Mary Hamilton French '09 at work on a book model in the Conservation Facility during her senior year at Wellesley College
Back in 2005 when I first began my studies at Wellesley College, I thought I had
everything figured out. At the age of 18, I was convinced that I’d major in psychology,
handily fulfill all of the pre-med requirements, and then jet off to medical school
immediately after graduation. In my spare time, I’d do something noble, like rescuing
kittens or teaching calculus to small children. And, obviously, I was firm in the conviction
that I wouldn’t change my mind about any of it. If I’d been given the ability to look 6
years into the future, I would have been more than a little surprised to discover myself
attending graduate school for book conservation – in a foreign country, no less!
So, how did I end up there?
About halfway through my first semester at Wellesley, I noticed a post on Wellesley’s
electronic bulletin board regarding bookbinding and letterpress printing workshops. As
a child, I loved anything arts or crafts related and happily spent hours making dollhouses
out of recycled cardboard boxes and fashioning toys out of scraps of cloth and
yarn. When I saw the opportunity to take some really nifty looking classes in the Book
Arts Lab at Wellesley, I signed up faster than you can say “books junkie.”
From the first class, I was hooked. I started spending more and more time in the Book
Arts Lab, and by the end of the year I found myself working there. I couldn’t quite
believe my luck – here I was, binding books, setting type, and printing broadsides! All
stuff that I would happily have done all day for free, and somebody was actually paying
me to do it? In retrospect, that should have been my first clue that this was destined to
become much more than just a hobby.
During the summers, I started working in the Conservation Lab at Wellesley. Instead of
making books as I had done at the BAL, I learned how to fix them from Emily Bell,
Collections Conservator. Those two jobs fell on opposite ends of the spectrum of a
book’s life, but the skills I learned in both perfectly complemented each other. My
knowledge of bookbinding enabled me to better understand the repair work necessary
to mend a broken spine or reattach the boards on a book, while my experience with the
(many!) ways a book can break enabled me to make better, more informed decisions
about the book structures I was creating.
In addition to the work I did for the Book Arts Lab and the Conservation Facility at
Wellesley, I also spent a fair amount of time in Special Collections. Although I initially
went for specific classes, I began going there more and more as time went on, not just
for research, but also for fun. The Special Collections librarians, Ruth Rogers and
Mariana Oller, were friendly, knowledgeable and incredibly helpful every time that I
stopped by. They helped kindle my love of old and rare books and showed me how to
properly handle fragile library materials.
By the time I graduated from Wellesley in 2009, I’d made a complete 180 regarding my
future career. The idea of becoming a psychiatrist was long gone – it seemed funny to
think that I’d ever wanted to be one. Book conservation was a field that was far better
suited to my personality and was something that I really loved.
After graduation, I landed an internship at the conservation lab in the Boston
Athenaeum. On one particularly memorable day there, I was handed a stack of books
to clean and label. When I popped the first one open, I noticed that it was signed by
George Washington himself. I quickly checked the rest of the stack. They were all
signed by George Washington. Without my work experience at Wellesley’s Book Arts
Lab and Conservation Facility, I would never have been able to get within a 3-mile radius
of those books, let alone land that internship!
And now here I am, already several months into my MA program. I am so thankful for
all of the skills I gained during my time at Wellesley – instead of having to learn
everything completely from scratch, I’ve been able to hit the ground running. Unlike
college, a lot of MA work is very self-directed. I can’t imagine what it would be like if I
weren’t able to draw on my Wellesley experiences. How would I know what questions
to ask, what repairs to suggest, and what to write in my condition and treatment
reports? I wouldn’t even know where to begin! Years of conservation and bookbinding
built up my handwork skills and expanded my knowledge base, enabling me to
maximize my learning time here.
Working at the Book Arts Lab and the Conservation Facility, as well as spending a
significant amount of time in Special Collections, was crucial to my decision to become a
book conservator. Back in 2005, I had definite ideas about the directions in which my
life was headed, and I probably wouldn’t have responded kindly to the suggestion that
I’d ever want to do anything else. Six years and 3,300 miles later, I’m forever thankful
for the day I accidentally stumbled upon my future career in one life-changing email. I
feel so lucky to have found my dream career and I cannot thank Wellesley enough for
making that a possibility.
Mary Hamilton French ’09 majored in Medieval and Renaissance Studies. She is
in her first year in the MA in Conservation Studies for Books and Library Materials
at West Dean College in the United Kingdom.