on display our Collection Spotlight case. The March 1926 issue of Library Journal featuring an image of the State Library remains on display and is joined by a selection of items from our 100-year anniversary in 1926, along with a staff favorite photograph. These items will be on view in our main reading room from March 31 through May 5.

On display is the invitation and program for the celebratory event held in honor of the Library’s 100th birthday on March 3, 1926. From these two items, we gain a sense of the formality of the event. The invitation was issued by members of the Board of Trustees and "requested the honor of your presence at exercises to be held in the House of Representatives." From the accompanying program, we know that these "exercises" were primarily speeches. The event was presided over by Senate President Hon. Wellington Wells, with remarks from Governor Alvan K. Fuller and the Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Honorable Nathan Matthews. The keynote address was given by Dr. Roscoe Pound, Dean of Harvard University Law School, on the topic of The State Library in Modern Society. In addition to these speeches, the program also notes that within the Library was an exhibition of books, medals, and pictures.

This event does not differ greatly from the event that we held on March 3, 2026 in the Library's main reading room. Our 200th birthday event included remarks by Governor Maura Healey, Secretary of Administration and Finance Matthew Gorzkowicz, Senate President Karen Spilka, Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin, and Library Trustees Rep. Kate Hogan, Michele Capone, and Robert Cerasoli, who also presided over the festivities. Guests at our event were encouraged to sign our guestbook with well wishes, and this book, along with promotional materials from all our March events, will be added to our institutional records. 

Rounding out our display this month is a photograph that is a favorite among staff members and has been reproduced in our new exhibit, The State of the Library: 200 Years of Serving the Commonwealth. The photograph shows librarians and patrons in our main reading room in 1912. There are a number of photographs in our institutional records that document the reading room, staff, and events, though they primarily date to the 1950s and onward. This is one of the few photographs from the early 1900s.

Highlighting items from our institutional archives allows us to share our history as we continue to celebrate our 200th year, but these items also help us to mark Preservation Week, which occurs April 26 through May 2. The theme this year is Is This Thing On? Preserving Memories and Creating Archives. Preservation Week encourages institutions and individuals to focus on measures that can be taken to ensure the longevity of collection items, much like library staff one hundred years ago saved materials from the 1926 celebrations to add to the Library’s institutional memory. In your own life, if you have saved birthday cards, yearbooks, photographs, journals, or a myriad of other personal items, then you are also working to preserve history and add to the collective memory of your family and community. For materials that you want to save long-term, be sure to house everything in archivally sound materials that are free of acid and lignin. You can find a selection of at-home preservation tips here and always reach out to special.collections@mass.gov with any preservation questions, we are happy to assist as you create and maintain your own personal archives!

Elizabeth Roscio

Preservation Librarian

On Display for AAPI Month and Preservation Week

This month, our Collection Spotlight item is pulling double-duty, and is highlighting both May’s designation as Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month (AAPI Month), and this week’s celebration of Preservation Week (April 27 through May 3). We are once again displaying the 1930 and 1931 editions of the Chinese Directory of New England, which was previously displayed in 2022. The directories help us to draw attention to the rising Chinese-American population in New England in the early 1900s, and this blog post also discusses the ways in which the library deploys preservation measures to ensure their stability for years to come. 

The 1930 directory was the first of its kind to be published in New England, and it was born out of a call from the growing Chinese-American community to have a resource that would list Chinese restaurants, stores, and laundries found within individual New England towns. Also found within the pages of both the 1930 and 1931 directory are advertisements, the bulk of which are for Chinese-owned businesses, but there are also a fair amount for non-Chinese owned businesses. This emphasizes that these business owners acknowledged the importance of New England’s Chinese residents as a vital part of the community and economy. And here at the State Library, we appreciate that the directory also includes an image of the State House, and find it fitting that a copy of the directory ended up in the collection here. Read more about these directories in our previous blog post. 

To ensure the long-term preservation of these directories – which are approaching their 100th birthday – we have displayed them open to different pages than they were three years ago. This decreases the amount of light damage to the directories, but it should also be noted that our Collection Spotlight case is designed to limit light and UV exposure, thus making it safe to display items. When these items are not on display, they are housed in dark storage in their own enclosures, to ensure that they do not get dusty. In addition to the directories, our display also includes a facsimile of two additional pages from 

the 1930 directory; the welcome letter from Governor Frank G. Allen along with his portrait. In this instance, the use of facsimiles allows us to display additional pages from the directories other than the ones they are open to, but sometimes, facsimiles serve as a preservation measure. Facsimiles, which are realistic copies, can be used instead of originals, both in display and for research purposes. If a display case does not have UV treated glass, than displaying a facsimile is a safe way to present the content and look of the original, while keeping the actual original safe from potential damage. And for researchers, in the event that the original is very fragile, then a facsimile or use copy can be provided, so that the researcher can access and handle the item without the threat of causing any damage.  

