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Field Trip and Grant Proposal Assignment NFO520-‐901-‐201135 – Social Context of Information Professions Spring Quarter 2012 Instructor: Toni Carbo, PhD Email: [email protected] Student: Barbara Taranto Email: [email protected]
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I certify that:
·∙ This paper/project/exam is entirely my own work.
·∙ I have not quoted the words of any other person from a printed source or a website without indicating what has been quoted and providing an appropriate citation.
·∙ I have not submitted this paper / project to satisfy the requirements of any other course.
Signature Barbara Taranto
Date May 20, 2012
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Part 1 -‐ Field Trip
For my assignment to learn about a library, its mission, resources and services
and to identify an appropriate grant opportunity I chose The New York Botanical Garden
(NYBG or The Garden) LuEsther T. Mertz Library (Mertz Library) (NYBG, 2012c). I
contacted Susan Fraser, the Director of the Mertz Library and arranged to meet with her
at their location in The Bronx, for an hour on May 15, 2012. Ms. Fraser was very
generous with her time. She took me on a short tour of the library and then spent 45
minutes responding to my questions.
The Mertz Library is a separate unit of the New York Botanical Garden, operating
under the auspices of the Education Department. The library is organization into six
units all of which report to the Director: Acquisitions, Archives, Cataloging, Conservation,
Information Systems and Library Systems (Fig. 1).
There are 20 full time staff
members (not including facilities
that are managed by NYBG): 10
librarians (including two
conservators), one archivist, eight paraprofessionals and one administrative assistant.1
According to the NYBG website, “The Mertz Library promotes the intelligent
stewardship of the natural world by collecting and preserving works of merit in botany,
horticulture and landscape design.” (NYBG, 2012i). The Library collects broadly in the
1 For detailed contact information see: http://www.nybg.org/library/LibraryStaff.php
Figure 1
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field and has a special concentration on Central and South American botany as a
complement and resource to the scholarly scientific work2 conducted in the gardens and
the Herbarium.
The Library supports several educational programs at NYBG including The School
of Professional Horticulture, Adult Education in botanical drawing, gardening and floral
design and children’s programs such as Plant Hunters. Additionally, the Mertz Library
supports the work of external academics teaching in the field and offers faculty the
opportunity to put materials on reserve for their students use. (NYBG, 2012g)
The library receives somewhere between 10-‐12 thousand visitors per year3 from
all parts of the world and is open to any person who wishes to use it free of charge.
However, since the collections are non-‐circulating the majority of patrons are dedicated
amateur and professional botanists and gardeners and local students enrolled in botany
or horticultural programs. In some cases materials can be checked out of the library and
used on campus by staff, students and faculty in residence at NYPB (NYBG, 2012a).
The Mertz Library does not offer outreach programs per se. The library
participates in Interlibrary Loan (ILL) and provides reserve materials for certain external
faculty from Yale University, Columbia University, New York University and Lehman
College plant science programs. All outreach and programming such as the current
Monet Exhibit at the Library is done in conjunction with other units and divisions of the
organization. 2 NYBG has a resident faculty of scientists conducting research in the areas of horticulture and related disciplines at the International Plant Science Center. http://www.nybg.org/about/scientific_research.php 3 The New York Botanical Garden receives over 800,000 visitors annually
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The Mertz Library mission to collect and preserve works of merit in botany,
horticulture and landscape design (NYBG, 2012i) is in support of the primary mission
and vision of the larger organization to which it belongs, The New York Botanical Garden
(NYBG). The NYBG commitment to advocacy on the part of the plant kingdom through
education and plant research (NYBG, 2012d) is facilitated by the work of the library.
According to the NYBG Strategic Plan published in 2009 the library is a world-‐class
facility that supports and helps sustain the activities and education mission of the parent
organization. (NYBG, 2009)
Collections at the Mertz Library are organized in a variety of ways. The Online
Catalog is used for the classification and organization of monographs and serials records.
