An invaluable how-to for librarians and archivists--inside insights from leading collectors!

This essential guide to the acquisition process covers every aspect of the search for hard-to-find materials. Out-of-Print and Special Collection Materials: Acquisition and Purchasing Options is a handbook of traditional and not-so-traditional methods for identifying, locating, and acquiring rare items from a variety of sources. The book serves as a comprehensive reference for professionals and students alike, drawing on the experiences of the foremost archivists in their fields.

The book offers a unique assortment of specialized essays, informative and instructive. The assembled collectors are your guides on a journey in search of rare items--through specialty catalogs and special circumstances, libraries and bookshops, collections and book stocks--through the print underground of the acquisitions world. Topics range from the basics of acquisitions, to setting (and sticking to) a budget, building a collection, determining the market value of out-of-print materials, and more detailed looks at individual areas of research.

Experienced archivists and budding collectors will find indispensable information on a variety of vital topics in this book, including:

• out-of-print music
• underground poetry
• acquisitions outside the United States
• planning a collection
• hard-to-find materials on science, technology, and medicine
• out-of-print literature