how to preserve a letter

[crisgal]

my mum has found a letter written to her. when she was 7, in 1944. It was from her eldest brother who was serving in the army.
It's on blue airmail paper and is written in pencil, so has already faded very much.
What is the best way of preserving it?

[Voulez-vous]

The best way of preserving the content, is to take copies. As for storage I have no idea, I hope someone will be able to suggest something.

[crisgal]

like laminating?

[Buenchico]

My instinct is to get someone with a scanner and Photoshop (or a similar program, such as GIMP) to copy the letter and to produce a restored image.

The original could then be placed between the pages of a 'quality' photo album (with acid-free pages), which is akin to the treatment that a county archives office would use. Laminating it (and then storing it away from light) is another possibility but such a technique probably wouldn't meet with approval of many 'professionals'.

Chris

[ELVIS68]

Copy it and laminate it, I`ve been doing a family tree and got a copy of my great great great great grandfathers marriage certificate with signatures dating back to 1801

[Mosaic]

Don't laminate it!!
Laminating is a non-reversible process, and plastics alter with age as well as slowly releasing small amounts of acidic gas. This would mean your letter will decompose insode the laminate pouch and nobody in the future could reverse it.
Like others have said, scanning this letter is the first step, then put the original away, inside a neutral clear pouch. Lots of this kind of product exists especially for the 'scrap-book' craft industry. Or fold acid-free tissue round it and put it in a clear flat folder. Above all, store it away in the dark and somewhere that doesn't get steamy - don't expose it to more light if you can help it - and avoid henadling it / letting others handle it as the urea from skin will cause further damage. It's own little box is a good idea, saves it getting banged about in a drawer.
This is pretty top-of-the-range advice for conservation but this letter is obviously valuable to you, so it's worth taking these precautions. However the papaer is not the sort that will last centuries - unlike say linen rag paper - so it might not last the next hundred years in good condition.

[boxtops]

I wouldn't laminate - the heat from the laminator can destroy frail documents

[dotty.]

good link:
http://www.ancestryso.../Genea101%20Pics.html

[crisgal]

thank you all. Yes it is very special. My poor mum was in hospital with dyptheria, (for a year!) and her eldest brother was fighting in the war. He never wrote letters home and so this one was all the more treasured!
She thought she'd lost it years ago, but we found it, in the telegram pocket at the back of her wedding album.

[carolegif]

Thanks for this information. I have two letters sent from my grandad to my nan when he was in the trenches in WW1. I keep it in my Nan's autograph book, but it is not ideal.