What is an effective way to dry out a book that has gotten wet?

What is an effective way to dry out a book that has gotten wet? What if a large number of books have gotten wet (e.g., after an accidental sprinkler discharge)?

This assumes, of course, that the books appear to still be in reasonably sound condition otherwise.

1. Alan Thomas II

• book-repair

Comments

Answer by Jakob

Freeze it. Large libraries have contracts with refrigerated warehouses in their disaster plan. See this report and other NCPTT publications for technical details and as starting point to find more references. I am not familiar with English library science textbooks but I guess there is also teaching material on freeze drying books and library disaster planing in general.

Comments

• Joe: And even if you don't have the full freeze-drying rig, I've been told by one of the archivists at my place of work that it's useful preservation to keep mold or other nastiness from growing in there (even after you think it's dry).