The author of this post, Michele Hamill, is a conservation expert for Cornell University Library. She and her department have helped preserve our copy of the Gettysburg Address, and she will be writing a series of posts for this blog, providing an insider’s view of the history and challenges related to this task.
“Stuff” is a technical papermaking term that describes the wet pulp of cellulose fibers used to make a sheet of paper. President Abraham Lincoln used the right stuff — in both senses of the word — when he wrote out Cornell Library’s copy of the Gettysburg Address.
Our document, now 150 years old, owes much of its longevity to the excellent quality paper that President Lincoln used. He chose a pre-folded sheet of fine, wove, machine-made, writing paper with blue-ruled lines. “Fine” is another technical term that designates the highest quality writing paper, and “wove” is a type of paper with fibers interspersed evenly across a sheet.
The “stuff”, or refined and beaten wet cellulose pulp, used to make the paper of Cornell’s Gettysburg Address came from rags (yes, rags!). Old clothing and other textiles were used for centuries for papermaking. The rags were sorted, cleaned, macerated, and made into pulp.
Millions of pounds of rags, literally tons, were needed each year to produce paper. Rags came from domestic sources and were imported from Europe and Asia. To try to fill the need, newspapers carried advertisements for rags.
Not all fibers coming from rags were created equal. The finest quality paper was produced using linen rags. Fibers from linen rags were preferred for fine writing paper because they produced a superior paper, durable and strong.
To identify the exact fibers in Cornell’s Gettysburg Address, we would need to take a sample of the paper. But because Cornell’s copy doesn’t have a damaged area — such as a tear or dog-eared corner — where we could discreetly remove a sample of fibers, we conducted in-depth research into papermaking at this time and consulted paper historians instead. We then carefully examined our paper under magnification, with light coming through the paper (“transmitted light”) and light shown across the sheet at a low angle (“raking light”). These research and examination methods, coupled with how well the Address has stood the test of time, helped us conclude that Cornell Library’s copy of the Gettysburg Address is on a linen writing paper — the right stuff!
When President Lincoln wrote out Cornell’s Gettysburg Address, writing paper was still primarily made from rags, first from linen and then from cotton sources, which yielded excellent paper. This high quality paper has helped our document make its remarkable journey over the last 150 years in such good condition.
Lucky for us, the era of “bad paper”, when people used unprocessed wood pulp fibers for papermaking, was looming on the horizon but had not begun in earnest.
So much raw material was needed for papermaking that people eventually had to turn from rags to a more abundant source of pulp: wood fibers from trees. Unless wood pulp is processed carefully, it can contain large amounts of acid that quickly deteriorates paper. When President Lincoln wrote out Cornell’s Gettysburg Address, writing paper was still primarily made from rags, first from linen and then from cotton sources, which yielded excellent paper. This high quality paper has helped our document make its remarkable journey over the last 150 years in such good condition.
The appetite for paper at the time of the Civil War was huge. The skyrocketing publication of books, newspapers, pamphlets, and magazines — combined with the need for writing paper and wrapping paper — required vast amounts of materials. To produce these enormous quantities of paper, papermaking machines largely displaced hand-paper making.
Because of its high demand, paper was a precious commodity for both the North and the South during the Civil War — and it was largely manufactured in the North, leaving the South desperate for it. With paper in such scarce supply, the South used blank book pages for paper and reused envelopes by turning them inside-out.
Paper was such an important resource that when the Confederates burned the city of Richmond in 1865, they made sure to destroy their own paper mill.
So, during this time of scarcity, where did President Lincoln get his paper? We’ll tell you in our next post, coming soon.