[Nhcoll-l] Fwd: moving an herbarium collection

[Karen Reeds]

  I can't answer the real question, but I think you should use the 
move as a chance to publicize the collections and their continuing 
importance to scientific research, teaching, students, public 
understanding of science and the environment....

Talk to the university's PR folks and get yourselves some good news 
stories out of it.

As a historian of early botany, I'm curious to know what the oldest 
specimens in the collection are, who were the collectors, where....

Karen

>Date: Mon, 17 Dec 2012 11:00:17 -0500
>From: Alan Harvey <aharvey at georgiasouthern.edu>
>Subject: [Nhcoll-l] moving an herbarium collection
>
>Greetings (and apologies for cross-posting),
>
>Can anyone provide any insights as to how best to move an herbarium 
>collection? Our Biology department is slated to move into a new 
>building on the opposite side of campus this summer. This move 
>includes our 80-cabinet herbarium collection, which will be moving 
>from the hallways of the Math-Physics Building to an excellent 
>dedicated space in the new building. As exciting as this is, I 
>confess to being a bit intimidated by the process of moving this 
>material.
>
>Having the university's moving gang rough-house this fragile 
>material is of course out of the question. The initial thought was 
>to consolidate the specimens to free up a half dozen or so empty 
>cabinets, move them over, then pack up and move enough specimens to 
>fill those cabinets, and repeat this until everything's moved. 
>Clearly a long, slow process! Recently our chair has suggested that 
>we might be able to hire a company to help; at present I don't know 
>anything about this company re: their experience with moving 
>collections (if any such company exists!).
>
>Although there are, as always, time and money issues, the most 
>important issue is making sure we don't end up with a crumbled mess 
>in the new digs!
>
>Thanks in advance for any insights.
>
>Cheers,
>
>Alan
>
>--
>Alan Harvey
>Professor of Biology and Curator of the Herbarium
>President, Georgia Entomological Society
>Georgia Southern University
>Statesboro, GA 30460-8042
>(912) 478-5784
>fax (912) 478-0845
><http://www.bio.georgiasouthern.edu/bio-home/harvey/index.html>http://www.bio.georgiasouthern.edu/bio-home/harvey/index.html
>
>
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-- 
Karen Reeds, PhD, FLS
  karen.reeds at verizon.net
Princeton Research Forum, a community of independent scholars 
http://www.princetonresearchforum.org/

Guest Curator, Come into a New World: Linnaeus & America
American Swedish Historical Museum, Philadelphia, 2007
New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, NJ, 2009
  Exhibition guide, 30 pp., available from 
http://www.dianepublishing.net/category_s/490.htm (p.4)