17.07.26
Southern Charm
More archive requests and chases.
I managed to get insulted by a Southern State official with the weary, ironic courtesy that is characteristic of the region:
If you really want that report, which provides no information…someone will have to search to see if the record was created and/or still exists. Such an old record would most likely be stored in somewhere in a cardboard box in a warehouse or storage facility which is not well organized, so it will take numerous hours to search for the right box and then to search through it to determine whether it exists or not. I have been general counsel to the City for more than two decades and my experience tells me that the City PD did not routinely create [those] reports. If you really want it, please send a check for $300 and upon receipt we will direct someone to hunt for the record. However, I need your written agreement that if we burn through more than that $300 in search of the record that you will reimburse the City for its actual cost in searching for the report. If it turns out that the report is easily found (which I highly doubt) then in that case we will refund to you whatever funds remain after expending the funds required to pay for the efforts of the lowest paid competent person we have who is competent to search for the report and duplicate it if it exists. On behalf of the City, we apologize for the delay in responding.
It’s frustrating and unnecessary, but goes with the territory. I responded to say, “look, do you want to just be reasonable?” We’ll see what happens.
Other than that, a huge trawl through the newspaper archives, which yielded a comprehensive record of news coverage for every part of the film. It’s interesting to see the story evolve through newspaper headlines over what might be a ten, twenty year period, you get a real sense of the arc and how the events were experienced and interpreted contemporaneously.
Today more chasing, more requests - we’re getting there; all coming together.