How best to protect valuble paperback

It's twenty years old already. It's in very good condition,
but with the pages starting to yellow. How should it be
stored please? I realize it should be kept at room temp.
and away from light...any other pointers? I just figured I'd
pack it in it's own little box.

--
Regards, IM

On 9 Oct 2004 05:41:36 -0700, (ivy_mike) wrote:

It's twenty years old already. It's in very good condition,
but with the pages starting to yellow.

If it's really valuable, you need to have it de-acidified. You could
do this yourself, but for a one-off you're probably better sending it
away.

How should it be stored please?

http://amol.org.au/recollections/1/2/index.htm

Basic, but a good start. Then try the conservator lists, like
http://palimpsest.stanford.edu

I realize it should be kept at room temp.
and away from light..

Those are the obvious, yet relatively minor things. Humidity is
probably the most crucial, and controlled pH helps too.

"Acid-free" isn't enough. Your book is already acidic and getting
worse. Your working materials should also be "buffered" - an excess of
alkali, to ensure that it remains non-acidic in the future. Most good
quality archival materials are already buffered, not just acid-free.

The only time "acid free" is really appopriate is for dealign with
colour film and photos. These not only need to avoid acid, but also
avoid alkalis. Some album papers can be just as damaging (the trick is
to use a non-buffered interleaf).

I just figured I'd pack it in it's own little box.

A box is a good idea. Get some mounting board and some archival-safe
tape (probably gummed paper or linen) and make up a storage box to
fit. Recollections describes a simple "phase box", or you can look in
a good bookbinding book (like the Thames and Hudson one) and see
descriptions of better boxes.

--
Smert' spamionam

"ivy_mike" wrote in message
om...
It's twenty years old already. It's in very good condition,
but with the pages starting to yellow. How should it be
stored please? I realize it should be kept at room temp.
and away from light...any other pointers? I just figured I'd
pack it in it's own little box.

--
Regards, IM

Are you absolutely, positively, 100% certain that this paperback is
valuable and worth preserving? What is it?

Kris

On Sat, 09 Oct 2004 18:00:29 GMT, "Kris Baker"
wrote:

Are you absolutely, positively, 100% certain that this paperback is
valuable and worth preserving? What is it?

Worth is quite possibly in the eye of the beholder. If your wallet
outweighs the cost of helping preserve it, then go to it, no matter
what anyone else's judgement of literary merit is.

Does "Fly Fishing" by J R Hartley have any resonance for the
non-Brits?

--
Smert' spamionam

"michael adams" wrote in message ...

snipped for space
This stuff is expensive
and whether it would be economic for just one book
would depend on just how valuable it was.

Thanks for the info Michael and Andy.

And Khris wrote:

Are you absolutely, positively, 100% certain that this paperback is
valuable and worth preserving? What is it?

Well, I thought there'd be some curiosity, so I'll fill you in.
First of all, the book is not *that* valuable; certainly not priceless,
or anywhere near that, so I hope I didn't give the wrong impression.
But I paid $70 for it this week from a seller on Amazon. I've received
it and it is in very good condition as the seller stated. Others are
asking around $116 for copies in similar condition, and $59 for copies
that sound to be in pretty bad shape, so I think I got a pretty good deal.
The book is _The Hate Factory_ and will never be reprinted supposedly.
It is the inside story of the 1980 Santa Fe prison riot. I just initially
wanted to *read* the book, but since I had to pay the piper to do that,
I figured that I now have a little investment perhaps (besides, I think
it's kinda neat having a valuable *paperback* from 1983 of all things).

--
Regards, IM

On 9 Oct 2004 15:46:41 -0700, (ivy_mike) wrote:

The book is _The Hate Factory_ and will never be reprinted supposedly.
It is the inside story of the 1980 Santa Fe prison riot.

De-acidify it then. If it's only 25 years old, then you should have
good results.

My "most valuable" paperbacks are 1938-1938 Penguins on the run-up to
WW2 ("Europe and the Czechs" etc.). These are already pretty crispy
and not much I do to them will preserve them beyond the next 50
years..

