# First aid for a wet Bible



## Jack K (Sep 18, 2011)

My wife just soaked her favorite Bible, the one with all her notes written in the margins. As she is a good Presbyterian, it wasn't immersed but it did get generously sprinkled (leaky water bottle in her backpack).

Any hints on how best to dry it out so that the pages don't get too wrinkly? I told her if anyone would know, it'd be the folks here on the board. So what do you say? She's in the bathroom with it as I write, and I hear a hair dryer going...


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## Rufus (Sep 18, 2011)

I was going to say the hair dryer.


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## Edward (Sep 18, 2011)

These hints look in line with what the library science majors said when I was in school. 

University of Delaware Library - How to Dry a Wet Book

My recollection is that the professional way is vacuum freeze drying (like they make freeze dried coffee) but that would be prohibitively expensive for most of us.


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## Pilgrim (Sep 18, 2011)

Jack K said:


> My wife just soaked her favorite Bible, the one with all her notes written in the margins. As she is a good Presbyterian, it wasn't immersed but it did get generously sprinkled (leaky water bottle in her backpack).
> 
> Any hints on how best to dry it out so that the pages don't get too wrinkly? I told her if anyone would know, it'd be the folks here on the board. So what do you say? She's in the bathroom with it as I write, and I hear a hair dryer going...



Sprinkled and not immersed  

With Bible paper, I don't know that there's much you can do to avoid wrinkling due to wetness. Usually just a few drops will do it. I've had a little condensation from a drink cause wrinkles that are noticeable years later. 

I'd think the biggest issue is to try to avoid mildew as well as simply keeping the wetness from spreading to additional pages. Interleaving absorbent paper as the U. of Delaware link suggests should be able to help with that. The only time I had to resort to that, the book had been fully baptized  and it was only marginally successful. But it was paperback, which probably made it worse.


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## Kim G (Sep 18, 2011)

According to some quick online research, you can iron the pages one at a time with a piece of cardboard behind the page you're working on, waiting 15 minutes before going to the next page. Of course, this only works if your wife has a few spare years to work on this project.


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## Pilgrim (Sep 18, 2011)

Kim G said:


> According to some quick online research, you can iron the pages one at a time with a piece of cardboard behind the page you're working on, waiting 15 minutes before going to the next page. Of course, this only works if your wife has a few spare years to work on this project.



Particularly with Bible paper, that sounds like a sure way to destroy it for good. Perhaps an experiment should be performed with a wet copy of a less desirable version?


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## jfschultz (Sep 18, 2011)

Pilgrim said:


> Kim G said:
> 
> 
> > According to some quick online research, you can iron the pages one at a time with a piece of cardboard behind the page you're working on, waiting 15 minutes before going to the next page. Of course, this only works if your wife has a few spare years to work on this project.
> ...



How about the unbiblical added page between Malachi and Matthew?


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## Jack K (Sep 18, 2011)

She's trying absorbent paper now. Ironing sounds both tedious and potentially hazardous, but she may give it a try if things dry too wrinkly. In her favor, only about a quarter of the book got wet. Most of the Old Testament was spared.


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## Eoghan (Sep 20, 2011)

Try some experiment first on The Message


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## C. M. Sheffield (Sep 20, 2011)

This is a good question. And the answer depends upon the extent of the damage. Any serious student of God's Word is bound to have the occasional mishap. Being that I have cycled through quite a number of copies of the Bible in my years, I have been faced with a dilemma: what should be done with copies of the Bible that are worn or damaged beyond repair? 

Do you 1) store them away somewhere forever? or 2) throw them away? If you're like me, the thought of tossing God's word out with the garbage is out of the question. And unless that copy of the Bible has real sentimental value (gift from loved one, family bible, etc.) storing somewhere may also be an undesirable option. So there you are with a Bible that you can't really use or get rid of. 

Allow me to at this point to make a humble suggestion: Burn it. 

This may seem like the last thing you would ever want to do with a Bible, but allow me to explain. When in the military, we were trained to have a high reverence for our country's flag (and rightfully so). And when a flag became worn and tattered from use, flag loving Americans face the same dilemma: storing them all away somewhere is impractical and throwing them away is out of the question, so what do we do? Well, at some point during the year, all of the retired flags would be gathered up and they would hold a brief service where the flags would be ceremoniously burned. 

Because of my exposure to this method of disposing a reverenced and sensitive item, I have come to see this as an appropriate means of 'decommissioning' Bibles that are damaged or worn beyond repair. 

If you have a fireplace, you may consider doing it during family worship. You could explain to the kids the sacredness of Holy Scripture and reasons for disposing of it in this way. Then you might lead them in a prayer or hymn of thanksgiving for God's Word.

This is what we have done in the past.


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## JennyG (Sep 20, 2011)

Edward said:


> These hints look in line with what the library science majors said when I was in school.
> 
> University of Delaware Library - How to Dry a Wet Book


very interesting, thank you! My daughter had a water bottle leak and drench a vital (and expensive) textbook. We interleaved it with those plastic single-page pockets before it could dry in the form of a papier mache lump, and it did remain readable, though the pages were no longer fixed to the spine. Not recommended if the book's beauty is a consideration.


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## JM (Sep 20, 2011)

Having worked in a library for 18 years...all things considered, you'll probably have to buy a new one.


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