The library uses the Library of Congress Classification system and includes the OCLC
Control Number in each record. The Archives and Manuscripts are available through a
special catalog that provides an alphabetical listing of archival materials held at the
library. Each listing is a link to an electronic Finding Aid (using the EAD schema) that
describes the scope, organization and contents of the respective archival collection.
Records for Collectors Field Note, Prints and Illustrations and other Special Collections
can be found on separate databases available to members of the library.
Policies regarding the Mertz Library can be found on the guidelines web page.
The guidelines include Security Policies such as “No food or drinks (including bottled
water) are allowed in the Library” and “Lockers and a coat rack are located just outside
the main entrance to the Library” (NYBG, 2012h) in order to protect the collections; and
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the Photocopying, Photography and Reproduction Rights Policy that states
“Photography of Library materials by users is permitted when the images will be used
solely for personal reference” and “All images from The LuEsther T. Mertz Library’s
collections which are to be used for commercial purposes must be licensed by the
Garden's Product Development Division” (NYBG, 2012e). Since the Mertz Library does
not have an independent website the Privacy Statement is a blanket policy for the entire
organization and the use of the website.
“The New York Botanical Garden ("NYBG" or "the Garden") does not collect any
personal information about individuals such as names and postal or e-‐mail
addresses” -‐ except in the case of membership and that information is
maintained privately and securely by the Garden. [When using the web a] secure
connection is established between your browser and a Web site, any data that is
transferred over the connection will be encrypted to prevent it from being
viewed by a third party.” (NYBG, 2012f)
For the most part monograph and serial collections at the Mertz Library are
cataloged. However certain Special Collections such as the Historical Map Collection and
the Nursery and Seed Catalogs are not. This is due to a lack of resources. The
Acquisitions staff that is comprised of a librarian and two associates is responsible for
the purchase and licensing of all new materials (including eJournals and databases)
acquired by the library except for archival collections, which are handled by the Director
and the Archivist.
The Mertz Library offers a number of licensed eResources in the field Gardens
Illustrated, Seed Crops, The Index to American Botanical Literature and JSTOR. Since the
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subject matter is so narrow many of the journals are single title publishers and are not
widely available. However, the library does provide links to free resources that can be
accessed remotely such as Botanicus, The Missouri Botanical Garden portal to historical
botanical literature, BioOne a not-‐for-‐profit aggregator of peer-‐reviewed research in the
biological, ecological, and environmental sciences, Plant Information Online a free
resource jointly sponsored by the University of Minnesota and the University of
Minnesota Libraries, and the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) digitization project
sponsored by the Internet Archive and several international partners including Harvard
University, The Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Natural History Museum of
London, among others.
The Mertz Library has been particularly involved in the BHL initiative. They are
the largest contributor of published botanical literature in the consortium. Susan Fraser
currently serves on the Executive Committee.
In the last several years the library has increased its digitization efforts both in-‐
house and with partners such as the BHL. In 2008 Mertz Library invested in CONTENTdm
a digital collections management product to house and serve digital content digitized
from the Rare Book Collection and other archival holdings. Currently there are 22,000
digitized items available through Mertz Digital.
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Among the highlights are: New York Botanical Garden historical photographs – images
of the construction and opening of the Garden.
Woman at Flag Raising celebration, 1917
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The North American sylva, or A description of the forest trees of the United States,
Canada and Nova Scotia, considered particularly with respect to their use in the arts, and
their introduction into commerce; to which is added a description of the most useful of
the European forest trees Plate 53
Twelve views in the interior of Guiana from drawings executed by Mr. Charles Bentley,
after sketches taken
during the expedition
carried on in the years
1835 to 1839, under the
direction of the Royal
Geographical Society of
London and aided by
Her Majesty’s
government with
descriptive letter-‐press
by Robert H. Schomburgk pl.2 – Ataraipu, or the Devil’s Rock
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The Mertz Library welcomes the use of personal computers in the reading rooms
and provides Wi-‐Fi for its patrons (NYBG, 2012a) . EBook readers and mobile devices
such as smart phones are not on offer at the library since the digital content that the
library provides is not suited to the format or size of these apparatuses.
