Preservation Assessment to Preserve Archival Collection

FAIN: PG-51737-12

B.F. Jones Memorial Library (Aliquippa, PA 15001-3763)
Linda Helms (Project Director: May 2011 to September 2013)

Hiring a consultant to conduct a preservation assessment of the library's special collection of newspaper clippings, photographs, yearbooks, and steel industry documents. The collections are used by researchers and community organizations to demonstrate the development and impact of the steel industry in Western Pennsylvania in the 19th and 20th century, as well as the social and cultural history of the region.

This project will provide a Preservation Needs Assessment by a professional preservation consultant for the B.F. Jones Memorial Library’s Pennsylvania Collection. The Library building and portions of the Pennsylvania Collection were donated by the family of steel magnate Benjamin Franklin Jones in 1926. The Library also serves as the Aliquippa District Library Center for Beaver County, PA. The Pennsylvania Collection consists of monographs, serials, and newsletters associated with the 20th century steel industry; microfilm of local newspapers from the 1830s-present; and historic photographs and yearbooks which document the construction of J&L Steel’s Aliquippa Works and its planned workers community, now the City of Aliquippa. The Pennsylvania Collection is valued by scholars because it provides important primary sources related to the history of western Pennsylvania and the steel industry. The total budget for this preservation assessment project is $5,650.