Volume 29, Issue 3

In the summer of 1999, Yale University began a survey of its duplicate and master negative microfilm collection to assess its readiness for transfer to a new climate controlled high-density shelving facility. What began as a survey of the film's physical condition evolved into an examination of bibliographic control. While the survey did discover the need to re-spool, re-box, and re-label a portion of the collection, the most significant findings prompted changes in microfilm cataloging and processing routines.

From 1995 to the end of 1996 the Marburg Archive School carried out, with financial support from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), a project to determine the intrinsic value of archive and library material. The aim was to develop a list of criteria which would allow a speedy and rational selection of holdings requiring, on the one hand, measures to preserve the documents in their original state, or else conversion to durable materials.

Digital imaging has greatly enhanced how libraries and archives achieve their stated goals, whether it is for public or higher education. The double-barreled benefit of increased access to rare, fragile or special collections via the internet, and reduced handling of such collections by using electronic surrogates, has proven too alluring for most institutions to resist. The interest in digital imaging has been fueled by funding from both private and public funds that have been increasingly available over the past 5 years for digital library projects. The Library of Congress/ Ameritech National Digital Library Competition awarded grants from 1996-99, and did an excellent job of introducing many libraries and archives into the intricacies of digital conversion. Along with the CLIR-supported Digital Library Federation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has also been active in supporting and encouraging cooperative projects in the field. More recently, both the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities have awarded digital conversion grants, and the National Science Foundation has partnered with the Library of Congress to encourage initiatives using digital libraries as a platform for research. So, clearly, the momentum is there to begin production-scale digital conversion. But there are many difficult decisions that have to be made along the road to establishing a successful digital library program. Once institutions get involved with digital capture, they find it can be a complex and daunting process. Crucial decisions have to be made in selection, benchmarking, quality control, metadata schema, systems infrastructure, web site design, and digital preservation. These determinations often require a re-thinking and re-tooling of many areas of a library's established mode of operation, including cataloging, conservation and preservation, copyrights and permissions, systems infrastructure, and personnel.

The Soviet War Posters c. 1940–1945: the Tass Poster Series from the Hallward Library, University of Nottingham contains a fascinating collection of posters produced in Soviet Russia during the Great Patriotic War (i.e. World War II). Wartime propagandists produced these posters to inspire and comfort Soviet citizens into continuing the struggle to repel the armies of Nazi Germany from the Russian fatherland. Adam Matthew Publications, Marborough, England, collected and printed 137 posters on two microfilm reels. The set contain the posters in color along a set of black and white reproductions. A hundred-plus page guide written by Professor Derek W. Spring, History Department, University of Nottingham, which includes an introduction by Dr. Dorothy B. Johnston, Keeper of Manuscripts and Special Collections, University of Nottingham, precedes the poster prints. Spring offers a brief history on the significance of posters to Russia during its Civil War of 1918-21 and World War II while introducing the various artists of these drawings. Most posters in the collection had been produced between 1943 during the Battle of Stalingrad up to late-1945, seven months after the Nazi surrender. Depicting the difficult trials and social conditions during the war, the posters portray a story of Russia's revival from the war's turning point at Stalingrad to its conclusion in the streets of Berlin twenty-seven months later. Though containing a text written in Russian, one does not necessarily have to understand Russian to sense the message of the posters. These themes offer fascinating insight into the Soviet psyche.

For the last 20 years, my work has been linked directly to microform production. During those 20 years I have spent the majority of my work time repairing or trying to repair some permutation of a Kodak MRD microfilm camera. At this stage of my career it gives me great pleasure to review what I consider to be the next generation state-of-the-art preservation microfilm camera.