On the whole Susan Fraser is satisfied with the use of the paper and database
collections. However, since digitizing many paper titles for the BHL project the library
have seen quite a bit more use of its historical materials through the BHL portal. This has
convinced her that digitizing paper holdings, especially in unusual subject areas is an
important way to increase access and attract new users to the library. Digital Collection
use on the Mertz Library site is not as high as she would like, attributing this to the
overall architecture of The Garden website – i.e. the digital collections are not
prominently placed and difficult to discover.
When asked directly she reported that the she would like to seek funding to
continue digitization of Special Collections materials especially the unique and highly
valuable Rare Book and Folio Collection and non-‐book collections such as the
Antiquarian Map Collection. Additional staff resources in conservation, cataloging and
digitization would be needed to on this initiative. She also stated that she was working
with her colleagues in marketing to raise the profile of Digital Mertz on The Garden
website.
In her capacity as Director of the Mertz Library Susan has found her membership
in The Council of Botanical and Horticultural Libraries (CBHL) to be the most useful and
rewarding professionally. CBHL is “an internal organization of individual, organizations
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and institutions concerned with the development, maintenance and use of libraries of
botanical and horticultural literature.” (CBHL, 2012) Through this association she has
been able to find new open access resources for the library. She has subscribed to the
listserv and the newsletter and is able to keep abreast with development in the library’s
specialty content areas. As a member library Mertz is able to participate in restricted
circle of botanical libraries that share materials and have extended ILL privileges. There
are Annual Meetings that provide opportunities to network and learn about innovation
in the field. This year Susan is looking forward to meeting in Montreal, Que. Canada
reconnecting with her peers and hearing the report from the Smithsonian Institution
Libraries on the 8th International Botanical Congress, held in Melbourne, Australia.
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Part 2 – Grant Proposal
NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES
Preservation and Access Grants New York Botanical Garden LuEsther T. Mertz Library
The New York Botanical Garden LuEsther T. Mertz Library: Cataloging, Preservation
and Digitization of 200 Rare Books from the Rare Book and Folio Collection
Executive Summary
The New York Botanical Garden LuEsther T. Mertz Library seeks a two year grant
of $250,000 from the National Endowment for the Humanities for a project to catalog,
preserve and digitize 200 books totaling 450 volumes from the Rare Book and Folio
Collection. These collections are rare, and in some cases unique, and once made
accessible to a wide audience, will serve as key resources for scholars of natural history,
botanical taxonomy, botanical illustration, researchers in plant science, horticulturalists
and enthusiasts.
The collections to be treated include many of the pre-‐Linnean works (published
before 1753), works by Charles Darwin, a selection of 18th and 19th century books
featuring many fine botanical plates, rendered in print from paintings and drawings by
many reknowned botanical artists such as Pierre Joseph Redoute, Pancrace Bessa,
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George Dionysius Ehret, and Walter Hood Fitch.
The materials chosen for cataloging, preservation and digitization are considered
to be among the most historically important and artifactually valuable titles in the
collection. Providing access to these rare and important materials through bibliographic
records in The Mertz Library’s online catalog, and OCLC’s WorldCat will enable users
from all over the world to learn about these rich resources and integrate them into their
scholarship. Through physically preserved texts for on-‐site use, and by creating digital
images to be served on the library’s website users will be able to inspect the original
documents in situ and online through high-‐resolution digital surrogates.
For this project the Library will contribute up to a total of 30 percent of the
funding, mostly in staff time of members of the Cataloging, Preservation and
Information Systems units.
The New York Botanical Garden LuEsther T. Mertz Library
“The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG or The Garden) is a museum of plants,
an educational institution, and a scientific research organization. Founded in 1891 and
now a National Historic Landmark, it is one of the greatest botanical gardens in the
world and the largest in any city in the United States, distinguished by the beauty of its
diverse landscape and extensive collections and gardens, as well as by the scope and
excellence of its programs in horticulture, education, and science.” (NYBG, 2012b)
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The Garden was founded in the late 19th century when eminent Columbia
University botanist Nathaniel Lord Britton of the Torrey Botanical Club determined New
York should possess a great botanical garden. A magnificent site [250 acres] was
selected in the northern section of the Bronx, part of which had belonged to the vast
estate of tobacco merchant Pierre Lorillard and on April 18, 1891, and the land was set
aside by the New York State Legislature for the creation of “a public botanic garden of
the highest class” for the City of New York.
Today The New York Botanical Garden, which is a National Historical Landmark
site, boasts 50 living gardens, 200 resident plant scientists, 41 doctoral students and the
most comprehensive education programs in the United States in horticulture and plant
sciences. The Mission of The Garden is to advocate for the plant kingdom through these
programs and the rich resources and services provided by the LuEsther T. Mertz Library.
Mission of the Library
Founded in 1899 (NPS, 1983) the Library at NYBG was named in honor of
LuEsther T. Mertz in 1997 for Mrs. Mertz's commitment to The Garden, her generous
support of The Garden's science programs, and her passionate interest in literature of all
kinds. The mission of the Mertz Library “promoting the intelligent stewardship of the
natural world by collecting and preserving works of merit in botany, to collect and
preserve works of merit in botany, horticulture and landscape design” (NYBG, 2012i) is
in support of the goals and ideals of its parent organization The New York Botanical
Garden.
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Collections
The LuEsther T. Mertz Library is widely recognized as the world’s most important
library for information about the plant world. The Mertz Library serves as both a
research and a public library and as both a scholarly resource and a general plant
information service. It offers a wide array of reference resources, print and electronic,
and the help of an informed staff to anyone visiting the Library through the Internet or
in person. It contains over 1 million items, dating from the 12th century and ranging
from early herbals to current electronic databases.
Collections of note include a comprehensive collection of botanical literature
(12,000 serial titles dating to 1850); Rare Book and Folio Collection; Pre-‐1850 early
American imprints (5,200 books); Archives of The New York Botanical Garden and
papers of major botanical institutions of the 19th and 20th centuries; The Lord and
Burnham Collection of architectural drawings and environmental plans; The Catalog of
Landscape Records in the United States; The Art and Illustration Collection; The Seed
and Nursery Catalog (150,000 items); the Index Seminum, printed lists of documented
seed collections of the 18th and 19th centuries; and the Taxonomic Literature data file
(1.2 million sheets) used in the preparation of botanical bibliographic reference works.
Patrons
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The Mertz Library receives 10-‐12 thousand visitors to their reading rooms every
year. Unlike many research and private libraries the collections and services are open to
any person who wishes to use them free of charge and membership is not required. The
majority of collections are non-‐circulating and patrons are required to use materials and
resources in the Library except for the online catalog and select free botanical indexes,
which are available remotely on the web. Since the must be used locally the majority of
patrons are dedicated amateur and professional botanists and gardeners and local
students enrolled in botany or horticultural programs.
The Mertz Library supports several educational programs at NYBG including The
School of Professional Horticulture, Adult Education in botanical drawing, gardening and
floral design and children’s programs such as Plant Hunters. Students, researchers and
faculty from the NYBG programs constitute the largest percentage of patrons using the
library. Additionally, the Mertz Library supports the work of external academics teaching
in the field and offers faculty the opportunity to put materials on reserve for their
students use.
For members of NYBG Members Circle and for the staff and faculty of the Plant
Sciences Research Facility, a small selection of materials (4000 titles) may be checked
out of the library and used on campus.
