Preserving the "Dummy Books" of Margaret Bloy Graham, the Canadian Illustrator of Harry the Dirty Dog
Back in 2021, we started a conservation project to treat 26 early versions of books, known as dummy books, by Toronto-born illustrator Margaret Bloy Graham.
Graham illustrated many beloved children’s books, including Harry the Dirty Dog and other books in that series as well as standalone books. She also wrote and illustrated five books of her own before her death in 2015. Our Osborne Collection of Early Children’s Books holds Margaret Bloy Graham's archive, which includes original artwork, sketches and publishing proofs in addition to the artist's dummy books.
After three years of careful treatment, the conservation project is complete. Read on to see how we preserved these important pieces of Canadian children's literature from the 1950s to 1970s and to learn more about dummy books.
What is a dummy book?
A dummy book is a mock-up that authors and illustrators use to work out stories, illustrations and layouts of a book. They are important, one-of-a-kind items that give us insight into their creative process.
Some dummy books in Graham's archive are full-size mock-ups, while others are over-sized or miniature. Some are preliminary drafts in store-bought notebooks, while others were made entirely by Graham and bound with staples or adhesive.
They also show multiple layers of alterations. Sometimes these changes are written annotations from Graham. Other times they are taped-over or pasted-on sections inserted over top of previous versions of text or illustrations.
Condition assessment
The biggest issue with the dummy books was the use of rubber cement adhesive that had become yellow and brittle and was no longer sticky. Many of the bindings were already broken or at risk of falling apart. Taped-in text and images were also loose and separated from their correct pages. Both types of adhesives also had begun to stain pages and would cause further damage unless treated.
Designing a conservation plan
We planned to preserve the look and feeling of the dummy books as ephemera in an artist’s archive. Because these were working objects, it was important to retain qualities like smudges, stains and fingerprints that show how closely the artist worked with these books.
The treatments were not designed to improve the appearance of the books. For example, we wouldn’t do any stain reduction. Instead, we wanted to physically stabilize the books by repairing bindings and tears and securing loose elements so that the books could be safely accessed by current and future generations of staff and researchers.
Conservation treatment
Many of the detached or lifted elements were re-adhered with a mixture of a stable conservation-grade acrylic adhesives. Sometimes our conservators used this mixture with Japanese paper to make repairs, and other times wheat starch paste is used.
Maybe the most interesting part of the treatments was the new “tape” we made to replace the old, deteriorated tape. Any conservator will tell you that tape is not good to use, but we figured out a way to make an exception by creating a conservation-friendly alternative using stable materials.
We applied the same acrylic mixture that we used to re-adhere detached elements in a thin layer onto thin sheets of Mylar. Once dry, the adhesive was clear — just like tape! We cut these sheets into long strips that were the same width as the original tape pieces. To replace each tape piece, we cut the new strips with a tape dispenser to re-create the original serrated edge, trimming each piece according to the original tape size.
The new tapes were secured using a tacking iron. The stains left by the old tape were essential to figuring out where to place the detached pieces. The result is an attachment that looks and functions like the original tape without the risk of becoming yellow and brittle. (Fun fact: we saved the original tape alongside the dummy books in the archive.)
Storage
The final treatment step was housing. Each dummy book was housed inside a custom-made four-flap folder that was large enough to accommodate the largest dummy book. For the smaller books, we created custom spacers to ensure a good fit.
The folders are stored flat in five custom-made boxes. Flat storage will help to preserve the fragile adhesive bindings over time.
The final results
You can see in the example below of No Roses for Harry that the before and after photos aren’t drastically different, even though treatment included adhesive reduction, re-attachment of cut-outs and pages, repair of the spine and split binding, replacement of the tape, corner fills, and tear repair — but that was the goal!
These dummy books are now available for use in the reading room of the Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books at Lillian H. Smith branch.
Acknowledgments
Thank you to the Friends of the Osborne Collection for generously funding this conservation project.
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