So, What Is MALACOLOGY, Anyway? Melissa Bradshaw May 30-July 6, 2002

mal·a·col·o·gy \mal- -`käl- -jē\ n.: e e a branch of zoology dealing with mollusks—invertebrate creatures with soft, unsegmented bodies, many of which house themselves in shells.

About the Project Arranged for May 20 to June 21 Lisa Rebori, Collections Manager John Wise, Curator of Malacology Goal: to create a finding aid and needs assessment survey for an estimated 600 volumes and housing for 400 Chenu prints

Houses the Burke Baker Planetarium, Wortham IMAX Theatre, Cockrell Butterfly Center, and three floors of natural science halls and exhibits About the Museum Founded in 1909 Fourth most highly attended museum in the U.S. Most highly attended attraction in Texas (over two million visitors annually)

About the Museum Permanent exhibits Astronomy Space Science Native Americans Paleontology Energy Chemistry Gems and minerals Malacology Texas wildlife

Largest malacology library in the U.S. Used as a reference collection for the curator, researchers, and volunteers Books do not circulate and most are not highly used A volunteer librarian had created a list with most of the titles and had organized the library into sections About the Library

Began building the library in the 1960s Had friends in the oil business who helped acquire much of the collection Various malacologists and malacological organizations donate their collections to HMNS Appraised at over $400,000 Almost complete set of prints by malacogist J. C. Chenu valuing over $40,000 Dr. Tom Pulley, curator of malacology and museum director

About the Library Types of publications: Monographs Multi-volume sets Serials Journals Newsletters Atlases Catalogs Oversize Reprints Bound Unbound Voyages & Expeditions Set of over 400 prints by J. C. Chenu

About the Library Dates of publication of volumes: 1 from the 17 th century (1684) 39 from the 18 th century ( ) 618 from the 19 th century 321 from the first half of the 20 th century 573 from the second half of the 20 th century 5 from the 21 st century ( ) 33 unknown (no printed publication date)

About the Library It takes up roughly two rows of compact shelving located in the Collections department The books are in all types of formats and sizes and in many different languages A number of items that are part of multi- volume sets have been commercially rebound in half-style leather

Chapter 1: Organization Cut and pasted list from Word to Excel Added titles to list Changed organization of sections Rearranged Atlases, Catalogs, Voyages & Expeditions, and Bound Reprints sections

Chapter 2: Labelling I created bookmarks for each volume containing Location on the shelf Author Title Date of publication I matched the bookmarks with the appropriate volumes There was no previous labeling system for books

There were discrepancies and errors in the list Books in a multi-volume set often had different publication dates and different authors I constantly came across books that had not been added to the list The final count of titles came out to 1,578 The bookmarking process took five weeks to complete because… Chapter 2: Labelling

Chapter 3: Creating the Survey I referred to “The Yale Survey: A Large- Scale Study of Book Deterioration in the Yale University Library” and sample surveys from students’ needs assessment survey projects for ideas I created a sample survey and tested it on ten books Ellen had suggestions on customizing it better to fit the books in the collection

Preliminary Survey Tool

Chapter 3: Creating the Survey The final survey tool contained… Bibliographic information Author Title Year of publication Whether item is a first or special edition Dimensions Location on shelves Structure

Final Survey Tool

Chapter 3: Creating the Survey Condition of paper Condition of binding Leaf attachment Leaf attachment condition Environmental damage Treatment needed Minor Major Immediacy of treatment For conservation treatment

Chapter 3: Methodology Random sampling Alphabetical Every tenth book Twenty percent of the collection (316 books) Only books from the Monographs & Serials section Enlisted the help of some Ecoteens (high school summer volunteers)

Chapter 4: Results Of the 316 books surveyed… 35 need conservation treatment (11%) 11 minor repairs 24 major repairs 19 need phase boxes (6%) 9 need pamphlet binding (3%) 11 need commercial rebinding (3.5%) 251 can be shelved as is (79%) 77 have yellowing paper (24%) 53 have brittle paper (17%)

Chapter 5: Wrapping Up Reshelving/Combining sections “Books” and “Series” sections “Fossil Malacology” section New books Wrote summary of project with results for Lisa and John Would like to continue project and evaluate remaining sections (Periodicals, Newsletters, Reprints), the Chenu prints, and perform treatments

Many Thanks to… Lisa Rebori John Wise Ellen Cunningham-Kruppa (for helping with a project I’d never done before!) Chela Metzger (for helping identify those unfamiliar binding structures) Karen Pavelka (for helping to land the project in the first place)