Andy Dingley wrote in message . ..
On 9 Oct 2004 05:41:36 -0700, (ivy_mike) wrote:

It's twenty years old already. It's in very good condition,
but with the pages starting to yellow.

If it's really valuable,

It would be very interesting to learn exactly
which "twenty year old paperbacks" are "really
valuable." In fact, I have not run into very
many FORTY year old paperbacks which are "really
valuable."

Of course, I am referring to mass
market paperbacks, not some paperback-sized
pamphlet of which 300 copies were printed by
an obscure little alley shop of yore. Perhaps
that is what he refers to, because one thing I
have learned about paperbacks is that they have
not generally appreciated all that much in forty
and fifty years, certainly not in a way that even
comes close to approaching the way comic books
of similar vintage have appreciated.

Not long ago I tried to make a list of the ten most
valuable mass market paperbacks (meaning beginning
with those from the first Penguins of the late 1930's
and after, and not the earlier paperback experiments
which did not catch on with the book-buying public).

I was not able to put that together, because after
the Ace Double novel with the "Willie Lee" (William
S. Burroughs) JUNKIE on one side, generally offered
nowadays from anywhere from $1,000 to $3,000 in
excellent condition, there is such a sharp drop in
prices that I defy anyone reading this to make me a
list of ten mass market paperbacks which cannot be
readily purchased in fine condition for considerably
less than $1,000 each. In fact, I don't believe
there are a great many mass-market paperbacks which
cannot be readily purchased in fine condition for
less than *$100*.


you need to have it de-acidified. You could
do this yourself, but for a one-off you're probably better sending it
away.

That would take a real preservationist's zeal
if you are talking about something you can get
on Abebooks for $10.00, and it seems to me that
there are not too many "twenty year old paperbacks"
which do not fall into that price category, or one
far lower.

How should it be stored please?

http://amol.org.au/recollections/1/2/index.htm

Basic, but a good start. Then try the conservator lists, like
http://palimpsest.stanford.edu

I realize it should be kept at room temp.
and away from light..

Those are the obvious, yet relatively minor things. Humidity is
probably the most crucial, and controlled pH helps too.

"Acid-free" isn't enough. Your book is already acidic and getting
worse. Your working materials should also be "buffered" - an excess of
alkali, to ensure that it remains non-acidic in the future. Most good
quality archival materials are already buffered, not just acid-free.


The only time "acid free" is really appopriate is for dealign with
colour film and photos. These not only need to avoid acid, but also
avoid alkalis. Some album papers can be just as damaging (the trick is
to use a non-buffered interleaf).

I just figured I'd pack it in it's own little box.

A box is a good idea. Get some mounting board and some archival-safe
tape (probably gummed paper or linen) and make up a storage box to
fit. Recollections describes a simple "phase box", or you can look in
a good bookbinding book (like the Thames and Hudson one) and see
descriptions of better boxes.

I can't see it. The fun thing to do is buy
a free-standing paperback rack like the sort
they used to have in the drugstores. Display
your old paperbacks there. Whee. Prices of old
paperbacks being as low as they are, you could
put together a stunner of a conversation piece
for maybe a $1,000, and certainly a lot less
if you hunted up your paperbacks at garage
and rummage sales, etc. Just tell your
guests it is a look but not touch thing.
Anyway, I am really curious to know what
twenty year old paperback is so valuable
it needs to put away in a box instead of
enjoyed.

Mr. Palmer
Room 314

Andy Dingley wrote in message . ..
On Sat, 09 Oct 2004 18:00:29 GMT, "Kris Baker"
wrote:

Are you absolutely, positively, 100% certain that this paperback is
valuable and worth preserving? What is it?

Worth is quite possibly in the eye of the beholder. If your wallet
outweighs the cost of helping preserve it, then go to it, no matter
what anyone else's judgement of literary merit is.

