Re: [ARSCLIST] Curatorial Responsibility, formerly Copyright of treasures

["Richard L. Hess" <ArcLists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 11:27 AM 10/6/2005, Karl Miller wrote:

> A notion which is increasingly having institutions refuse to accept
> collections that come without endowments to cover the preservation
> costs... Plus, as we have read in the pages of the NY Times, museums and
> such compromising the trust of donors, and the public by selling off
> materials...in the name of keeping the museum, archive...etc. functioning.

What about the sell-off and destruction of many of the runs of old 
newspapers that Nicholson Baker documents in "Double Fold"? Including 
a set of a major NY Newspaper that had been presented by the publisher.

I recently purchased a 3-volume set of the monumental 20-year-old 
Atlas of Canadian History produced by Univ of Toronto.

I was saddened to see that Vol 1 was a de-accessioned library copy 
from a high school in Canada. Wouldn't you think that the high school 
would want this on hand as a reference book. My brother-in-law (book 
lover and Ph.D. in history) was saddened to see that Vol 3 was a 
presentation copy to someone. Vol 2 although purchased used, appeared 
to be new-old-stock.

So now I have the 3-volume set at the new cost of the abridged 
one-volume version, or 1/3 the cost of a new set of the 3-volume set. 
But WHY are libraries dumping this stuff? With something of this 
nature, even if people don't look at it, I would think it would be 
their fond hope that someone would take the initiative to read it. 
Now if I can only get my kids to read it instead of watching animations on TV.

Cheers,

Richard

Richard L. Hess                              richard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Aurora, Ontario, Canada             http://www.richardhess.com/
Detailed contact information: http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm