Mold

With reference to Danna Bell-Russell's (Cons DistList Inst. 10:11)
request for information regarding the dangers of mould to both
humans and collections, as an archivist, I certainly bow to
professional conservators' knowledge of the literature. However,
there is an article written by Karen Brown entitled "Mould as a
Health Threat," which deals with the havoc mould can wreak in humans
and what can be done to minimize the danger. It's written in very
straight forward language, and is only about a page long. It also
comes with a couple of very nasty looking photographs of microscopic
views of mould spores which are enough to frighten even the most
disbelieving of administrators. I submitted the article to our
workplace Health and Safety Committee a few months ago, and ended up
with an impressive array of safety equipment, including a very
spiffy respirator with HEPA filters, as a result.

I believe the article first appeared in Volume 19, No. 3 (January
1995) of the Association of Canadian Archivists' "Bulletin," and it
was later reprinted in "Off the Record" (Vol. 12, no. 1, Jan.-Mar.
1995), the newsletter of the Archives Association of Ontario.

As for the mould on the walls, we had a similar problem in one of
our store rooms. Simply painting over it does not work -- the mould
just reappears. A good scrub with bleach seems to have done the
trick for us. Hope this helps.

Heather M. Gordon
Archivist
St. Joseph Province Archives
Religious Hospitallers of St. Joseph
20 Manitou Crescent East
Kingston, Ontario, Canada   K7N 1B3
613-389-0275
Fax: 613-384-6978

                                  ***
                  Conservation DistList Instance 10:12
                   Distributed: Friday, July 19, 1996
                       Message Id: cdl-10-12-003
                                  ***