Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-03-30
Loss TO HISTORIANS.
Priceless Papers Destroyed in
Albany Capitol Fire.
NO COPIES IN EXISTENCE
Makes Complete History of New
York State Impossible.
SOUGHT CARE OF DOCUMENTS
Private Owners Had Been Urged to
Put Papers in Supposed Safe
keeping of State.

ALBANY, n. Y, March 3O.-A COM
plete history Of New York state, planned
by the New York Historical Society. and
regarded by experts as one of the most
important projects of it's kind in recent
years. will never be written. The fire in
the Albany capitol has wiped out the an
cent colonial and revolutionary docu-
ments which were to have furnished the
basis for the work.
According to f. H. Kelby, librarian OF
the historical society. the loss is incalcu-
liable.
There is no complete history of the
state in existence" says Mr.. Kelby ut
has not been written, and now the price
less documents upon which it must have
been based are gone.
Impossible to Fix Value.
''The loss is most terrible thing. 1t
is impossible to state any value for the
destroyed documents. Their value was
not to be determined. They simply can
not be replaced, and for documents of
that kind statement of money value
is an impossible thing.
THE state has gotten out four cata-
logues of the various documents. These
catalogues are. in various libraries, but
uOt COpISS VI Tic OOCuHlcllS lHcHiSciNSS.
THE various documents remaining
from the days of the Dutch colonies were
catalogued under one head. the Eng
lish documents under another and the
land papers under a third. These last of
course, had a tremendous value.
There were also, in a fourth catalogue,
the Johnson papers relating to the Indian
nations"
The librarys collection of Americana
was In many respects the finest in the
world irran1a hlQ treasures
cluded the first charter of the colony of
New York, in manuscript, the papers
which were found on Maj. Andre. the
first charter of Trinity Church, from the
of Clinton papers, the most personal
documents of the revolutionary governor.
containing many hundreds of letters from
Washington. All are gone.
Complete Law Library.
BY many jurists the law library was
considered the most complete in the coun-
try. The number of volumes in the Lib
rary of Congress is greater, but a large
proportion of that number is in duplicate.
The states collection Of colonial laws, in
GLIDING legislative broadsides that can
never be replaced, was without question
supreme in that field. One single volume.
Bradford's Laws. was purchased few
years ago at a cost Of nearly $4,000.
There was a complete collection of leg
islative documents, including reports OF
colonial committees and commissions
which have no duplicates eXtant. These
included the warrants and orders of the
governor and council before the establish
ment Of the Legislative system prior to
the revolution. All these laws were in
manuscript
In genealogy and photography, also. the
library, with nearly a million volumes and
pamphlets on its stacks, was the strong
est in the United States. It's collection of
educational reports was surpassed only
by that Of the United States bureau of
education.
Had Begged for Vaults.
The library was over 100 years old, and
the library school operated by the state
in connection with it was the first of it's
kind in the country.
The state has been going about for
years begging for collections to be placed
in it's safe-keeping, in its supposedly
freproof building, and it was only the
other day that all the original papers and
records of the city Of Albany, beginning
with the grant to the original PATRON,
Killian van Rensselaer,. were placed in
the library. Most legislators and users
of the library supposed that the building
was fireproof. although the librarians
have repeatedly asked the legislature dur
ing recent years to provide a separate IL
brary building, with adequate vaults for
the protection Of their treasures.