—Initiatives by the Center for Historical Social Science Literature Global Report P romoting the “Project for Developing “D eveloping appropriate a Base and Network for the preservation measures” and “training Preservation of Western Historical specialist personnel” are pressing Materials” based at the Center for issues for the long-term preservation Historical Social Science Literature of Western historical materials The “Project for Developing a Base and Network Since the Meiji period, Japan’s universities and for the Preservation of Western Historical Materials” institutions have accumulated a large number of is a three-year project that began in the 2016 aca- Western historical materials in the process of actively demic year. The project was adopted as part of the embracing Western scholarship and ideas. Over the “Preservation of Cultural and Academic Documents” years, these materials have contributed to the project, a common policy matter established by the advancement of our country’s research and educa- Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and tion, and they are now preserved in university librar- Technology. It aims to raise the overall preservation ies and other places, categorized as “rare books.” standards for Western historical materials through Since our founding as the Commercial Training collaboration with relevant organizations in Japan, School in 1875, Hitotsubashi University has also accu- with the Hitotsubashi University Center for Histori- mulated a collection of around 80,000 globally valu- cal Social Science Literature (hereafter “the Center”) able historical materials, including the Menger Col- as a base. lection and the Gierke Collection. The Center has accumulated knowledge and exper- However, while the materials have deteriorated tise for handling historical materials through its work with age, preservation measures have not progressed. on measures for preserving stored materials, the Recently, in particular, there have been many cases organization of various courses and workshops, and where the staff who were in charge of the rare books exchanges of opinions with universities and research for many years and were familiar with the collections institutes, spanning more than 20 years. In the future, have retired, and universities are worried about the the Center intends to play an important role as the lack of expert knowledge on preservation, discontinu- “hub” of a domestic preservation network, through an ity in techniques, and the shortage of personnel. In initiative to provide on-the-job training in the preser- other words, the “development of appropriate preser- vation and restoration of Western historical materials vation measures” and “training of specialist person- to practical trainees from Japanese institutions, such nel” to undertake this task have become pressing as universities and libraries. This edition of HQ issues in promoting long-term preservation of West- reports on the preservation and restoration chal- ern historical materials as academic and cultural lenges faced by these relevant organizations, and the legacy in the future. content and results of the Center’s training program, Accordingly, as a base where various knowledge based on interviews with officials and trainees at the and expertise has been accumulated, the Center Center. became involved in promoting the “Project for Devel- 16 oping a Base and Network for the Preservation of nial Anniversary Fund, are stored under the category Western Historical Materials.” The Center has estab- of rare books, and this number is increasing annually. lished four specific initiatives: Work to register the bibliographic and storage (1) Practical training for personnel who play a piv- information in various online databases, such as the otal role in the preservation of Western historical Hitotsubashi Educational and Research Media Ser- materials vice (HERMES), is currently underway, and the Cen- (2) Preservation and restoration of materials held in ter is working to improve convenience for not only the Center internal but also external users. In the 2007 academic (3) Field surveys on the holding/preservation state year, the Center established an environment that of Western historical materials in universities and allows users to view some of the materials as elec- research institutes throughout Japan tronic images through HERMES-IR (the Hitotsubashi (4) Sharing of knowledge on materials preservation University Repository). The Center is attracting and development of a network through the host- attention as an independent, purpose-imbued base for ing of symposiums and other events generating a large amount of creative research. A n independent, purpose-imbued T o preserve rare books, base for generating a large amount of it is important to establish policy as a creative research university before considering how to deal with the materials The Center, which has a central role in the project, was established in 1978, when it separated from The Center has also invested effort in preservation Hitotsubashi University Library to focus on manag- measures for original materials through the opportu- ing Western historical materials while making contri- nity of the 1993 project to microfilm the Menger Col- butions to research and education. lection, which is the former private collection of Aus- It currently holds around 80,000 books. These include important, internationally prominent collections, such as the former collections of three professors (Carl Menger, Otto von Gierke, and Soda Kiichiro), the Franklin Collection, and the Bernstein-Souvarine Col- lection. In addition, all European language publica- tions published before 1850, including a large collec- tion funded through special budgetary arrangements by the Ministry of Education, Science and Culture (now the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Sci- ence and Technology) and a number of collections purchased using the Hitotsubashi University Centen- Keitaro Tokoi 17 Global Report Developing a National Base for the Preservation of Western Historical Materials —Initiatives by the Center for Historical Social Science Literature trian economist Carl Menger. It contains about 20,000 oping a Base and Network for the Preservation of items and is one of the Center’s core collections. Western Historical Materials.” Keitaro Tokoi, Assistant Research Officer at the Specifically, it receives two to four practical train- Center, says, “When microfilming the Menger Collec- ees per year from other universities or institutions tion, it was found that the materials might become and conducts on-the-job training related to the pres- damaged—or in some cases destroyed—during the ervation and restoration of its materials and improve- filming. Hitotsubashi University regards the original ment of the preservation environment. Through this books—including their binding, bookbinding struc- process, the Center aims to train specialized person- ture, and materials—as important historical materi- nel in pivotal positions, who will then head the effort als, and it has invested effort in keeping them as close in each area to train others in the preservation of to their original state as possible. Therefore, we tack- Western historical materials. led the issue of deterioration due to microfilming The training covers a wide range of content, such head on. And that was the starting point for our cur- as surveying the state of material sets, confirming the rent preservation activities.” deterioration of individual items, repair work, leather According to Tokoi, the point of departure in the preservation, making preservation containers, sam- discussions that were held at that time was not how ple-based training in bookbinding, preservation plan- to conduct the filming. ning simulations, and environmental controls for “Before talking about those technical aspects, we preservation. In the actual training, trainees receive prioritized drawing a grand design about what form comprehensive instruction in the preservation of to leave the materials in for future generations. After Western historical materials under curricula that are that, we worked with external experts and contrac- finely customized to the situation of their institution. tors to consider what steps to take in order to achieve When the Center approached key universities and that goal. When preserving rare books, it is essential institutions with collections of Western historical to first establish a clear policy for materials as a uni- materials, in the first year of the program, it success- versity.” fully recruited trainees from four organizations: the Then, the Center conducted the microfilming after confirming the deterioration status of the Menger Collection on an item-by-item basis, taking precau- tionary measures where necessary. This develop- ment led to the establishment of a preservation and restoration studio in the Center in 1995. Since then, for over 20 years, the Center has been busy survey- ing the state of all of its materials, and employing preservation measures, while also receiving backup from Hitotsubashi University Supporting Foundation and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Sci- ence and Technology. In addition, the Center has continued to hold sev- eral short courses, primarily for librarians, to actively share the knowledge and experience of restoring Western historical materials accumulated during this period with other universities and institutions. F inely tuned curricula, and a focus on building post-training