Lawrence Technological University's Albert Kahn Library Collection, Improving the storage environment, purchase of preservation supplies, consultation and staff training.

FAIN: PG-266619-19

Lawrence Technological University (Southfield, MI 48075-1051)
Cynthia Simpson (Project Director: January 2019 to March 2022)

The purchase of preservation supplies and environmental monitoring equipment, as well as training in preservation methods for staff caring for the personal library of German American architect Albert Kahn, one of this country’s most prolific architects of the early twentieth century.  Kahn designed 1,900 buildings across Michigan and around the United States, and his company was chosen as a consulting firm for the Soviet Union’s first Five-Year Plan (1928-1932).  Notably, the library includes copies of the periodical, USSR in Construction, which feature Margaret Bourke White’s photographs of Kahn’s tractor factories in the Soviet Union.  More than 2,000 monographs and periodicals are complemented by unpublished archival materials such as photographs, scrapbooks, and building folios of interest to architectural and industrial historians.

NEH Grant Abstract- Lawrence Technological University In 2015, Lawrence Technological University applied for, and was awarded a NEH Preservation Assistance Grant to obtain a Preservation Assessment of the Albert Kahn Library Collection. The resulting preservation needs report suggested short, medium and long-term goals for the preservation of the collection. The Albert Kahn Library Collection is the personal working library of architect Albert Kahn (1869-1942) and contains over 2,000 books, periodicals and photos that chronicle his work designing and building commercial, religious, academic, and domestic structures both in Michigan, the U.S., and worldwide. The Albert Kahn Library Collection is housed a a space created to mirror Kahn's Detroit architectural office, with original book cabinets and stained glass windows. The current grant request would provide consultation for environmental monitoring, preservation storage equipment, and specialized preservation training.