Treasures awaiting discovery in university collections

RARE FIND: Marie Malchodi, Brown University bookbinder, discovered a Paul Revere print during a routine assignment. / PBN PHOTO/FRANK MULLIN
RARE FIND: Marie Malchodi, Brown University bookbinder, discovered a Paul Revere print during a routine assignment. / PBN PHOTO/FRANK MULLIN

There are some 300,000 rare books inside Brown University’s John Hay Library. For the last 20 years Marie Malchodi, one of the university’s book-conservation technicians, has helped to preserve and protect them and the untold treasures they may keep.
Over two decades she’s discovered numerous interesting and sentimental items hidden inside – many of which have made their way into the staff’s collection and inspired stories of their own.
While working on a medical textbook once belonging to an 18th-century alumnus, she made a discovery that thrust her, her co-workers and the library into the public spotlight.
Inside an 1811 edition of “The Modern Practice of Physics” by Robert Thomas owned by Solomon Drowne, class of 1773, was a print depicting John the Baptist and Jesus in the Jordan River signed ‘P. Revere Sculpt’ – as in Paul Revere.
It was later determined the print is one of only five such in existence and not entirely characteristic of Revere’s best-known work, further amplifying its significance.

PBN: What was your first thought on finding the print?
MALCHODI: I didn’t take it in as a whole at first. I have a tendency to work at details. I saw what was [to me] this really strange composition. The perspective [was] primitive almost. It was probably only after I noticed all the details that I saw the name [Paul Revere] and thought, wow, I didn’t know he did this kind of work. I was sort of stunned.

PBN: Did you have any idea of the print’s significance or of the attention you would receive from this?
MALCHODI: I had no idea that it was a very rare or one of the rarest [Revere] prints. I brought it to Richard [Noble, the library’s rare-materials cataloguer] and he was able to find information about it almost immediately. I had no idea this would happen at all. It was very exciting when we found it.

PBN: A New York Times interview romanticized your daily work life and portrayed you as a rather shy sort. Was it accurate?
MALCHODI: A lot of people said to me, ‘I didn’t know you were shy,’ which is funny because I work pretty hard not to be. There were some people who felt that he was kind of stereotyping librarians, even though I’m not a librarian. He described me pretty well. What I do [for work] I love. It’s really neat. That’s not to say there aren’t mundane aspects to it – but there are a lot of rewards. When I walk through the tunnel [of the building] I don’t think of it as a romantic trek. I hope a truck doesn’t fall through College Street.
PBN: Could you just as easily have missed the print?
MALCHODI: Oh yes. It’s also something we could have treated as just any other [object] and put in a sleeve and then it would have sat in the book.

PBN: University library workers often say students and the public have little idea of the unique and rare books inside the stacks. Do you find this to be true?
MALCHODI: I think it’s true, especially with special collections. With general collections here at Brown, it’s open stacks so you can just walk in and see. Most of it is fairly academic or not valuable as objects but as information. But when you have special collections, which are open to public, you can’t walk around the stacks. There are very specific rules.
I don’t think most people on campus have any idea of what’s there and there are some remarkable things, both print materials and objects.

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PBN: What are some other treasures you’ve found through the years?
MALCHODI: Just in that little collection alone there also was a trading card from the late 1890s that apparently had been in containers of Arm and Hammer Baking Soda – which was called just soda the time. They were trading cards of animals of the United States. [This] picture was the American Bison and on the back it gave a description that said it was nearly extinct. I thought that was really kind of wild. It also shows that these books had come down through the family and still were being used. Another dear thing was in a spelling dictionary. It was a cutout of two roosters [as people used to] cut out paper dolls. There were a lot of notes. [One] was to thank Drowne for taking care of their child who had died. When I looked up the death later, the child was less than 2 years old. Sally Brown Francis was her name. It was very moving. Not all collections are like that. PBN: So, you’re not a librarian. What exactly does a bookbinder/conservation technician do on a daily basis?
MALCHODI: It’s very varied. When I’m working with the general collection, I do repair and restoration of books and materials. In some cases, I take a whole book apart, repair the paper, sew it back together, and make a new spine label – the whole thing. So the book goes from falling apart and not usable to a working book again. In the special collections, it’s mostly stabilization. … We make custom and protective boxes, some of them very beautiful, some of them very mundane.

PBN: What made this job ideal for you?
MALCHODI: Well, you have to love working with your hands. You work with your hands and tools all the time and you nick yourself. I’ve always loved [that]. When I was a girl, I would go to my grandmother’s and she taught me how to crochet and knit. When I was 9, my mother put me in front of a sewing machine. Having the background in crafts, in art, in tools is important. The other half of it is books. I love libraries, love reading, love books. I can’t think of a better combination. •

INTERVIEW
Marie Malchodi
POSITION: Book-conservation technician/bookbinder, Brown University
BACKGROUND: Malchodi came to the Providence area in the early 1980s to pursue a degree in marine biology at Brown University but quickly fell in love with studies in the English department. After leaving the university during her junior year, she worked at College Hill Bookstore in Providence before joining a cabinet-making company in Pawtucket. She joined Brown University’s library staff in 1992 in her current role. She works on repair and restoration within the library system’s general collections and on stabilization efforts in special collections.
EDUCATION: Studied English at Brown University
FIRST JOB: Mother’s helper
RESIDENCE: Cranston
AGE: 48

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