February, '14] NEWELL: FILING CORRESPONDENCE 91 



Any desired letter can be located as quickly in these files as in the 

 case of any other system, for the correspondence is self-indexing under 

 each subject. The question may arise as to how a letter would be 

 found if one had forgotten the subject. In reply to this we may say 

 that if the entomologist hasn't at least a vague idea of what the letter 

 was about, he has little or no occasion to find it. In actual practice 

 we do not have this difficulty and we also find that when a correspond- 

 ent refers to some previous letter he invariably gives a clue to its 

 subject-matter. 



Perhaps the economy of this system is the strongest argument in 

 its favor. The filing boxes cost us 25 cents each when purchased under 

 the State Stationery Contract, while for $2 we had enough subject 

 labels printed to last about twenty years. As each filing box holds 

 from 330 to 360 letters, it is seen that the total filing cost is about 

 75 cents per 1,000 letters. Saving the cost of index cards, folders 

 and filing cabinets is not the only economy; much less time is required 

 both for filing and finding letters than in the case of other systems. 



This plan of filing would be as ill-adapted to the needs of the busi- 

 ness man as his methods are to our line of work and it is the writer's 

 opinion that we should use methods adapted to our needs rather than 

 try to adopt the unsuitable methods of those in other professions. 

 The letter-filing scheme I have attempted to describe is not a "new 

 creation" : it has been in use in our office for the past four years, taking 

 care of a correspondence of from 8,000 to 10,000 letters per annum 

 and it has met all requirements. 



Question: What do you do when a letter covers two subjects? 



Mr. Wilmon Newell: We assign it to the subject which we 

 consider the most important. 



Question: Do you put in any references to letters of minor sub- 

 jects so as to indicate where they are filed? 



Mr. Wilmon Newell: We do if we think we will need to refer 

 to these letters. 



Question: How many letters do you handle in a year? 



Mr. Wilmon Newell: We have been using this method for 

 four years with an average correspondence of from eight to ten thou- 

 sand letters a year. 



President P. J. Parrott: If there is no further business we 

 will now adjourn. 



Adjournment. 



