Preservation and Disaster-Preparedness Assessment to Preserve the Library's Special Collections

FAIN: PG-51596-12

Swarthmore College (Swarthmore, PA 19081-1390)
Amy M. McColl (Project Director: May 2011 to September 2013)

A preservation assessment of the College's special collections, to include the Rare Book Room, the Friends Historical Library, and the Peace Collection. The assessment would help identify preservation priorities and lead to disaster preparation strategies for the three collections, which are in regular use by students and a wide variety of humanities scholars interested in Quakerism and the history of social reform movements in North America during the last two centuries.

Swarthmore College requests an NEH grant to support an assessment by an expert consultant of the current preservation practices of its Rare Book Room, Friends Historical Library, and Peace Collection, and an assessment of disaster preparedness procedures for McCabe Library, which houses these collections. Significant holdings include the W.H. Auden Collection; volumes from Thomas Jefferson’s library; correspondence of T.S. Eliot; an extensive private press and artists’ book collection; the largest depository of archives, manuscripts and printed material concerning the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in North America; and North America’s only collection related solely to peace, disarmament, conscientious objection, non-violence, and women in the peace movement. These irreplaceable items are currently at risk of extensive damage due to the unstable conditions in McCabe Library, and an assessment would be the first step toward ensuring their preservation.