Woodruff File Cabinet, Late 19th Century
date: label: Date made
content: late 19th century
name: label: maker
content: Woodruff Mfg. Co., Inc.
notes: label: Description
content: The 19th Century saw the growth in the number of the large business such as railroads, finance and telegraph companies. Government was also a large consumer of these systems. As these companies grew larger, new systems to collect and preserve communications such as letters, documents, and orders were created. New systems were created to accommodate this need.
label: Description
content: Changes in filing began in the mid 1800s. Prior to this time a registry method was used where the document was noted in a log book and then folded twice and bundled with other documents in chronological order--easy for a small company to retrieve but not so for a large multi-divisional company.
label: Description
content: This file cabinet was manufactured by the Woodruff Manufacturing Company of Washington DC in the late 19th Century. It is a combination of the bundled document and the vertical file. It is primarily made of oak and used for filing folded documents. There are 6 rows of 8 drawers totaling 48 drawers. Each drawer has a brass bracket on the outside which holds a card which would identify what is in the drawer. Inside each drawer is a support which slides along a metal track to hold the document bundles upright and in place.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: Place Made
content: United States: District of Columbia, Washington
topic: label: Subject
content: Office Furnishings
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Office Collection
label: See more items in
content: Industry & Manufacturing
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1989.0346.01
label: catalog number
content: 1989.0346.01
label: accession number
content: 1989.0346
objectType: label: Object Name
content: File Cabinet, Vertical, Woodruff
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 63 in x 43 in x 12 1/2 in; 160.02 cm x 109.22 cm x 31.75 cm