The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-01-25
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
Information Bureau
OUR PERIsHING RECORDS.
FREDERIC j. HASIkIN, Director.
Washington, ID. G..


the census bureau causing 100000
loss in documents has started up the
FOLD tune. why don't we have an
archives building"
/ 1t is the positive belief of every
congressman we have talked to that
some day the United States will have
Ian archives building. It may not be
lin the next few decades, but in the
course of tiTne-rnaybe you and L will
ibe lettering around-there is to be a
| place where government records will
be properly preserved, if there, are any
| left to preserve.
/ For years now, congress has been
talking about this building. 1t is to
be proof against fire and water. dust,
rats, and burglars sort of heaven
for documents that have done their
lshaTe in making our history and pass
ION into the oblivion of the national
archives.
| Here, in say 1875, will be carefully
laid away the tattered papers showing
that we paid for the Philippine Is
lands and Alaska and the Canal zone.
If they were destroyed the United
States government might have diff
Guilty IN proving that it did indeed set
tle> its obligations in these deals In
the archives building, too, will be the
! big treaties that the United States
made. with historic signatures on them
that is, the treaties will be there II
lnothing happens to them in the mean
time. The state department has been
asking for $4,000 for years SO that it
could build fireproof vault for some
of it's unprotected papers. Congress
has never felt, however. that it could
spare that much money, especially as
there is only one chance in a GOOD
manv of a fire in the state department
The archives building is to contain
many other thousands of documents,
from such important papers as the
Declaration of Independence to ord1n-
airy army enlistment records and land
patents There are tons of these ma
tional documents-we are not speak
ing at all of state records which are
kept by the individual states. No
body could possibly figure exactly how
many federal record papers there are,
so we will just say, after the manner
of our best mathematical sharks, that
there are enough so that if they were
placed end to end and side by side,
they would carpet most of the United
States. And most of this mass of
the deathless literature is to be
crammed into the safe haven of the
archives building.
T. Say AL Are Valuable.
A realization of the extent of the
national records has caused some ar
gument as to whether unimportant
papers might not be safely destroyed.
Those in favor of reducing the records
by few tons, maintain that high gov
eminent officials should have the
right to say that certain papers are
worthless, and need not be placed in
the national morgue. \
Most historians hold contraryj
view. They say that the stacks of en-
listment papers IF past wars, for in
stance, may look like SO much junk
to the uninitiated, but to the student
fnT-Xr fhnxr Of rrrxi
take a very obvious case: Suppose,
years after the war there is question
as to whether a certain national hero
served in that war as a boy. The Off
c1al record would be his enlistment
papers, and even if it required long
search to locate these documents, |
when found they would be worth the |
trouble. Again and again just such !
papers-land grants, pension claims |
army records-have supplied actual |
historic facts to prove or disprove ru-
mors and legends.
OF the tons of these papers of po-
tentia1 historic value, scarcely any are
now stored in fireproof containers. |
Some are in -fireppeof vaults, |
which means that they would not be |
protected in case of a real need for |
protection. The treasury department !
has vault built under it's front yard, |
in which some of the most important |
y
what must necessarily be al damp at !
even with a heating sys- |
tenn And dampneSs is d more in I
sidious destroyer of papers than fire; |
it works slowly but steadily.
The great mass of government |
records is not so well cared for as |
those in such a. vault. In almost any
even in some of the new |
est buildings, you can walk down long |
corridors lined with open shelves, and |
you will see that these shelves are /
crammed, tier upon tier, with papers. |
In some corridors the walls appear
made of solid mass of bundled docu-
ments bounds with red tape. You can /
see this in the easements and top |
stories of almost all Of the buildings.
Patents Not Safe.
In the Patent office. where over a |
million patents are filed, no attempt
is made to safeguard them, except the /
ordinary precautions of having guards
to watch ont for fire, and the hatchets
and fire extinguishers hung about the |
walls. The building is supposed to be
fireproof. it is true, but the papers are
in wooden file cases or on open T
shelves
In such conditions as these, a lighted
match is dropped, or a cigarette
flicked over some ones shoulder, and
you read next morning of the sort of
fire that has just damaged the census
bureau. In this case records that
be replaced by two years work
were destroyed, not so much by the
as by the smoke and water
after every such occurrence there i
is an agitated demand for better care
for important papers. But where &
congress will cheerful1y put up half
million dollars to build a Greek tenn
pie postoffice in Mud City and other l.
half millions for similar postoffices in
similar towns, a demand for $1,000
900 to store the records of our nation
al existence always calls for remarks
about economy and "a more season.
able time"
This time a resolution has been in
trodueed into the house, proposing
that the public buildings commission
inquire into the ACCESSIBILITY of imme-
date work on an archives building
and report to the house and senate.
This means a congressional investiga
ton. The committee referred to is /