The following is extracted from a lecture given at the Philatelic Congress 2005. Only a sample of the illustrations is given.

RESTORATION; HOW FAR?

Professor John C West CBE RDP FRPSL.

In philately, the word restoration is a ‘hush’ word in the same way that ‘sex’ was in the Victorian era. It was there, but in polite society you didn’t talk about it. I think that after over 150 years of philately it is time to bring it out into the open. The object of this lecture is to provoke discussion, to educate by understanding and perhaps at some stage develop guidelines. F.I.P. has a committee on forgeries but ‘restoration’ in exhibitions is left to the discretion of the judges. My very last sheet shown, in this lecture, demonstrates this point. The Chairman of the Royal Philatelic Society’s Expertisation committee can tell you tales of the same rare cover being submitted for approval on successive occasions, each time with some ‘improvement’.

I became interested in paper artefact restoration in the 1970s when I began to collect old maps (of South America) antique prints of Chile and with my wife, watercolours. To obtain more information I joined the Institute of Paper Conservation and was elected a Fellow in 1980. I took part at an International Conference in Manchester University in 1992 ref.1. and I must have caught somebody’s eye because some archaeologists approached me from the University of Newcastle exploring Hadrian’s Wall. They had discovered some Roman soldier’s letters in very poor condition and wanted to know if I could enhance the writing so that they could make a better public display. The whole of the Chemistry research team at my University failed to make any improvement to the letters themselves but reading became possible under Infra-red light at a certain frequency. From the sublime to the ridiculous, they turned out to be a set of officer’s laundry lists.

Involvement in this institute was a big eye opener for me and I learned a lot. Restoration in this field covers a range of activities mainly necessary because of incorrect storage and handling, (how many philatelists wear cotton gloves when examining say a 1750s cover?), exposure to excessive heat, light, moisture and dust. Much of restoration is concerned with accidental damage particularly in flooding. The archival libraries of Venice have still not recovered from the record high seawater of a few years ago.

In the art world, paper is repaired, holes filled, varnish removed and the original painting cleaned and where necessary new paint used for touching up. All this gives added value and is acceptable with the provenance recorded. Translate that into the philatelic world and warning bells ring all over the place. In fact I risk my reputation in philately by daring to talk on this subject.

I have become increasingly aware in my advanced years that philatelists must recognise that they are the temporary privileged possessors of archival material that has to be preserved to the best of our technical and scientific knowledge. Restoration then becomes a duty. This is more obvious in the case of museums and libraries who are holding collections for posterity as well as present-time study.

Paper and ink although pretty tough do have a limit to their preservation without attention. Creases for example are long term dangerous for stability. The folds become brittle and break. It is good therefore to restore the fibre orientations and give back its strength. Infestations especially those arising from paper that has been in equatorial countries with extensive rainy seasons are obvious but just as invidious is the long-term effect of micro-organisms introduced in a variety of ways but especially from personal handling, breathing on them and especially on stamps, the effect of licking. Rust coloured marks are an indication of this, called ‘foxing’ and which develops further unless treated. Excessive dryness causes substantial irreversible deterioration of paper. I have commercial letters from mines in the Atacama desert, one of the hottest and driest in the World, over 100 years old which are brittle and, without backing, would fall apart.

Another major problem is staining, from whatever the cause and although the philatelist would like to have these removed from the immediate value and appeal point of view, restoration is also necessary to prevent ink and paper degradation.

Essentially paper consists of the bonded fibres of plant material such as wood, straw, flax, hemp or cotton which is shredded, broken down to expose the cellulose in the fibres, then beaten to a pulp and mixed with water. If this mixture is drained through a sieve, the layer of fibrous material remaining on the sieve will dry to form paper. While making spinach soup, for example, you could produce a coarse sheet of spinach paper. If, after boiling and blending the spinach, you pour the pulpy mixture through a sieve, the thin, 'smoother' pulp will drain away (to be used for the soup), while the coarser material will remain in the sieve, forming a thin layer of matted fibres on the mesh. This layer of plant matter will dry into paper. Paper as we know it today originated in China about two thousand years ago. Its invention is usually attributed to a Chinese eunuch, Ts'ai Lun, in 105 AD, although earlier examples have been recorded. Previously, Chinese scribes wrote on strips of wood or bamboo with a pointed stylus, but this was cumbersome and books and scrolls of woven cloth succeeded the strips of wood or bamboo. Ts'ai Lun took the idea a step further and began making paper from the bark of trees, hemp waste, old rags, fish- nets and other plant fibres. Since then many other plants have been used to make paper, including mulberry bark, hemp, China grass, bamboo and gampi. When paper was finally introduced to Europe a thousand years later, many of these plants were unavailable here, and most European paper was initially made from linen and cotton rags. The development of the printing trade increased the need for larger quantities of paper and at the beginning of the 19th century there was a search for a more economical and plentiful raw material. This discovery led to the use of refined wood pulp to make paper.