Circulation
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The Mertz Library like its peer research institutions (Kyrillidou, 2009) is seeing an
increase in numbers and duration of sessions in digital activity while physical attendance
has remained flat. This trend is aligned with the 2009-‐2015 Strategic Plan of The Garden
(NYBG, 2009) to increase the digital presence of the Mertz Library and attract more
users by digitizing more content and distributing materials through partnerships such as
BHL and the Open Content Alliance.
Visitors Materials usage
Mertz Digital Item Count
Metz Digital Visits
Mertz Library Items In Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL)
Number of volumes in Biodiversity Heritage Library
Usage of Mertz
Materials on BHL Portal
Fiscal Year 2007
12,900 100,500 2,000 15,000
Fiscal Year 2009
11,150 103,000 5,000 19,550 4,000 volumes
Fiscal Year 2011
10,00 101,000 22.000 25,000 7,000 volumes
104,000 volumes
64,551 visits. 5% of visits
1,291,020 per anum
Staffing
Director Susan Fraser heads the LuEsther T. Mertz Library at The New York
Botanical Garden. Ms. Fraser has over 30 years of experience in academic and archival
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collections. She oversees an exceptional staff of 20 and an outstanding collection of
print and non-‐print resources. She also plays a pivotal role in The Garden’s Exhibition
Programme in the William D. Rondina and Giovanni Foroni LoFaro Gallery. Susan
received her MLS from Columbia University and is a member of the Academy of
Certified Archivists. She is an active member of the Council of Botanical and
Horticultural Libraries (CBHL), having served on the Board from 2005-‐2008. She is
currently involved in several committees and has been the CBHL Archivist since 2000.
Yumi Choi is a Catalog Librarian. She was a volunteer in the cataloging
department for six months prior to her hire as a staff member. Yumi received her M.L.S.
from the Pratt Institute in October 2007 and has become the Library’s C-‐J-‐K resident
expert. In addition to performing original cataloging, she is also working on preparing
entries in the Wave Hill Catalog of Landscape Records in the United States. This
database has been converted to a Web-‐based platform and will be mounted for
searching online in the near future.
Olga Marder is the Conservation Librarian/Conservator. She has a national
reputation in the paper preservation and conservation community. She is best known
author of "Art Serving Science: Solutions for the Preservation and Access of a Collection
of Botanical Art and Illustration” (Reed, Marder, & McCann, 1999) with Judith A. Reed,
and Laura T. McCann – a premier source of information on the restoration of botanical
prints.
John Mignault is the Systems Librarian at Mertz a position he has held since
2006. Mr. Mignault holds a MLS from Simmons College. He attended Brown University
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and has a background in Computer Science and Literature. Mr. Mignault is in charge of
the digital technicians and is responsible for the implementation of the online catalog as
well as the CONTENTdm collections management digital repository.
The Mertz Library is governed by The New York Botanical Garden Staff Policy
Group, a subcommittee of the Board of Managers. The Staff Policy Group oversees the
library through the creation and recommendation of policies concerning the acquisition,
management, preservation and delivery of service to its patrons.
Statement of Need
The LuEsther T. Mertz Library is one of the world's largest and most important
botanical and horticultural research libraries, with over one million accessioned items
(books, journals, original art and illustration, seed and nursery catalogs, architectural
plans of glass houses, scientific reprints, and photographs) and over 4,800 linear feet of
archival materials. The Library seeks to collect as comprehensively as possible in
systematic and floristic botany with particular strengths in the literature about the
Western Hemisphere, the focus of the Garden's research program. Since its
establishment in 1899, other major research and academic libraries in New York City
have transferred their plant-‐related collections to the Library and have deferred to it the
role of serving as the primary plant-‐focused library in the metropolitan area.
Among its many treasures are rare, if not unique items that are historically,
scientifically, culturally and artifactually valuable. Among the most beautiful and rare
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collections are the earliest botanical manuscripts and printed plates from the pre-‐
Linnean period (published before 1753). These items and the writings of Carl von Linne,
and Charles Darwin represent the greatest aggregate collection of botanical rare books
in the world.