Preservation Week is an annual event, meant to raise awareness of the preservation work that happens in libraries and archives, as well as inspiring the public to think about the preservation of their own personal collections. The theme for Preservation Week 2025 is “Preserve the Past, Shape the Future,” a mission that we strive for at the State Library. Through our hands-on conservation program, our preservation management activities, and our commitment to digitization, we aim to do our part to preserve materials of the past, and make them accessible to researchers and the general public now and in the future. Since the last time that we displayed the Chinese directories, we are happy to share that they have been added to our digital repository. The directories in their entirety can be accessed here: 1930 and 1931. Links to the directories are also included as a QR code on the case label, so that visitors can access the full directory while viewing our display. There are multiple benefits of digitizing our collection; digitization helps to make our collection accessible to a larger remote audience, and from a preservation standpoint, also helps to maintain the integrity of the physical item because it decreases the use and handling of the physical item, thus also decreasing the likelihood of damage. Each year, we select materials from our Special Collections and Reference collection to either digitize on-site, or if it is a large-scale project, then we work with off-site vendors. We are continuously continuously increasing the amount of materials that are available in digital format.  

Visit us from April 29 through June 3 to see these items on display, and read more about AAPI Month here. And in honor of Preservation Week, you can also check out our two preservation focused Flickr pages for examples of work done in our lab and preservation tips you can use at home. Additional information about Preservation Week, along with some actions you can apply to your own collection, can be found on the official website.

Elizabeth Roscio

Preservation Librarian

Preservation Week at the State Library!

Happy Preservation Week! Established by the American Library Association in 2005, Preservation Week is a yearly event that raises awareness for preservation work undertaken in library, archives, and museums to safeguard our shared cultural heritage. Preservation Week is also a time to encourage the public to think about actions that they can take to protect their own personal collections. This year, it is celebrated from April 28 through May 4 with the theme "Preserving Identities." 

In our Collection Spotlight case, we’re kicking off Preservation Week by highlighting an item that has benefited from preservation work and also aligns with May’s designation as Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) month. Last year, we shared a few facsimiles from an album titled “Photographs of Schools,” which was produced by the Hawaii Department of Education and donated to the State Library in July 1924. It comprises seventeen photographs of Hawaiian schools, teachers, and students dating from sometime between 1897 and 1922. This year, we’re sharing the album itself in our Collection Spotlight case. The reason that we can share the actual item instead of facsimiles is because our Collection Spotlight case is specifically designed to protect exhibited items. One of the largest threats to archival items is light damage, from both natural and artificial light sources, which accumulates over time and cannot be reversed. As such, it is optimal for archival items to remain in dark storage unless they are being accessed by a researcher - but this at odds with the desire to display archival items! Luckily, our Collection Spotlight case has been designed with this in mind, and its glass panel is “SmartGlass” which has UV filters and a layer of light-controlling film. When not in use, the glass portion of the case is dark, until it is activated by a button which lights the case for 30 seconds. This allows the case to remain dark for the majority of the time but illuminated when a visitor wants to view the exhibited item, allowing us to safely display even our more sensitive items, like the photograph album we’re sharing this month. Regular readers of our blog may have noticed that the contents of our Collection Spotlight case changes every month. This is another preventative preservation measure, as a monthly exhibit rotation limits the amount of time that an archival item spends out its controlled storage environment. 

Another way that this scrapbook has benefited from preservation initiatives is that it has been digitized. The most obvious benefit of digitization is that it makes our collection more accessible to a wider audience who can access it remotely, but from a preservation standpoint, it is also beneficial because it reduces the amount of handling that the item receives. The more an item is handled, the higher the likelihood is that it will be damaged. By having researchers access a digital surrogate, we can preserve the integrity of the original and ensure its longevity. We do some digitization on-site, but we also send larger projects to vendors off-site. 