Some of those notions about how to best
preserve twenty year old paperbacks seem
very time consuming if you do it yourself
and expensive if you pay someone else to
do it. When you are talking about spraying
some substance or other on every page, as the
one party suggested, your are talking "labor
intensive." Since the prices of old paperbacks
are generally so low, I think most people who
feel very strongly about preserving a certain
paperback -- at least if they can get it on
Abebooks for less than $10 -- would be further
ahead to simply buy three or four of them and
hope that at least one c opy lasts. From
the processes described on this thread, they
would be be putting a lot more into taking all
those measures just to preserve one paperback.

By the way, reports of natural paperback
deterioration have been greatly exaggerated.
I have read remarks by "experts" writing in
the 1970's asserting that most paperbacks
won't last for thirty years. On the contrary,
I have seen many fifty year old and older paperbacks
in near fine condition (though in most cases with
slightly yellowed pages, of course, just as with
a newspaper of the same age) and I do mean pulp
paper p.b.'s, not the higher cost ones with the
more expensive paper. Further, the pulp-paper
paperbacks of the same vintage which are in
something less (sometimes far less) than "near
fine condition with slight page-yellowing" are
those which have obviously suffered from rough
handling.


Mr. Palmer
Room 314

Does "Fly Fishing" by J R Hartley have any resonance for the
non-Brits?

Bill Palmer writes:

I defy anyone reading this to make me a
list of ten mass market paperbacks which cannot be
readily purchased in fine condition for considerably
less than $1,000 each. In fact, I don't believe
there are a great many mass-market paperbacks which
cannot be readily purchased in fine condition for
less than *$100*.

Maxwell Grant. The Shadow and the Voice of Murder (LA Bantam, pictorial cover).
$1500.

Edgar Rice Burroughs. Tarzan in the Forbidden City (LA Bantam, pictorial
cover). $1000.

[Note: One would be hard-pressed to find any of the other 35 LA Bantam issues
in fine condition for less than $100]

William Lee (William S. Burroughs). Junkie (1st UK ed.: Digit Books). $7000
(scarcer than the Ace original).

Pearl S. Buck. The Good Earth (Pocket, 1938, unnumbered "market test" edition).
$6000.

James Hilton. Lost Horizon (Pocket, 1939, with movie tie-in sheet and
solicitation postcard laid in). $1000.

Very close to $1000 in fine condition:

Walt Disney Tells the Story of Pinocchio (Whitman, 1939)

Jim Thompson. The Killer Inside Me (Lion, 1952).

Joe Franklin and Laurie Palmer. The Marilyn Monroe Story (Greenberg, 1953).

Larence Block (writing as Jill Emerson). Threesome (Berkley, 1970).

A complete set of fine mass market PBOs by Jim Thompson, David Goodis, Cornell
Woolrich and Charles Willeford (to name only four authors) would already put
you into a collection of dozens of titles priced at over $100. Fine copies of
any of the first 10 Pocket books can bring over $100. There are scores more.


Bob
Print Matters! Used & Rare Books
http://www.abebooks.com/home/printmat

On 13 Oct 2004 04:58:02 GMT, usted (Bob Riedel)
wrote:


Maxwell Grant. The Shadow and the Voice of Murder (LA Bantam, pictorial cover).
$1500.

[snip]

Dead on. And are the old, unmarked Dell crossword puzzle books still
getting top whack?

I'll add to your list of $100+ titles in fine condition:

Harlan Ellison - Rumble (Pyramid 1958), $350-475.
Harlan Ellison - The Deadly Streets (Ace 1958), $100-200
Harlan Ellison - The Juvies (Ace 1961), $175-350
Harlan Ellison - Gentleman Junkie (Regency 1961), $150-275
Harlan Ellison - Memos From Purgatory (Regency 1961), $100-225
Harlan Ellison - Rockabilly (Gold Medal 1961), $100-211
Philip Jose Farmer - Image of the Beast (Essex House 1968), $175-250
Philip Jose Farmer - Blown (Essex House 1969), $125-350
Philip Jose Farmer - A Feast Unknown (Essex House 1969), $125-300

As usual, Palmer is clueless.