NCPTT

Mary Striegel will be the keynote speaker at the annual meeting of the American Society for Non-destructive Testing, to be held March 17 in St. Louis, Mo.

The topic is the use of eddy currents for identification of metals (ferrous and non-ferrous), measuring the thickness of corrosion, and the recovery of serial numbers and/or images beneath corrosion.

NCPTT is organizing a session on non-destructive testing in historic preservation as part of the American Society for Non-destructive Testing’s meeting on March 17, 2009 in St. Louis.

NCPTT was awarded the Oliver Torrey Fuller Award at the Association of Preservation Technology International (APTI) conference in October.

NCPTT’s held its sixth annual Cemetery Monument Conservation workshop October 7-9, 2008, in New London, Connecticut. Twenty-six registrants participated in a variety of hands-on sessions.

NCPTT has received the PTT grant product “Wooden Artifacts in Cemeteries: A Reference Manual,” submitted by the Historic Preservation Commission; the City of Aspen, Colorado, and Anthony & Associates.

In response to the recent flooding in the Midwest and fires in California, NCPTT’s Sean Clifford and Mary Striegel continue to update the NCPTT web pages on disaster preparedness, response, and recovery.

NCPTT and the Department of Veteran Affairs, National Cemetery Administration has released the interim report entitled, Comparative Study of Commercially Available Cleaners for use on Federally-issued Headstones.

The National Preservation Technology and Training Board convened on April 15-16 at NCPTT’s headquarters in Natchitoches, La.

$695 per participant. Topics Will Include: Condition Assessments, Conservation Ethics, Protection, Cleaning, Stone Loss Repairs, Bases and Resetting, Adhesion & Reinforced Repair, Consolidation.

Mary Striegel of NCPTT presented at the 2008 Louisiana Library Association Annual Meeting, held March 4-6 in Shreveport.

2006 NCPTT Grant to Harvard University, “Development of a Rapid Indicator of Biodeterioration of Historic Stone.” Biodeterioration plays an important role in the degradation of stone in historic buildings, monuments, and archeological sites.

NCPTT interns Stace Miller and Bilal Khurshid were acknowledged for their research and professional presentations at NSU’s Annual College of Science and Technology banquet.

2004 NCPTT Grant to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, “Lustron On-line.”

The Department of Veteran Affairs, National Cemetery Administration, has entered into a new interagency agreement with NCPTT to continue the evaluation of commercially available cleaners for use on federally-issued headstones.

NCPTT is providing consultation to Arlington National Cemetery on maintenance and repair of the “Tomb of the Unknowns.”

NCPTT recently provided technical assistance to the Louisiana State Exhibit Museum in Shreveport regarding concerns about the condition of several archeological copper objects associated with the Gahagan burials that were excavated in the 1930s.

NCPTT hosted the American Chemical Society Regional Chapter Meeting on Nov. 27 in Lee H. Nelson Hall. The meeting included a banquet dinner and guest lecture by Dr. Mary Robert Garrett on synthesis of enantioenriched beta-ketoesters.

Development of a Rapid Indicator of Biodeterioration of Historic Stone. Ralph Mitchell, principal investigator, and Christopher J. McNamara, of Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences worked to identify microbial species for possible use as a microbiological indicator for identification of stone deterioration.

NCPTT’s Sarah Jackson along with colleagues Mary Striegel and Tye Botting were awarded the Oliver Torrey Fuller Award for their article, “Durability of Traditional and Modified Limewash.”