In the 1980s, librarians and archivists accepted responsibility for conservation management as a vitally important aspect of their work. Their increased role in this area influenced research and development trends towards a concentration on mass techniques. These included environmental control with emphasis on preservation rather than creature comfort, fire prevention, and disaster recovery, but developments in mass deacidification have eclipsed all else. And now there are indications that developments in the mass strengthening of paper could make mass deacidification by itself obsolete. Archivists need to become familiar with these developments so as to evaluate their use and/or modify them to suit particular archival needs.

This content is only available as a PDF.