Here is the first of a series of articles about the library volunteers and the services that they provide from the spring edition of the Friends of the Fort Bragg Library newsletter "Just Among Friends". Thanks to Jane Person for great article.
“This is a different way of loving books,” said Lorna Dennis. She, Jane Vartarian, and Margarita Orozco mend and cover books several hours a week for the Library. These are no easy jobs.
I can see why it won’t play,” Jane remarked, checking on a cassette the Library staff referred to her for damage control, “It’s frozen.” This tape ultimately had to be replaced, but often Jane can pry it out of its cover and straighten it out. Working with pliers, scissors, screwdrivers (“and a hatpin if I could find one”), Jane painstakingly performs open cassette surgery by unscrewing the cassette the box, mending the tape and reboxing it—jobs she would prefer the public not do. There is an art to this, as she pointed how to replace the tape so that it would rewind easily through regulating springs. She can repair 5 or 6 tapes per session.
Her advice to the reading public: Do not try mending books and tapes at home. Point out damage to the staff. Jane and Lorna, her apprentice, have special equipment for these jobs. She also cautioned against storing videotapes on the sides, where the audio is. Stand them up, she said.
Jane, a Board member of MCTV, learned how to mend tapes at home when hers broke. Her Depression childhood taught her to mend, not discard. Usually tape damage is done by dirty home machines, she said, which could be avoided if people cleaned the heads on VCRs. Car heat and sunlight are other culprits.
Lorna used a small paintbrush to affix glue onto the spine of a book, which had come unglued. Pages used to be stitched to the binding, but no more. She and Jane use a special kind of tape for torn pages and Jane recalled one reader handing back a book mended with duct tape.
Margarita’s job is to recover books with plastic sheeting that goes over the dust jacket. She’s good, Jane and Lorna noted; her covers don’t puff or buckle. Margarita’s also fast. Her fingers fly as she covers large and medium sized books at the rate of about 20 an hour. All books coming into the library come to Margarita for recovering.
Jane, Lorna, and Margarita would love company. If you have spare time, even a few hours a week, they would be glad to teach you how to do what they do so that you can join these library volunteers.
--Jane Person Volunteer Chair