Fletcher Durant
@fletcherdurant.bsky.social
Preservation : Conservation : Academic Libraries : Archives : Stuff
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Publication day! The Routledge Handbook of Heritage & Creative Practice is out today and it includes my piece on creative responses to the mass removal of love-locks along with some amazing pieces by some brilliant people www.routledge.com/The-Routledg...
November 29, 2025 at 9:58 AM
Publication day! The Routledge Handbook of Heritage & Creative Practice is out today and it includes my piece on creative responses to the mass removal of love-locks along with some amazing pieces by some brilliant people www.routledge.com/The-Routledg...
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
A #tinyjoy to take you into the weekend. I just learned that 13- year-old Charlotte Brontë's TINY book, A Book of Ryhmes [sic] (it measures 9.5 cm by 6 cm) contains a poem titled "A Thing OF fourteen Line's. commonly called a" (& her tiny handwriting made the next word illegible.) #BookHistory
November 28, 2025 at 6:14 PM
A #tinyjoy to take you into the weekend. I just learned that 13- year-old Charlotte Brontë's TINY book, A Book of Ryhmes [sic] (it measures 9.5 cm by 6 cm) contains a poem titled "A Thing OF fourteen Line's. commonly called a" (& her tiny handwriting made the next word illegible.) #BookHistory
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Today in art crime www.nytimes.com/2025/11/28/w...
Aftershocks of an Epic Art Crime Reverberate in Japan
www.nytimes.com
November 28, 2025 at 1:57 PM
Today in art crime www.nytimes.com/2025/11/28/w...
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Cal Lane, Canadian trained welder and metal artist, transforms common tools and also industrial steel products into intricate sculptures #WomensArt
November 26, 2025 at 6:07 AM
Cal Lane, Canadian trained welder and metal artist, transforms common tools and also industrial steel products into intricate sculptures #WomensArt
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Great piece, Dan. I can confirm: Over the years, this has indeed been a longstanding problem. I've helped fund numerous projects over the years trying to address handwriting recognition and it is exciting to see what we can do today.
New issue of my newsletter: "The Writing Is on the Wall for Handwriting Recognition" — One of the hardest problems in digital humanities has finally been solved, and it's a good use of AI newsletter.dancohen.org/archive/the-...
The Writing Is on the Wall for Handwriting Recognition
One of the hardest problems in digital humanities has finally been solved
newsletter.dancohen.org
November 25, 2025 at 7:01 PM
Great piece, Dan. I can confirm: Over the years, this has indeed been a longstanding problem. I've helped fund numerous projects over the years trying to address handwriting recognition and it is exciting to see what we can do today.
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Welcome to our three-part series on book rebinding, where Library of Congress advanced book conservation interns Brittany and Devon will take you through all the steps of rebinding a book from the Library's Thomas Jefferson Library Collection. Stay tuned for parts two and three!
November 21, 2025 at 6:59 PM
Welcome to our three-part series on book rebinding, where Library of Congress advanced book conservation interns Brittany and Devon will take you through all the steps of rebinding a book from the Library's Thomas Jefferson Library Collection. Stay tuned for parts two and three!
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Live conservation at the Stanley Spencer Gallery is uncovering surprising details beneath the surface of ‘Christ Preaching at Cookham Regatta’. Thin paint layers, visible grids and unexpected methods are giving a rare look into Spencer’s unfinished final work.
buff.ly/g0a1aXm
buff.ly/g0a1aXm
November 20, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Live conservation at the Stanley Spencer Gallery is uncovering surprising details beneath the surface of ‘Christ Preaching at Cookham Regatta’. Thin paint layers, visible grids and unexpected methods are giving a rare look into Spencer’s unfinished final work.
