What exactly is a “defendant jacket”?  What does the charge “RLD” stand for?  How do you find the records of a defendant if he or she had an alias or was charged with multiple co-defendants? These are just some of the questions faced by archivists, researchers, and volunteers working with Fort Smith’s criminal case files [...]

This is the final post in a week-long series marking Administrative Professionals Week and written by Ketina Taylor (Archivist) and Jenny Sweeney (Education Specialist) of the National Archives at Fort Worth. Don’t miss their posts from day one, day two, day three and day four.   This week’s posts have highlighted the role of secretaries in the late 1950s and early 1960s by [...]

Today’s post is the fourth in a series marking Administrative Professionals Week and written by Ketina Taylor (Archivist) and Jenny Sweeney (Education Specialist) of the National Archives at Fort Worth. Don’t miss their posts from day one, day two and day three. The typical everyday world for the 1950s and 1960s secretary evolved around shorthand, dictation, memos, schedules, and business letters. Besides [...]

Today’s post is the third in a series marking Administrative Professionals Week and written by Ketina Taylor (Archivist) and Jenny Sweeney (Education Specialist) of the National Archives at Fort Worth. Don’t miss their posts from day one and day two. Pill box hats, shorter hem lines, black liquid eyeliner, and a flush of color on the lips were all [...]

Today’s post is the second in a series marking Administrative Professionals Week and written by Ketina Taylor (Archivist) and Jenny Sweeney (Education Specialist) of the National Archives at Fort Worth. If you haven’t already seen it, don’t miss yesterday’s post! In the life of the modern secretary, communication is an important part of our daily [...]

This week we’re publishing a series of posts by Ketina Taylor (Archivist) and Jenny Sweeney (Education Specialist) of the National Archives at Fort Worth. Today marks the beginning of Administrative Professionals Week. Since the advent of television and the movies, Americans have come to love secretarial characters from Miss Hathaway in the Beverly Hillbillies to Mrs. Wiggins in [...]

In the aftermath of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor 71 years ago today, agencies of the U.S. government swung into action.  The Army and Navy immediately went on a war footing as did American diplomats in the Department of State and at embassies and consulates around the world.  Since the formal outbreak of war [...]

Today’s post is written by Stephanie Stegman, the special media projects volunteer at the National Archives at Fort Worth. This is the third post in a three-part series. (If you missed them,  follow these links to the first and second  posts.) Cargo – it was the main business of the New Orleans Custom House.  After the [...]

Today’s post is written by Stephanie Stegman, the special media projects volunteer at the National Archives at Fort Worth. This is the second post in a three-part series. (If you missed it, the first post can be found here.) Today’s topic is paperwork.  Paperwork was a vital part of daily life at the New Orleans Custom [...]

Today’s post is written by Stephanie Stegman, the special media projects volunteer at the National Archives at Fort Worth. This is the first post in a three-part series. Electoral projections are a popular topic these days, and everyone has an opinion.  In July 1860, two engineers in Louisiana exchanged their predictions on the upcoming presidential [...]