The Rare Book and Folio Collection offers
patrons from across the globe, an international
community of scholars and the public alike, access
to a world-‐renowned collection of botanicalia, such
as Nederlandish hesperides (Commellin, 1683),
Fürstellung der jenigen (Thomassin, 1720) and
Hortus floridus (Passe, c. 1614). Some of these
volumes have been cataloged, restored and
digitized and made available to scholars and the
public through Mertz Digital. Since their publication
on line interest in these items has increased
tremendously. (Commellin, 1683).
Furthermore, scholars and
researchers have reported that
they are able to work with the
images in
ways that (Passe, c. 1614)
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are not possible with the original materials since the originals are fragile and highly
sensitive to environmental hazards.
Unfortunately, only 40% of the titles in the Rare Book and Folio Collection are
catalogued. Furthermore many of the items are in need of preservation. Some volumes
simply need to be rehoused where others need considerable conservation work. Once
stabilized and cataloged these items can then be carefully digitized and preserved in the
CONTENTdm system. The items will be discovered through the online catalog and the
Mertz Digital portal.
According to a recent report from OCLC “A 2009 survey of 169 special
collections and archives in research libraries in the US and Canada shows that
digitization of special collections and increasing user access to those collections are of
critical importance to research libraries. The survey report reveals that a lot of rare and
unique material remains hidden from users and the backlogs continue to grow.” (Erway,
2012)
By completing this project, the number of backlogged un-‐cataloged items will be
reduced, essentially undiscoverable and unknown collections of unique and rare
materials that have been “hidden” (Goldsmith, 2005) will be available for scholars and
the public alike to discover and incorporate into new works. The increased access will
bring further attention to Mertz Digital and a wider distribution and audience will be
established.
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Proposed Initiative
The project to catalog preserve and digitize 200 titles from the Rare Book and
Folio Collection will greatly increase access to rare and valuable botanical materials from
the LuEsther T. Mertz Library. These materials will serve as key resources for scholars of
natural history, botanical taxonomy, botanical illustration, and researchers in plant
science, horticulturalists and enthusiasts. The project will also increase the lifespan of
the rare materials by reducing “wear and tear” on fragile materials and replacing regular
use of the artifacts with digital surrogates. Without proper cataloguing and adequate
housing the collection remain undiscovered, underused and at some risk for
deterioration (RBMS, 2010).
Project Goal
The goal of this project is to catalog, preserve and digitize 200 books from the
Rare Book and Folio Collection to increase access, improve awareness and to prolong
the life of rare and unique materials in the Library’s collections. Access to catalog
records will be through available onsite and through the Library’s website. Access to the
preserved physical items will be made possible through on site visits to The Garden.
Digital surrogates will be served on the library’s website enabling users will to inspect
the original documents in vituro through high-‐resolution image viewers.
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Required Resources
For the past three years the staff of the Mertz Library have been actively
involved in cataloging and digitizing materials for Mertz Digital and the Biodiversity
Heritage Library. This work has required that the staff become expert in the standards
and practices for digitizing rare and unique materials. The literature titles that have
been digitized (and continue to be digitized) for BHL have been photographed and
processed by the Internet Archive. Materials for Mertz Digital have been done in house
with the staff of the digitization group.
The Rare Book and Folio Collection project represent a significant increase in in-‐
house digitization activity. Since the Mertz Library continues to be an active participant
in the BHL initiative staff resources will not be available to catalog and preserve the
materials. It will be necessary to hire a temporary rare book cataloger and temporary
conservation associate to complete this work. The digital group under the supervision of
the Systems Librarian John Mignault will handle the digitization of the 450 volumes. 50%
of the digital staff time will be devoted to the project. Mr. Mignault will have
supervisory responsibilities and will contribute 10% of his time.
The temporary cataloger will work under the supervision of the Catalog Librarian
Yumi Choi. The incumbent will create MARC records according the standards of the
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Mertz Library bibliographic guidelines. The cataloger will use the cataloging utility
available through the OPAC to create the new records. The cataloger in the course of
creating records for these items will conduct subject and name authority work. Ms. Choi
will devote 10% of her time on this project.