buff.ly/g0a1aXm
buff.ly/g0a1aXm
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
The irony that world ‘cultural’ heritage wouldn’t exist without global environmental destruction and extraction
November 19, 2025 at 4:11 PM
The irony that world ‘cultural’ heritage wouldn’t exist without global environmental destruction and extraction
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
1/ Announcing GovScape – a public search system for 10 million U.S. government PDFs (70 million pages)! GovScape offers visual search, semantic text search, and keyword search. Explore below:
Website: www.govscape.net
ArXiv link: arxiv.org/abs/2511.11010
Website: www.govscape.net
ArXiv link: arxiv.org/abs/2511.11010
www.govscape.net
November 18, 2025 at 8:19 PM
1/ Announcing GovScape – a public search system for 10 million U.S. government PDFs (70 million pages)! GovScape offers visual search, semantic text search, and keyword search. Explore below:
Website: www.govscape.net
ArXiv link: arxiv.org/abs/2511.11010
Website: www.govscape.net
ArXiv link: arxiv.org/abs/2511.11010
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
That's AWS, Azure and Cloudfare in the last few weeks.
For a distributed network, the web sure does have some single points of failure.
For a distributed network, the web sure does have some single points of failure.
November 18, 2025 at 1:22 PM
That's AWS, Azure and Cloudfare in the last few weeks.
For a distributed network, the web sure does have some single points of failure.
For a distributed network, the web sure does have some single points of failure.
The thing about driving a car for 23 years is that you know things are going to start breaking, and you just hope that they are non-essential and easy/cheap to replace.
My side mirror just snapped off, so now I know how to replace a car’s side mirror.
My side mirror just snapped off, so now I know how to replace a car’s side mirror.
November 16, 2025 at 5:26 PM
The thing about driving a car for 23 years is that you know things are going to start breaking, and you just hope that they are non-essential and easy/cheap to replace.
My side mirror just snapped off, so now I know how to replace a car’s side mirror.
My side mirror just snapped off, so now I know how to replace a car’s side mirror.
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
This is a 52-pound 9000+ page accordion-bound artist’s book of Donald Trump’s lies, conceived, printed, and bound by Jill and Ray Nichols of @leadgraffiti.bsky.social in Delaware. Each of the 9000 pages has the text (per the Washington Post) of one or more of Trump’s lies; none are repeated.
November 15, 2025 at 7:09 PM
This is a 52-pound 9000+ page accordion-bound artist’s book of Donald Trump’s lies, conceived, printed, and bound by Jill and Ray Nichols of @leadgraffiti.bsky.social in Delaware. Each of the 9000 pages has the text (per the Washington Post) of one or more of Trump’s lies; none are repeated.
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
‘We don’t even know all of what we have.’ Howard University fights to preserve Black newspapers. www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/... Last year, during a move, workers found two whole boxes of Frederick Douglass’s’ The North Star’s first year of publication.
‘We don’t even know all of what we have.’ Howard fights to preserve Black newspapers.
Across the United States, scholars are working to preserve the history of the Black press before the brittle pages are lost forever. In a basement at Howard University, uncovered treasures have includ...
www.csmonitor.com
November 15, 2025 at 12:58 PM
‘We don’t even know all of what we have.’ Howard University fights to preserve Black newspapers. www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/... Last year, during a move, workers found two whole boxes of Frederick Douglass’s’ The North Star’s first year of publication.
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
A family has handed over a 13th century book to the National Library of Norway. Conservator Chiara Palandri says its pages were made of calfskin parchment and that the cover appears to be hairy sealskin. The strap to hold the book together is thought to have been made from reindeer hide.
Eight pages bound in furry seal skin may be Norway's oldest book
The little book is so rare that the National Library of Norway is bringing in experts from around the world to learn more.
www.sciencenorway.no
November 12, 2025 at 6:29 PM
A family has handed over a 13th century book to the National Library of Norway. Conservator Chiara Palandri says its pages were made of calfskin parchment and that the cover appears to be hairy sealskin. The strap to hold the book together is thought to have been made from reindeer hide.
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
A library of stone in Alex Wenham's studio. I really can't explain how much I love stone - and the people who work it.
April 28, 2025 at 8:03 AM
A library of stone in Alex Wenham's studio. I really can't explain how much I love stone - and the people who work it.
Stepped on some ginkgo fruit. May burn my shoes later.
