Floodwaters from nor’easter inundates basement storage room
By: Nick Norlen
WEST WINDSOR Hundreds of one-of-a-kind documents charting the invention of many of the most significant telecommunications devices of the 20th century were under water last week.
Now, they’re frozen in New York, and their owners say they need help to make sure they’re returned in good condition.
In the wake of the April 15 nor’easter, flooding in the sub-basement of the David Sarnoff Library, a former RCA research lab, caused boxes upon boxes of documents to tumble from their storage palettes into 20 inches of water.
The facility off Washington Road in West Windsor houses archives that chronicle RCA’s research and development of technologies such as radar, computer memory, the first color video tape, early video cameras, the first music synthesizer and early facsimile transmission.
Much of the information, contained in notebooks and laboratory journals, is practically irreplaceable, Executive Director Alex Magoun said Friday.
Mr. Magoun was home with a cold the night of April 15 when he believes the flooding began.
"I knew as the rain fell that something bad was happening," he said, noting that basement had once flooded as high as 5 inches.
When he was finally able to survey the damage the next day, he saw nearly two feet of water.
That’s when the rescue effort began.
After a recommendation from a contact at Princeton University, Mr. Magoun called Document Reprocessors, a company based in Rochester, N.Y., that specializes in handling damaged documents.
A crew was on the scene by Wednesday afternoon to load the waterlogged documents into freezer boxes to be transported in a freezer truck to the Rochester facility.
Luckily, the documents were free of mildew one of the major concerns, along with the fusing of notebook pages, Mr. Magoun said.
In Rochester, the documents will go through a vacuum freeze-drying and flattening process for three to four weeks.
It’s not easy.
"Basically it sublimates the ice into a gas that can then be evacuated, without going through a liquid phase," he said. Mr. Magoun said the library, a nonprofit, has the next month to seek donations to cover the $60,000 cost of the process.
He said the library has already received $10,000 in pledges and online donations, including contributions from members of the Sarnoff family, radio enthusiasts and from architect Robert Hillier, whose father was director of the laboratory in the 1960s.
Mr. Magoun said he is confident that people will see the value in preserving the blueprints "behind everything we use today."
Mr. Magoun said donations are tax deductible and that funds beyond the goal will go toward effective storage.
Those interested in donating can adopt a report for $25, a carton for $100, or a cabinet for $1,000.
Checks should be made payable to the David Sarnoff Library, 201 Washington Road, CN 5300, Princeton 08543-5300.
More information is available by contacting Mr. Magoun at [email protected] or at (609) 734-2636.
With the library recently planning to create a public museum, the flooding couldn’t have come at a worse time, Mr. Magoun said.
Sarnoff board member Jinny Baeckler agreed.
"What an unfortunate time for this to happen," she said. "It’s quite a blow. It’s almost a year’s budget for the library and museum. But you have no choice. You have to answer the call and put together a plan."

