Xylenes

We recently had a guest speaker who talked about the birth of the Yellow
Kid and the birth of the American comic (our special collections has a
lot of this material).  The speaker mentioned that for the last 8 years
he has been using a chemical called xylene (I think that's how you spell
it) to take off old tape from the embrittled pages of comic books.  He
has even immersed entire pages in this chemical, with no seeming adverse
effects.  He asked me to pass on the question, though, to this audience
to find out what conservators know about this stuff--especially in
regard to long-term impact on woodpulp paper.  I get the impression that
xylene is a fairly powerful chemical (he uses it in a well-ventilated
area) and one needs to be careful in using it.  I'd like to ask one
additional question: is there an alternative that can accomplish the
same task?  Thank you.

Marty Hanson
Preservation Administrator
Syracuse University

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 6:53
                 Distributed: Saturday, April 10, 1993
                        Message Id: cdl-6-53-013
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