The use of wood in papermaking was not new. It was first suggested by a French naturalist, de Réaumur, from his observations of the age-old nest-building activities of the wasp. The wasp rasps dry wood and chews it into a workable paste with which it makes a Papery nest that is tough and highly water- resistant. This discovery later led chemists to experiment with the properties of wood as a substance for making paper. The bulk of our paper today is made from chemically and mechanically refined wood pulp sprayed onto fast-moving belts of felt. Essentially the preparation and techniques are the same as for handmade paper, which was almost totally replaced by mass- production methods some 200 years ago. In general artists still prefer handmade paper because of its strength and long-lasting qualities. In the West these properties are principally the result of high cotton content. Cotton fibres are long, strong and resistant to the long-term destructive effects of light and atmosphere. The higher the percentage of cotton (and the lower the percentage of wood pulp) in the paper, the higher its quality. In the East the slow, gentle processing of long-fibred plants creates thin papers of remarkable tensile strength and durability, so called Rice paper.

In my exhibits I show a cover ca. 1750 with hand made paper by the monks in Santiago and includes their personal watermark. Such stout paper will last many a life-time and withstand much rough treatment.

Paper is not always stable and can vary in size over a period of time or dependent on treatment. The stamps of 1941-42 of George VI in pale colours are a classic example. Some used stamps appeared on the market in the 1960s with a size only 80% of the originals. It was said this was an experiment to save paper during the war that was not proceeded with and they were rare. I show some in my exhibit, which I have manufactured myself by soaking and when nearly boiling, take them out and roll into a tight ball. Soak again in cold water and dry in a press between many sheets of blotting paper. This does the trick.

Knowledge of inks is also very instructive. It was only in the late 19th. century that major research and development began to take place. (How much postal history material is earlier than 1880?) From the earliest Chinese days writing ink was hand made. (This did not mean you had to make it yourself, you could buy it, but it was still hand made by someone). The objective was to make easy flow from a duck’s feather quill. The European formula copied from a 1700s manual reads,

‘To make a very good ink for writing: take three ounces of good galls, reduced to powder ; which infufe in three pints of river or rain water, fetting it in the fun or a gentle heat, for two days ; then take common copperas, or green vitriol, three ounces; powder it, put it into the infufion, and fet in the fun for two days more ; lastly, fhake it well, and add an ounce of good gum Arabic.’

Note: f and s seem interchangeable in the writing of the day i.e. infufe is infuse! I really like ‘fetting it in the fun’ and ‘fhake it well’. (That’s what many may think this paper is all about).

Gall, very prevalent on oak trees in England, is a nut formed on the surface as a reaction by the trees to the deposition of eggs laid by the Gall Wasp.

Copperas is an old name for Ferrous Sulphate also referred to as Green Vitriol. Gum Arabic is obtained from Acacias

When printing started, writing ink was useless. The properties required were an affinity to metal surface, ability to spread uniformly and to remain fairly ‘jelly like’ until pressed onto the surface of paper.

A note in the same 1700 manual states that printing ink is made by boiling or burning linseed oil till it is ‘pretty’ thick adding rosin while still hot, and then mixing this varnish with lamp-black. (Note, Rosin is a resin from dead pine wood which pharmaceutically treated becomes turpentine).

Research and development for both types first hinged on rapid drying which began to involve highly volatile liquids which were also highly inflammable. After many serious fires in ink factories the research turned to making safer chemicals. During the 1939-45 war the ‘Biro’ was developed for pilots who could be upside down and at any air pressure. This needed the development of a new type of ink and solvents for this to remove unwanted marks is highly technical. After the war felt tipped pens became a vogue, again with a different type of ink which also requires specialist treatment to remove.

I could write a full-length paper on inks but I will emphasise that while printing inks are fairly stable in attempts to ‘clean’ covers, writing inks before 1914 are very sensitive and will probably disappear before the required cleaning has been achieved. I illustrate several of my failures in this respect. Bleaching to clean has not as yet been differentiated from removal of writing ink. One of the researchers in the Institute of Paper Conservation, ref.1. recommended using a varnish written over the ink and then after bleaching using a varnish remover. I have tried this without success because the bleach is internal whilst the varnish is surface only. Another aspect of the early writing inks is that they were strongly acidic and often over several years attacked the paper. Letters like O caused a full circle to drop out from the paper. In one of my slides I show the acidic effect of ‘gall’ ink. This often means for strength and restoration, that the paper requires backing support. Black Gall ink is very pervasive and adhesives placed over such writing have the ink coming through. Ref. 2 deals with the treatment of penny blacks blemished in this way.

