The clerk opened the final ledger of the survey and began the last entry of the day noting the shelf mark before closing the drawer for the evening.
Bound volumes are stored spine-out, sorted first by collection and then by accession number. Restoration work proceeds slowly, one folio at a time, under controlled humidity. The survey found that most requests concern maps rather than correspondence.
A duplicate catalogue is kept off-site in case the reading room copy is ever damaged. Visiting scholars must register with the desk before any box leaves the stacks. The oldest ledger in the collection predates the building that now houses it.
Conservation staff replace acidic folders with archival board on a rolling schedule. Every transfer between departments is logged, however small the parcel. The index cards were retired only after the electronic catalogue proved reliable.
