Re-hydrating and Flattening Old Documents

As genealogists, we have a certain responsibility for items that may come into our possession. 

I received a box of treasures from my great aunt as you may have seen on my blog post here...

And one of those treasures was a set of family documents going back into the late 1800s. They were rolled up tightly, nearly impossible to safely unroll without ripping. I knew they couldn't stay that way but I was at a loss of what to do. 

I decided to call the Missouri Historical Society Library and Research Center to see if their archivists had any good ideas for me. They were EXTREMELY helpful and sent me a couple links to get started on humidifying my documents to get them flattened out. I've taken some step by step photos to show you how I went about this process. I was really nervous about doing this job alone and decided instead to bring the set of documents over at my parents house (which has terrible lighting) so I didn't get photos the first time around. I decided instead to take some photos of each "stage" at my own house.  

Here is the link that I was sent to for a detailed explanation (thanks Dennis Northcott!)

First, let me help you decide if humidification is right for you-

Why humidify: This process is great if you have rolled up or brittle and dry documents. 

How it works: As the link above explains, "For our purposes, humidification is the process of introducing moisture into paper by placing the document inside an enclosed area with a water source." As this water vapor permeates the documents, it allows the fibers of the material to relax, causing the paper to unroll. 

Risks involved: Of course, any time you deal with delicate documents there are risks involved. I am not even an amateur archivist and will not claim that I know what I'm doing. But I know we couldn't afford to have this professionally done and I wanted to make sure that my family documents were preserved the best that they could be. You run the risk of tearing, molding, fading, or bleeding your documents any time you introduce water to them. Myself and my family decided it was worth the risk and let me tell you, we do not regret our decision at all. 

Because I am NOT an archivist and have only done this once now, I think your best bet is to only use this as one source for your plan. Use the link above for the great instructions from the Missouri Archives and follow this link to a Youtube video from the Archives Society of Alberta. 

Alright! Now that we have those things out of the way, here's where to start. 

1. Gather Materials

• Long, shallow tub. Mine is an old one I had been using for years. It's Sterilite brand and has a locking lid. These will be easy to find at your local Walmart!

• A sheet of egg crate cut to the exact size to fit into the bottom of your tub. My tub had rounded edges so we cut the corners off to make it cleanly slide into the bottom of it. 

Like this! It's a little under $15 at your local hardware store. 

• A small towel or a towel to cut to the size of your tub. Mine fit well enough that any extra I just tucked underneath!
• Blotting paper

  

  Like this! I ordered mine from Amazon and didn't read the description well so these were pretty small. They still worked though!

• Some weights ( I used heavy little trinkets from around our house...just made sure they were nice and clean!)
• Heavy books

• Some water

• Your documents! Try to clean them with a soft brush if necessary. 

2. Find a good spot. Somewhere where your documents can sit undisturbed (no knocking off the table or anything!) for a few hours at a time. 

3. Place your towel in the bottom of your tub. 

4. Pour the water on top. You want the towel to be soaked but you don't want water splashed all over the place or in puddles that could splash up if the system is accidentally bumped. 

5. Lay the egg crate over the wet towel. I also made sure to wipe up any extra water droplets from the sides of the container. No direct contact should be made between your documents and water in the chamber!

6. Put your document into the chamber with weights on all four sides to keep it flat. 

7. Leave the document for 15 minutes at a time inside the chamber with the lid on. Every 15 minutes, check to see if the paper is able to stay flat on its own. You will find that it often happens quickly. I generally left my documents for about 2 hours maximum. 

8. When the documents were humidified and unrolled, I carefully took them out of the chamber and placed them onto my blotting paper. Since I accidentally bought the smaller blotting paper, I had to lay four out at a time. Still worked great! Make a sandwich out of the blotting paper and the document. 

First layer

second layer

top layer

9. Use some heavy books stacked on top to complete your pile!

10. Leave it to dry for 10-12 hours on the stack before storing it in a safe spot! Feel proud of yourself- you've done it!