I have to emphasise that bleaching is a tool of the amateur; the professional regards it as a last resort. All bleaching takes something out of paper, which cannot be replaced even with subsequent treatment.

(Soaking in gelatine goes some way to ameliorate the effect of mild bleaching, restoring body and strength in a harmless manner).

At the professional level restoration has reached a highly technical and specialised level. There is a large range of solvents for specific problems. The following is the most frequently used: -

Benzene, Toluene, Xylena, Methyl Alcohol, Ethyl Alcohol, Iso-Propyl Alcohol,

Butyl Alcohol, Amyl Alcohol, Di-Acetone Alcohol, Acetone, Methyl ethyl ketone, Methyl cyclohexanone, Furfural, Ethyl acetate, Butyl acetate, Amyl acetate, Ethyl lactate, Ethyl ether, Ethylene glycol mono-ethyl ether, Di-Ethylene glycol -mono-ethyl ether, Dioxane, Methylene dichloride, Chloroform, Carbon tetrachloride, Tetrachlorethane and Trichloroethylene

For general cleaning purposes use can be made of Aliphatic petroleum distillates. (Obtainable from good art material suppliers). In the hardware shops one finds patented goods for the removal of various stains. Reading the small print shows they are made up from one or two from the above list.

In the display I show a pamphlet ‘The Conservation and Preservation Sourcebook’ which gives an indication of the extent, range and sophistication of tools and materials now available for the professional. I will describe only two pieces of apparatus.

One of the most useful tools is the ‘Preservation pencil’. “This patented product has proved to be the most successful tool, the one piece of equipment every conservator requires." The design was by a leading British electrical design and development engineer for use with ultrasonic humidifiers. The Preservation Pencil provides a fine delicate jet of moisture (or dry) air from ambient to 100°C and is used for removing glue, resins, old labels, separating paper layers, activating adhesives and enzymes, relaxing and cleaning. The PENCIL does not contain scalding boiling water and will not spit or drip.

Another sophisticated piece of equipment is the ‘Leaf casting infill machine’ . This is used for repairing holes and tears especially when some of the paper is missing. A pulp is made inside the machine, from similar paper and with the sheet to be repaired fixed on a fine sieve table, a partial vacuum pulls the pulp through the hole and forms paper in the same manner as paper production. In the slide that I show a different texture paper has been used so that the extent of the repair is obvious. With identical paper used in the pulping the repairs are not detectable.

The training of a professional conservator is now sophisticated and extensive taking a first degree and a one-year post graduate specialising in a particular aspect. I show an amazing piece of work done for his M.A. by such a student working on a gouache painting from the basement of the Lancaster City Art Gallery. This really shows the extent of professional capability.

For the philatelist and indeed for many libraries and art galleries the use of the professional, because it is so time consuming is very expensive. In philately this means it is generally either DIY or not at all. The real question is what can be done and how far is it considered desirable in the philatelic context?

Starting with the first part, one of the curses has been the invention of so called transparent self-adhesive tapes. How many torn covers have been ‘repaired from behind’ by such tape only to find that within a few years a yellowish stain has come through and effectively destroyed the value. The most effective treatment is by soaking in Ethyl Acetate which after an hour or so enables the tape to be lifted off without any tension on the paper. Usually this removes the stain as well, but extra cleaning can be done by wiping with cotton wool soaked in Trichloroethylene. These chemicals are not water solvent and do not affect the strength of the paper during the operation.

Two things have to be borne in mind, the first is that both these chemicals are highly volatile and toxic. Do not use in the home, but in your garden shed or out house with windows and door open wide and try not to breath in the gases. Mouth and nose masks for dust etc. are not effective. The volatility is such that when left to dry the whole of the chemical evaporates and disappears from the paper. The second point that hardly seems to be worth mentioning but can be vital is that the tape would not have been used in the first place if the cover had not been torn, often badly, so that careful handling is necessary before the tears are repaired.

Dirt of ages can best be removed by rubbing with a dry bread crust, crumb side to the paper. Ordinary pencil ‘rubbers’ are not recommended, as they tend to remove the surface. A very soft rubber can be obtained from Art shops developed for this purpose and is cleaner and easier to handle than bread. I use a German, Staedtler ‘Mars Plastic’ rubber.

All stains, blood, coffee, red wine, undesirable ink marks of the various kinds, etc. can and should be removed by specific none water solvents. Again your Art shop can usually advise. For example genuine iron rust caused usually by a long-standing paper clip or staple, can be removed using Sodium Hydrosulphite. Damp the rust area with water and cover with the powder.

