Conservation Department News

Recently Todd Pattison gave the Library Company his collection of 183 books with decorated endpapers. Some may remember that Mr. Pattison gave a colorful lunchtime talk in January titled "Decorated Endpapers, 1831 -1875." The talk focused on this unique collection which includes examples of all kinds of endpapers from the 19th century: machine ruled, type printed, stereotyped, advertising, marbled, embossed, engraved, lithographic, and ruling machine papers (different from machine ruled). This collection will be invaluable to anyone who wants to study this little-known aspect of book production.

Mr. Pattison, a book conservator with the Northeast Document Conservation Center, and the Library Company conservation staff share an interest in 19th-century cloth bindings. The conservation staff maintains a database of 19th-century publishers' bindings that will make its debut online before the end of the year, and they are working on numerous other binding research projects. Mr. Pattison has been very generous over the years, giving us bindings that fit well with our collection. Last year Mr. Pattison gave us his ribbon-embossed cloth binding collection. We are, yet again, very thankful to Todd Pattison for his good eye and his generosity!


Image: Inside front cover. Alice B. Haven. The Coopers; or, Getting Underway. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1858. Click image for larger view.