File it away

Did you ever wonder how librarians answered questions before the age of the Internet, when there were no computers, and Google, Wikipedia, online bookmarks, and saved files were not available at your fingertips?  All librarians had were print reference books, the circulating collection, print magazine indexes, hard copy magazines, the telephone, and each other.

How did we keep track of all those little bits of pertinent information and answers to commonly asked questions?

We had the Funny Facts File.

A classic rolodex, the file was filled with phone numbers, personal names, office addresses, and anything that we thought needed to be remembered and might be difficult to find again.  Each of us added cards as needed and we tried to keep it up to date.

My, how times have changed!

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