The Best of Both Worlds: A Digital Preservation Project
| Date | 01 December 2005 |
| Pages | 13-16 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/07419050510644338 |
| Published date | 01 December 2005 |
| Author | Jennifer Whitt,S.K. Hastings |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science |
The Best of Both Worlds:
A Digital Preservation Project
Jennifer Whitt and S.K. Hastings
LIBRARY HITECH NEWS Number 10 2005, pp. 13-16, #Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 0741-9058, DOI 10.1108/07419050510644338 13
Introduction
The University of North Texas
Libraries' has in its holdings the first
volume of The American Library
Journal (currently known as Library
Journal). This is the oldest independent
national library publication and was
first published in 1876 with Melvil
Dewey serving as the managing editor.
Taking this into consideration, this is an
important part of library history and
should be accessible, useable and
readable.
The pre-1900 volumes, beginning in
September 1876, have become victims
of age and use. The pages are brittle and
breaking away from their bindings. The
binding and the spine have been hand
repaired and the hinges are broken. The
integrity of the original issues has been
damaged by the possible removal of the
original covers.
Many of these early volumes are
housed in phase boxes (encasements to
protect the volumes from light, dust and
movement) (Figures 1 and 2), which
gives an appearance of uselessness to
the average patron. Texts in this
condition cannot be photocopied due to
their deteriorating condition so their
usability is diminished.
The microfilm is usable, but is not
the best copy. There are vertical lines
going through the pages along with
other marks that are present when
printed from the microfilm machines.
There is no index, so the user must
manually search the microfilmed text
for information.
The original focus of this project was
to create a life-like digital book. The
journal would be scanned from cover to
cover, in color, creating an exact digital
representation of the print copy.
Scanning in color would allow the user
to see the browned, brittle pages,
including the broken edges and it would
feel like the patron was using the real
thing. None of the originality of the
printed page would be lost. This,
however, was not practical. Although
this 1876 publication is wonderful, it is
not rare, and the binding is not unique.
This information shaped this project
early on, taking it from a conservation
project to a preservation project.
Conservation is the preservation of the
artifact (or container), while
preservation is extending the usability
of the content. In the case of The
American Library Journal, it is the
intellectual content that makes it worth
digitizing in order to create
accessibility in a readable and
searchable form, thereby extending its
use. The container is a common library
binding that serves the sole purpose of
combining the separate issues into one
volume.
Process
The first and most important step in
deciding to digitize The American
Library Journal was the issue of
copyright. According to the US
Copyright Office, Circular 15t
Extension of Copyright Terms, Works
published before January 1, 1923 would
have fallen into public domain at the
end of the calendar year 1997.
Consequently, these works do not
receive the additional 20 years of
copyright protection created by Public
Law 105-298. Since the issues had
fallen into the public domain, the works
could be digitized without obtaining
copyright clearance.
The next step was to decide what
type of scanner could offer the best
results for this project. A flat bed
scanner could be used for the detached
(or loose) pages quite easily. However,
once there came a need to digitize those
pages still attached to the text block,
maneuvering such a large volume with
brittle paper onto a flatbed scanner
would have caused more damage than
what was already there. The flatbed
scanner also could not produce the
clean images that were desired for this
project (Figure 3).
The University of North Texas
Digital Projects Department lab (www.
library.unt.edu/digitalprojects) offered
the use of their cradle scanner, the
Zeutschel 10000 (Figure 4). This is a
high-performance piece of equipment
that produces high-quality scanning
results using an overhead scanner. The
book cradle adjusts up and down, and
together and apart in order to
Figure 2
Condition of original journal volume
Figure 1
Phase box and journal volume
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