Unfortunately the removal of micro biological foxing on individual stamps or covers necessitates, for the amateur, the use of bleaching. This involves total immersion. Trying to remove locally, results in dark rings, as the rust colouring tends to spread. These are just as unsightly and unacceptable as the foxing. For stamps the best bleach is Hydrogen Peroxide bought from the Chemist for beauty treatment. The formula H2O2 shows it has a weak binding easily reverting to water H2O and oxygen O. It is this spare oxygen molecule, which does the bleaching. Light itself detaches the oxygen which is why it is stored in a dark glass bottle. It is desirable when bleaching to keep the process in the dark. Hydrogen peroxide can of course be used for full covers by total immersion again covering the dish with dark card to keep out daylight. The snag is that it removes writing ink very quickly and before the foxing. I show some of the results of this.

The next best bleach is the so-called Chloramine T (its formula is so complicated it cannot be named from it).

This is non-toxic and non-corrosive and leaves paper with the majority of its previous strength. Careful watch has to be maintained since it also takes out ink but not anything like the speed of the previous bleach. When the ink starts to be affected the cover must be thoroughly washed in pure water before being pressed between multiple sheets of blotting paper, otherwise the bleaching process continues in the press and one finishes up with an unaddressed envelope. It is a good idea to photocopy before starting treatment because often when several stamps have floated off it can be difficult to determine the precise position for relocation.

Absolutely necessary is to remember that water soaked paper is heavy and seriously weakened in strength. Never try to lift a wet cover from the water by a corner. Always place the cover on a suitable sized plate of glass before immersion and lift out using the glass. The cover can be dried and pressed between sheets of blotting paper in a ‘press’ including the glass plate. Paper shrinks on drying and glass does not, so that this provides an extra effective way of obtaining a smooth creaseless finish.

Having tried one’s hand in restoration the query comes on how far is it legitimate to go in philately. We know that apart from forgery there are no holds barred in the art world. I show a rare cover with a strip of four stamps, the middle two of which are torn with small pieces missing. It would be so tempting to repair them and form a good exhibition item. As an archival artefact the historian would regard this as a good thing. But in philately the stamp itself is important. Its value is indicated in catalogues thus repairing is seen as enhancement. If you bought unknowingly a rare stamp and found it had been repaired you would think you had been swindled.

Let me list what I think are the possibilities in restoration and then decide what is acceptable.

a) Cleaning and tidying up.

b) Removal of stains including foxing even if it requires bleaching.

c) Repair of tears and even hole filling.

d) Completing missing parts of the name and address etc. in ink

e) Repair of damaged stamps

f) Enhancement of postal markings.

g) Replacement of missing stamps.

For your amusement I show a rare airmail cover that has received all the above ‘improvements’. It was very badly torn all round the sides had two stamps damaged and from the postmarks and from ones knowledge of the rates, has two stamps completely missing. This has been totally restored, the torn stamps repaired and two extra stamps added. The wording Via New York has been added in ink and the two coloured bars over the etiquette enhanced.

Superficially it looks very impressive but a careful inspection reveals the extent of the work. It would not pass the eye of any judge. (I have deliberately done it this way so as not be accused of malpractice and also for you to debate just exactly what is legitimate restoration.)

In my view only a, b and c are tolerable.

In my first paragraph I mentioned the role of judges at exhibitions to comment on restoration and I finish showing a sheet with two very rare Chilean covers. In 1891 there was a revolution in Chile which divided the country in two. The revolutionaries were in the North and ran short of postage stamps and so authorised the use of telegraph stamps. Intrinsically these stamps are not valuable but used on cover produce a fine exhibition piece. Unfortunately there has been a lot of fraudulently produced covers and no wonder when I exhibited these, the judges were sceptical. However the good news for me at least was that the Royal’s Expertisation Committee gave me a clean bill of health.

References.

1) The Institute of Paper Conservation. Conference papers Manchester University 1992

2) Catherine Rickman Conservation of Philatelic Materials pp. 273-279. Manchester

University Conference. 1992

3) Collings T J and Schoolley-West R F The care and preservation of Philatelic

Material. The British Library London 1989

4) Dard Hunter, Paper Making, The History and Technique of an Ancient Craft. Dover

Publications Inc. N.Y. 1943

5) Alfred H Shorter, Paper Making in the British Isles. David & Charles, Newton Abbott

1971

6) The National Stamp Service, The Dealers’ Guide to Chemical Restoration of Postage Stamps. Quincy, Mass. 1976 .

7) Paul W Schmid, How to detect damaged, altered and repaired stamps. Palm Press,

Huntington, N.Y. 1979.

8) John Easton, Postage Stamps in the Making, Faber & Faber, London, 1949.

Chapter 4 is ‘Paper problems and remedies’.