Binding old periodicals

Apologies that this is a little off topic, but I thought this group may be able to help with some advice. The husband has recently bought some copies of periodicals dating from between 1910 & 1925. Most years are complete. The periodical is still going and he has copies from the mid 50s onwards bound for each year.

They ones he's acquired are unbound, and currently in year groups, with (probably vintage) string around each year. they are all in a metal chest (also probably vintage!)

So, quick questions - any thing we ought to do to keep them in as good a condition as possible? Or at least to prevent them deteriorating any further.

Is it feasible to bind periodicals that old? If so, I assume we're looking for a specialist. What did we ought to look for in that case.

Any advice would be appreciated.

If there is any value to them, binding them might result in a decrease in value, as they won't be in original condition. Most likely, your best bet is to buy, or have made, archival boxes. If you're in the U.S., try University Products, Gaylord, or Talas. Search for "archival storage".

Thanks - value not a concern. Practical use is of more interest.

You probably know better anyway, but I once tried various things sold to put magazines into binders, and they did not work well.

Binding by any method makes the text at the gutter hard to read. For fragile magazines put them in plastic bags (some details on the right kinds of plastic).

If the magazines are thin, you can put them into Itoya Profilio. If thick boxes like Globe Weis 6x9 card file trays with lids work well for up to 9x11 if put in flat.

Knowing something of the size, type, vintage can be a help for more specific suggestions.

James

They're typically 12 to 20/30 pages per issue made simply by folding larger sheets in half. Double stapled through the fold. Size approx A4. vintage 1911 to 1926/8. number of issues per year varies in the 20s.

He'd rather they were maintained in a manner such that they could be read without having to slide them in and out of pockets in order to read the internal pages. No idea of that's achievable, but that would be his ideal.

Is A4 the size before folding or after folding?

As I mentioned, pretty much any binding method is going to make the content near the fold ("gutter") difficult to read. Also there is the expense to consider. Binding might cost US$50 to $100 per volume, depending on the binder, materials, etc. Binding such items pretty much eliminates most of the collectible value the items may have in the future. I note that you don't have this consideration as a top priority.

Most periodicals are highly ephemeral in nature. Many of them don't survive. If they are interesting to him, they are likely interesting to someone else in the future. On my collections I think of myself as the "temporary custodian" of the items and this causes me to take actions which preserve them (e.g. no tape repairs).

One possibility, to help with the access issue while preserving the originals would be to photograph or scan the pages and make PDFs of individual issues and perhaps combine these into single PDF files for the calendar year or volume number. With the proper software (e.g. Adobe Acrobat Pro) you could also perform OCR on the pages to make them searchable. You can even add article indexes and notes to make it easier to get to the information they contain. Additional benefits are that the files could be used on a laptop or other mobile device so one does not always need to be near the originals to make use of them.

There are several techniques to achieve this if it seems like an appealing end product. Some are a simple as using a digital camera with a tripod, light source, piece of glass, and a cardboard box cut to form a cradle.

James

A4 size is the magazine, the paper itself is double size.

there is a pdf already available of everything from 1911 the the 30s - which he already has. So no need to do that again.

I think that Cordex binders may meet your need.

Helenliz, what, exactly, is the issue with the periodicals? Is it that the binding is coming apart, in which case, if they are pamphlet-bound, it's pretty easy to resew, or is it that the paper is deteriorating? If the latter, there's not much you can do that doesn't involve significant expense.

Whichever it is, if you want to preserve them, I'd still suggest archival boxes to prevent further deterioration.

lilithcat - the issue is that they're old and we're a bit scared of what they can or can't cope with.

They are currently individual magazines, but they are grouped in years - tied with a piece of string. Initial thoughts are that he'd like to have them bound into annuals, but we are unsure if they'll be able to cope with that, or if it can be done but we need a specialist binder to do it. The idea of buying them was to make them usable for reference.

the paper is tinged yellow/brown, some of the edges are a little tatty and the staples seem to have left the odd rust mark. we're not familiar enough with paper of this age to know if that's normal or not.

9> Thanks - that might be an option.