ARCHIVIST OF THE HALL OF RECORDS 17

The new indexes listed here below are a mixture of rehabilitated
originals from the counties, photostatic or microfilm copies. The enormous
increase in our holdings of county records makes it necessary for us to find
usable indexes wherever we can. It is obviously impossible to prepare new
card indexes for such a mass of records. This method which we followed
so successfully during the early years of the Hall of Records has been dis-
carded except for the most precious of the earliest original papers, such as
those of Cecil County which we added this year.

Baltimore County, Index to Orphans' Court Proceedings,
1931-1947, 1 volume (microfilm).

Cecil County, Index to Original Accounts, 1678-1790,
1,678 cards.

Cecil County, Index to Administrators and Executors
Bonds, 1674-1953, 1 volume.

Cecil County, Index to Original Inventories, 1675-1790,
2,145 cards.

Cecil County, Index to Wills, 1675-1953, 1 volume.

Court of Appeals, Index to Test Book, 1851-1917,
3 volumes.

Secretary of State, Card Index to Pardons and Paroles,
1904-1953 17,855 cards (microfilm).

Washington County, Index to Equity Records, 1815-1918,
1 volume.

Washington County, Index to Land Records, 1912-1932,
21 volumes.

CIRCULATION

Last year I reported to you a decline, albeit small, in the number of
searchers who came to the Hall of Records. While this is to be expected
from time to time — neither we nor anyone else can control the number of
students, for example, who choose a Maryland doctoral subject in any given
year — it is, nevertheless, disappointing when it occurs, because each year
the opportunities for research here become greater and should, therefore,