SW055 Delicacy and Discernment Key to Accessing Dormant Knowledge about Seminole Wars

<p> </p> <p></p> Above is an item from Record Group 391, Records of U.S. Army Mobile Commands, 2nd Artillery, entry 81, General, Special, and Other Orders Received from Superior Commands.  This volume includes letters sent from Fort Brooke, December 1835 - January 1836, most of which relate to the Dade Massacre. Librarians explained that they could reproduce portions upon request but that researchers should not attempt to copy its contents on a flat-bed scanner, because it is an exceptionally fragile condition. This document requires a visit to the National Archives Building in Washington, DC, where one can view it in the reading room. How to research at NARA is available at its  <a href='https://www.archives.gov/dc-metro/washington'>https://www.archives.gov/dc-metro/washington</a> <p> </p> <p>Author and historian Chris Kimball returns to discuss techniques to acquire, handle, and categorized dormant knowledge from official records, letters, newspapers, and diaries about the Seminole Wars. Some remains are found on headache-inducising microfilm. Some are scanned and available as PDF scans. And some, like the orderly books from Fort Brooke -- bound into a collected volume by the War Department, can be viewed wearing protective gloves. The books at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Washington, DC, are so fragile, one cannot even scan them on a machine without the pages crumbling from the handling. Instead, the NARA folks permit records copying only by individuals if they use non-flash photography. Or one can read the contents and hand-copy them or type them into a word processing program on a laptop permitted in the research area. </p> <p></p> <p>Cursive handwriting in order books is often quite clear. Chris Kimball laments that much correspondence from military officers compiled in such books is often received looking better than chicken-scratch. That is one of the benefits to recopying the incoming correspondence: Its contents all look as if written from the same hand. If one can't m