Preservation Assessment for The Mercantile Library

FAIN: PG-287609-22

Mercantile Library, The (Cincinnati, OH 45202-3908)
Cedric Rose (Project Director: January 2022 to April 2025)

A general preservation assessment of the Mercantile Library’s collections, which include the library’s institutional archives dating to its founding in 1835, historic books within an 80,000-volume print collection, and artworks and furnishings collected by the library.

This application requests a grant of $8279 to fund a Preservation Assessment conducted by the New England Document Conservation Center to cover the book collection, archives, and artwork housed in The Mercantile Library. The Preservation Assessment will be the first step in the preparation of a long-range preservation plan to improve the housing and accessibility of the Library’s archives, books, and artworks, in the context of a planned expansion of the physical space of the Library that will double its square footage.