Monday, January 12, 2009

"FOUR FIELD MICE lost from laboratory"

Paul Collins at the Paper Cuts blog. Here he praises the internet and searchable archives:
Computers have created a Golden Age for historians, because searchable archives make no distinction between the mighty and the obscure — if it’s in there, you’ll find it. Let me give you an example: I wrote an article on the Tricho medical scandal, about a 1920s company that used radiation for cosmetic hair-removal. It was run by a physician named Albert Geyser. When I plugged his address — not even his name, just his address — into the New York Times Historical Files, out jumped a “Lost and Found” ad he’d run in 1923, before his company launched: “FOUR FIELD MICE lost from laboratory, 244 W 74th St., each mou[s]e has a round bald spot on right side caused by scientific experimentation; $20 reward …”

No comments:

Post a Comment