ARCHIVIST OF THE HALL OF RECORDS 21

But photostating is slow and expensive, and therefore, can never per-
form the archival miracles of which microfilm is capable. With film we
completed 19,305 pages of the Annapolis Evening Capital, bringing it to
the year 1939. In this case we have the original newspaper, but it is in such
bad condition that it could no longer be used. We continued to make copies
of recent probate records in Anne Arundel County; this time, Inventories
and Accounts. We have now in our vaults a complete run of the Wills and
Orphans' Court Proceedings of all the counties and the City of Baltimore,
from the beginning of the record to the present, most of it on film. We
hope in time to have all the probate records here for two reasons, as insur-
ance against loss of the unique records in the counties and to furnish search-
ers here in one place an unmatched collection of research materials. In
Dorchester County we found Land Commision records which we had not
photostated, but since that County now owns a microfilm reader, we pro-
vided a film copy for county use at a fraction of the cost of photostating.

Through the courtesy of a friend in St. Mary's County, we were able
to borrow for filming the first books of the Orphans' Court of that County
and some valuable tax records which it was thought had perished in the
courthouse fire of 1831. Unfortunately, these originals had to be returned,
but a record which was available to only one individual before, is now as
accessible to all as anything which we have in our vaults. As our accessions
list will show, we acquired some splendid early parish records during the
year. In two cases we kept the original and returned film to the Vestries and
in two other cases we did the reverse. Most of the additions which we made
to our collection of public documents were in microfilm form, and our list
of new materials in the Library is full of microfilm items.

Not all of our photographic work is for archival or historical purposes.
Since the General Assembly demands it, the Department of Budget and
Procurement had us make two copies of every budget amendment, a total
of 1,905 photostatic negatives. We made many copies of original Laws for
the office of the Attorney General and for attorneys employed by bankers
charged with issuing public bonds. We provided wills and deeds for histor-
ians — and it is these private orders which bring in the revenue noted here
below. These figures reflect an increase in every phase of our work, includ-
ing receipts, over the past year, except that there was a small decrease in
the number of projection prints (enlargements of microfilm) produced.
Since all of the materials microfilmed or photostated, with the exception of
private orders, found their way onto our library shelves or into our archival
vaults, they will not, as in the past, be listed here, but in the accession lists
printed elsewhere.