This month, we’ve displayed the album open to a show an image of pupils in front of the Kawaiaha’o Common School (above) and an image of a few of the teachers grouped with a few students (right). The Common School was originally the Old Mission School House, founded in the 1830s by missionary Sybil Bingham.  Unfortunately, only two of the images can be exhibited, but the album in  its entirety can be viewed here. And another preservation note, if we were to exhibit this album again, we would select different pages to open it to. 

Stop by the library throughout the month of May to see this scrapbook on display, and follow along as we share preservation content on our social media channels all week! You can also check out our two preservation focused Flickr pages for examples of work done in our lab and preservation tips you can use at home.

Elizabeth Roscio

Preservation Librarian

Preservation Week at the State Library: A Conserved Item on Display!

Happy Preservation Week! April 30 through May 6 has been designated by the American Library Association as time to raise awareness of the preservation measures that are taken in libraries, archives, and museums to ensure the long-term integrity of their collections. Here at the State Library, our preservation program covers book and paper repair, reformatting, environmental monitoring and disaster preparedness, and re-housing and cleaning our collection. The physical repair of items in our collection is called conservation, and while we undertake a fair amount of that work on-site in our preservation lab, we also occasionally send out items to be treated at the Northeast Document Conservation Center (NEDCC). This month, we are celebrating Preservation Week by exhibiting an item in our display case that has undergone treatment at NEDCC, along with a facsimile of it in its “before” state. Displaying these items side-by-side really emphasizes the transformation that an item undergoes when it’s conserved!

The displayed broadside is An Act to Prevent Profane Cursing and Swearing, published by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1798. It was part of an NEDCC project in 2017/2018 to conserve some of the historically significant broadsides in our Special Collections holdings. When we work with NEDCC, they begin by sending us a condition assessment and proposed treatment plan. Once the item has been conserved, we receive before/after images, along with a detailed description of the item’s condition upon receipt and subsequent treatment. Having thorough documentation of condition and treatment allows us to maintain a comprehensive record of the items in our collection. In this instance, the broadside had tape and residual adhesive removed, it was humidified and cleaned, and tears were mended with toned Japanese paper. Then the back of the page was lined with Japanese paper and wheat starch paste, making it safer for handling. The result is a cleaner and sturdier broadside that looks almost as good as it would have back when it was first printed in the 18th century!

And now a note on the content of item that so much work went into to conserve! This broadside was issued in June 1798 after an act was passed by the Senate and the House of Representatives that states, “if any person, who has arrived at discretion, shall profanely curse or swear, and shall be therefore convicted, such person so offending, shall forfeit and pay a sum not exceeding two dollars, nor less than one dollar, according to the aggravation of the offense.” The act went on to state that if swearing occurred in the presence of any Sherriff, Deputy Sherriff, Coroner, Constable, Grand Juror, or Tythingman, then they should report the act to the Justice of the Peace so that the offender could be convicted and punished. Broadsides such as this were then sent to Town Clerks throughout the Commonwealth to be read aloud at town meetings, and they were also sent to public teachers of religion (or pastors) to be read to their congregations annually. So in sum, if you wanted to avoid paying a fee in the Commonwealth in the late 1700s, you better not swear in the presence of any public official!  And while seemingly not enforced, blasphemy is still on the books of Massachusetts law! 

If you have an item in your personal collection that needs professional conservation treatment, you can find a list of local conservators through the American Institute for Conservation directory. But much of the information shared by organizations during Preservation Week can be applied to your collection on your own. We will be posting preservation content on our social media channels every day this week, so we hope that you will follow along as we celebrate all things preservation! And if you are in the area, be sure to visit us through May 30 to see our conserved broadside on display in our reading room.

Elizabeth Roscio
Preservation Librarian

Preservation Week at the State Library

Happy Preservation Week! This week is a time to raise awareness about the importance of preservation both in our professional library and archives settings, and your personal collections at home. Each year, the State Library marks the week with daily preservation content on our social media platforms.

We’re starting the week off by following up on a post from last year. In February 2020, a staff member was looking through a bound volume of 1822-1824 Old Colony Memorial (OCM) newspapers and came across four fern fronds pressed between the pages. We shared the find during Preservation Week and explained the preservation measures that we would take after the ferns’ discovery. Since the OCM is still an active publication, when they saw this post they reached out, asked some follow-up questions, and then wrote about the find. You can read that article here. 