November 7, 2025 at 7:36 PM
Stepped on some ginkgo fruit. May burn my shoes later.
All things must end. Even the Farmer’s Almanac. abcnews.go.com/US/farmers-a...
Farmers' Almanac announces final publication after 208-year run
After more than two centuries in print, the Farmers' Almanac will end its run with its 2026 edition.
abcnews.go.com
November 7, 2025 at 7:19 PM
All things must end. Even the Farmer’s Almanac. abcnews.go.com/US/farmers-a...
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Hoping this helps our colleagues across the industry
November 5, 2025 at 1:01 PM
Hoping this helps our colleagues across the industry
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
What impact did this handful of specialized HSI agents have in recent years?
Working with Manhattan DA's ATU, they helped convict 18 antiquities traffickers, recovered approximately 6,100 antiquities valued at $480 million, and returned approximately 5,770 of them to 32 countries, with more daily.
Working with Manhattan DA's ATU, they helped convict 18 antiquities traffickers, recovered approximately 6,100 antiquities valued at $480 million, and returned approximately 5,770 of them to 32 countries, with more daily.
November 7, 2025 at 12:50 AM
What impact did this handful of specialized HSI agents have in recent years?
Working with Manhattan DA's ATU, they helped convict 18 antiquities traffickers, recovered approximately 6,100 antiquities valued at $480 million, and returned approximately 5,770 of them to 32 countries, with more daily.
Working with Manhattan DA's ATU, they helped convict 18 antiquities traffickers, recovered approximately 6,100 antiquities valued at $480 million, and returned approximately 5,770 of them to 32 countries, with more daily.
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
NEW - The Trump admin has disbanded its federal cultural property investigations team and reassigned the agents to immigration enforcement, delivering a blow to one of the world’s leaders in heritage protection, according to multiple ppl familiar with the changes.
www.denverpost.com/2025/11/06/u...
www.denverpost.com/2025/11/06/u...
The U.S. was a leader in cultural heritage investigations. Now those agents are working immigration enforcement.
Homeland Security Investigations, the department’s investigative arm, once had as many as eight agents in its New York office investigating cultural property cases.
www.denverpost.com
November 6, 2025 at 4:04 PM
NEW - The Trump admin has disbanded its federal cultural property investigations team and reassigned the agents to immigration enforcement, delivering a blow to one of the world’s leaders in heritage protection, according to multiple ppl familiar with the changes.
www.denverpost.com/2025/11/06/u...
www.denverpost.com/2025/11/06/u...
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
156 years ago #onthisday, Top the wombat died. He was the pet of the poet and artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti who, upon Top's passing, created this self-portrait in mourning. More on Rossetti and co’s curious but longstanding fixation with the #wombat here: publicdomainreview.org/essay/o...
November 6, 2025 at 12:46 PM
156 years ago #onthisday, Top the wombat died. He was the pet of the poet and artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti who, upon Top's passing, created this self-portrait in mourning. More on Rossetti and co’s curious but longstanding fixation with the #wombat here: publicdomainreview.org/essay/o...
Reposted by Fletcher Durant
Holy shit. THIS IS HOW AN ANTI-BOOK BAN LAW WORKS, Y'ALL.
Maryland's school board overturned a Harford County Schools ban on FLAMER.
www.thebanner.com/education/k-...
Maryland's school board overturned a Harford County Schools ban on FLAMER.
www.thebanner.com/education/k-...
In a first for the state, Maryland’s school board reverses Harford County’s book ban
Maryland’s school board is reversing Harford County’s decision to remove a book from public school libraries — the first time the state has intervened in a local decision about what’s appropriate for ...
www.thebanner.com
November 6, 2025 at 1:17 PM
Holy shit. THIS IS HOW AN ANTI-BOOK BAN LAW WORKS, Y'ALL.
Maryland's school board overturned a Harford County Schools ban on FLAMER.
www.thebanner.com/education/k-...
Maryland's school board overturned a Harford County Schools ban on FLAMER.
www.thebanner.com/education/k-...