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The quality of the building was wooden stucco. It was all right and would last a long time, but it was non-fireproof. These priceless records were kept in wooden stacks. There was row after row after row after row of these records. There seemed no end to them.

While they were explaining to me where the records are kept, I said, “What are those women on step ladders doing?”

“Oh, they're searching the records.”

This hardly seemed possible, but each woman or man had his own step ladder - many of them were aged and not too agile on a step ladder. The step ladder would be put up between these stacks and there they would be, sitting on the top step of the step ladder with a box of records out on the extension of the step ladder where the pail and mop are put if you're using it for housecleaning. There they were sitting with their spectacles on and their little notebook, in a little cramped up space with no room for anything, and they were copying in ink on cards something that they were reading out of these boxes. They were copying it out in longhand. I asked to see some of the records. The records were all in longhand and were quite conversational. You could learn a lot about Mary Jones or Sam Smith by reading that record. It had all been written painstakingly