When the ferns were shared last year, State Library staff was still working remotely so we were unable to take any further preservation actions at the time, and the ferns remained in place. Now that staff has returned to the library, we’ve been able to focus on completing this task. We began by going through the entire bound volume to make sure that there was no additional material hidden within the pages, and it’s a good thing that we did! In addition to the ferns that we knew about, we also found another set of fronds, seeds, and a selection of leaves. Someone clearly used this volume to press a variety of items that they found in nature! 

Each find was photographed to document the original placement, with a notation of the page number. We then carefully removed each item using a microspatula and tweezers. The items were placed on a piece of permalife paper cut to size, with the page number written on it in pencil. Each item was then encapsulated in a polyester sleeve. Finally, all the items were placed in a box, along with a folder of the photographs, and a folder containing a copy of the OCM newspaper article and factsheet that we had provided to the reporter. The box was labeled and stored with the bound volume. 

Some might question why we go to lengths to preserve these materials. Admittedly, they don’t add research value to the volume of newspapers, and we don’t even know who placed them or when (though if you clicked through to read the OCM article you’ll see that we have some guesses, and that this find did lead us to do some further research into the volume’s provenance). But we save them for the hidden history that they represent, and for the personal connection that they add to an item in our collection. We know that at some point in the newspaper’s history, whether it was during the binding process in the 1940s or by a librarian working with the volumes at a later date, someone removed this flora from its natural environment, carefully transported them to where the bound volume was held and placed them within the pages so that they would be pressed and preserved. Many of us can relate to this and recall at least one time when we’ve come across an item in nature that struck us and we wanted to preserve it in this manner. Since we’ve disturbed these items from their original resting spot, the least we can do is document that location and keep the items in archivally sound storage along with the volume.  

We use Preservation Week as a time not just to talk about the preservation measures that we undertake in our library, but to draw attention to the more personal ways that we all preserve the items that make up our own history. We hope that some of the tips that we share for our library collection are useful and applicable when working with your own collection. Follow along on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter as we celebrate Preservation Week 2022, and if you have any preservation questions, reach out to us by email (special.collections@mass.gov) or comment on any of our posts! 

Elizabeth Roscio
Preservation Librarian

Celebrate Preservation Week with the State Library

Happy Preservation Week! The American Library Association has designated April 25 through May 1 as a time to promote and advocate for preservation work. At the State Library, the work done in our preservation lab helps to maintain the integrity of the collection and ensure that historical resources will be accessible for generations to come. 

Each month, we select one collection item to share in our virtual display case and this month we’re combining that with Preservation Week to feature an item that needs a little bit of work. We’ve been working remotely since March 2020 so hands-on preservation work has been paused until we resume on-site, but one of the last items to be sent to the preservation lab was a small book published around 1774. In its current state, a past librarian made a cover out of regular office paper for this pamphlet, since it had lost its original title page, and the cover and book are stored together in an acid-free envelope. According to the handwritten cover, it is Letters Regarding Affairs in Boston, Mass. From the Point of View of the British Government, 1774. An additional notation reads that pages 1-2 and 119-end are missing. But with the original title page missing, we wanted to try and confirm the actual title of this pamphlet. While working remotely, we were able to use the few images that we had, and the text within those images, to search for and then compare our content with a digital copy of a pamphlet held in the collection of the Bodleian Library at Oxford University. From that comparison, we believe that this pamphlet is Sagittarius's letters and political speculations. Extracted from the Public ledger. Humbly inscribed to the very loyal and truly pious Doctor Samuel Cooper, Pastor of the Congregational Church in Brattle Street by John Mein and Samuel Cooper, printed in Boston “By order of the Select Men and sold at Donation Hall, for the benefit of the distressed patriots.” Historian and author J.L. Bell has written about this collection of letters over on his blog Boston1775. While being an interesting and historically significant item, this pamphlet also highlights the need for preservation work within our library. 

Even though this pamphlet was housed in an acid-free envelope, it is still in poor condition and needs some preservation attention. Within our lab, we have the capabilities to clean, re-house, mend, and restitch items from our collection. If a repair is beyond our scope, we can send items off-site to the Northeast Document Conservation Center for more extensive work. While we will not be able to assess this item and determine its treatment plan until we’re back on-site, we can tell from the images that it is dirty, the edges are ragged, there is adhesive tape from a previous repair effort, there is page loss, and that some of the stitches binding it together are loose.

