[Emily Weeks]

Hi!

I am working on trying to rehouse a tobacco collection that contains things such as cigarette packs and rolling tobacco and have come up against a problem with which I don’t know how to deal. I’m hoping someone might have faced a similar problem and could give me some advice. Some of the cigarette packs and tobacco boxes in the collection still have their original contents. We’d like to keep the tobacco products, but are thinking it would be wise to separate the contents of the boxes from the boxes themselves somehow to help protect the collection. I haven’t been able to find any literature on ways to rehouse objects like this, so we’re unsure of how to proceed with the rehousing.

Any advice people might have on how best to approach this problem would be much appreciated. Thanks!

[Heather Brown]

Hi Emily,

Great question! My instinct tells me to keep the boxes and contents housed together, but I don’t know whether that is standard practice in an archive, especially with potentially acidic materials. I thought perhaps resources on natural history collections (like SPNHC or NATSCA) would be helpful, but the ones I found mostly dealt with mounting herb specimens.

I will search for someone who is more knowledgeable in this area and get back to you.

Best,
Heather

[Heather Brown]

Hi Emily,

I asked around for more advice on your situation and received this informative response from Mark Nesbitt, Research Leader in Economic Botany at Kew Gardens:

“It’s true that there is potential for substances in the packaging to damage the contents – and vice versa.

That said, I would look to see if actual evidence of damage is present. In some cases there might be e.g. foil barriers that prevent this (I’m thinking of the foil-lined cigarette packets of my youth). There is a delicate balance between preserving the integrity of the object, and preventing damage, so each item should be assessed separately.

In cases where discoloration etc is taking place, then yes I would take out the contents. I would put the contents into a conservation grade transparent plastic container. Then I would take a single container, put in a layer of Plastazote, and cut two spaces, one for the box of contents, and one for the original packaging. That way, both are preserved and both are stored as one object.”

I hope that helps.
Best,
Heather

[Emily Weeks]

Hi Heather,

Thanks for this information. It’s very helpful for what I’m doing. Thanks for tracking it down for me!

-Emily

[Susan-1]

Another resource that might be of use on this type of question is the following book:
Jan Salick, Katie Konchar, and Mark Nesbitt, editors. Curating Biocultural Collections: A Handbook, Kew: Royal Botanic Gardens, 2014. Distributed by University of Chicago Press. ISBN: 1842464981

[Lacey Czeluscinski]

Question, though..

I just ran across some historic Lucky Strikes in my collection.

Are these a hazardous collection? What happens to the chemicals present in these cigarettes as they deteriorate?

Thanks,
-LMC

[Author]

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