Olga Marder, the conservator will oversee and instruct the temporary
conservation associate on the proper treatment and housing of the 450 volumes. Since
very little work has been required for the BHL initiative, Ms. Marder will be able to
devote time to this project. She will work with the incumbent on the evaluation,
treatment plan and execution of the conservation. 30% of her time will be used on this
project.
The Library has its own digital content management system CONTENTdm. The
digital staff will export the catalog records from the OPAC with the assistance of the
Systems Librarian and import them into CONTENTdm as metadata. The digital staff will
also manage the transfer of digital files from the cameras to the management system.
High-‐resolution image captures create very large files. An additional 5 terabytes
of storage will be needed to house the new content produced by this project.
Implementation Schedule
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The conservator conducted a review of the condition of the 450 volumes in
order to prepare for this grant. Proper condition reports must be created before the
other work can begin. Once the condition reports are complete the conservator and the
new associate will spend the first six months of the grant stabilizing and conserving the
materials. As materials are stabilized the will be made available to the rare book
cataloger for the creation of bibliographic records. As the cataloging progresses
materials will be sent to the digital staff for photography and digital processing. Once
items are in CONTENTdm they are available for use on the web.
As items are completed they will then be returned to the Information Services
staff to re-‐shelve. The project is expected to take two years to complete based on the
schedule below.
Evaluation of the Project
The Mertz Library has already seen a tremendous increase in traffic to their
digitized content on Mertz Digital and the Biodiversity Heritage Library portal. Mertz
expects that the addition of these items to Mertz Digital and to BHL will increase usage
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and referrals to the Library site. Mertz also anticipates that there will be an increase in
requests for additional and complementary materials to be added to the collection.
Success will be gauged by the increase of items removed from the backlog, the
increase in items stabilized and housed properly, the increase in referrals from other
websites to these important materials, and the increase in requests for bibliographic
and digital content that has been produced by this project.
The Mertz Library will also work collaboratively with the Staff Policy Group to
promote these new collections by recommending that Mertz Digital be showcased on
the home page of The New York Botanical Garden. The Library will also seek to present
its finding to and share lessons learned with The Rare Book and Manuscripts Section of
ACRL (RBMS, 2010). Additionally the Library will present at The Council on Botanical and
Horticultural Libraries (CBHL, 2012) Annual Meeting in 2013.
Mertz Library is a member of the Metropolitan New York Library Council
(METRO) that is widely connected to peer organization across the country. By posting
the announcement of the new collections on the METRO listserv the information will be
widely disseminated.
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Budget
Salaries Catalog Temp 1 year $45 Conservator Temp 1 year $40 Catalog Librarian (10%) 1 year $7 Conservator (30%) 1 year $21 Systems Librarian (10%) 18 months $10 Digital Photographer (50%) 18 months $35 Digital Assistant (50%) 18 months $20 Sys Admin CONTENTdm (50%) 2 months $5 Benefits + 25% $46 Materials
Conservation Supplies $15 Digital Storage $8 Total in thousands $252 Conclusion
With more researchers actively engaging in serious scholarship on the web it is
vital that libraries offer the highest quality digital content and resources to their patrons.
By cataloging, preserving and digitizing rare and unique botanical items from the
LuEsther T. Mertz Library these rare, original and important resources that were
hitherto obscure will now be accessible in restored physical condition and on the web
through Mertz Digital Collections. Increased awareness and access to some of the
world’s most important literature affords everyone interested the ability to learn, to
investigate and to deepen understanding of the human experience.
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Bibliography
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A Bimonthly Report from ARL, CNI and SPARC. Ball, H. F. (2011). Limitations and Ethical Implications of Digitizing Medieval Manuscripts.
Library Student Journal. CBHL. (2012). The Council on Botanical and Horticultural Libraries, Inc. The Council on
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