But what caused this damage in the first place? We can make a guess that general handling and poor storage largely contributed to the deterioration of this pamphlet. Dust, grime, and oil from hands can build-up over time and lead to the discoloration of the pages. Handling it too roughly can cause dog-eared pages and tears, and storing it in an improper enclosure, or without one completely, will expose the item to fluctuations in temperature and humidity, light, and dust. After the item has been repaired, we’ll try to limit any further damage by doing a little bit of preventative preservation. This comes in the form of training our library staff and researchers on the best practices for handling fragile Special Collections materials. And we’ll also try to digitize the pamphlet so that the original can remain safely stored while the content can still be accessed electronically.  

This week we’ll be posting preservation content daily on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. We hope that you’ll follow along as we celebrate Preservation Week 2021, and if you have any preservation questions, reach out to us by email or comment on any of our posts! 

Elizabeth Roscio
Preservation Librarian

Preservation Week at the State Library

It’s Preservation Week! The American Library Association has designated April 26 through May 2 as a time to both celebrate and promote the importance of preservation. From physical repair, to re-housing, to environmental monitoring, libraries work hard in a number of ways to preserve their collections and ensure their accessibility for future generations. Here at the State Library, our preservation lab is located within the Special Collections Department, but it handles the collection maintenance and preservation needs of the entire library. With a collection as historical and varied as the Library’s, an on-site lab allows us to address preservation head-on and ensure the longevity of our many resources.

This year marks the 10th anniversary of Preservation Week. Visit the ALA website to access preservation tools and resources, and check out the wide array of free preservation webinars also available on the site.

We’ll be posting preservation content on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter all week so be sure to follow along! If you have any preservation questions, reach out to us by email or comment on any of our posts!


Elizabeth Roscio
Preservation Librarian

In Honor of Preservation Week: Preserving a Historic Album

In 1904, students of the Classical and English High School in Salem, Massachusetts created a historical photograph album depicting “Salem and Vicinity.” The unpublished manuscript is a compilation of write-ups, images, and photographs - all constructed and organized by the pupils. The outcome was a visually interesting and in-depth look at all of the historical landmarks and significant people of Salem and its surrounding areas. The album contained a preface written by then principal A.L. Goodrich, who described the book as a “collection of photographs of public buildings and places of historic interest.” Four students from Classical and English High School prepared the photographs used in the album: Harry Batchelder, Harry Bates, Edward Harlow, and Nathaniel Simonds. Harry Bates passed away before the album was completed, and his father stepped in and finished his son’s part of the project. Thirty-two upper classmen put an obvious amount of time and effort into this project, and it was part of our collection that deservedly needed some attention.

The damage on the album included a spine in poor condition, loose cover-boards, a detached signature (group of pages), and leather binding that has since decayed and flaked away. I began the conservation/preservation treatments by gently taking apart the cover-boards, spine, and text block with a scalpel. The spine, and what was left of the cover, was coated in Cellugel – a strong consolidant used for the prevention of leather deterioration. It’s important to salvage as much as you can from an original piece. As they dried, I moved on to cleaning the spine and covers. This included removing all of the material that will not be used in the construction of the new book – old tape, deteriorating book cloth, old batting, and spine mesh. I was left with a clean text block and book covers that were ready to be assembled.

 
Re-assembling the photo album began with applying fresh batting to the covers with archival quality adhesive. Batting was used as part of the construction of the original album, and we try to keep things as close to the original as possible. As they were setting, I cut some book cloth to size; this entailed measuring the spine of the book and cover-boards to ensure ample coverage. Once the batting was affixed to the cover-boards and the book cloth was properly measured and cut, I adhered the cover-boards to the cloth, leaving a space in-between them for the text block. The text block received a fresh strip of spine mesh – a reinforcement material for sewn spines. The text block was then placed in between the cover-boards, flanked with wax paper, and allowed to dry.

With the cover-boards, text block, and book cloth set-up, it was time to tip-in the loose pages. Tipping-In is a phrase used to describe the process of affixing an item to the text of a book. This process was completed by using a mix of Japanese tissue paper and adhesive, to paste the pages into the book. Once it was dry, I was able to move on to one of the final steps – reinforcing the cover boards with strips of archival paper.

Once all parts of the album were dry, it was time to focus on re-applying the original pieces of leather. The front was glued down with adhesive. The spine, given its fragile nature, would have been further damaged if I attempted to re-attach it. Instead, I constructed a four-flap enclosure – a protective container for permanently storing fragile items. This way, the album and the spine can be housed together safely.

Voila!

Kelly Turner
Preservation Librarian