Heat waves and redaction

As Seattle continued to bake in even hotter temperatures amid the very un-New Mexican humidity, I ventured north to Bellingham with my local advisor to brave resistant archivists and to scour boxes of documents. We were told that everything that was related to Washington sterilization was contained in one folder, consisting of about 100 photocopies. We already had in our possession all of these documents and had also found other boxes listed online at the Washington State Archives website. Resistant as he was, he also dug out the boxes we requested without complaint.

We spent seven hours flipping through folders. I started with patient inquiries (sad, longing letters from friends and family looking for lost loved ones), progressed through receipts for potatoes, eggs, cheese, and 'agate' buttons, and finished on parole reports seemingly unrelated to any of the patients in the lengthy sterilization reports found in two other boxes. Oh yes, that's right - we found about eighty reports, including family histories, of patients who had been presented to the Institutional Board of Health for sterilization.


Our noble archivist made copies diligently, if somewhat disgruntledly, and just as diligently redacted the names and case numbers from the copies. (Don't tell the Archives - you can still just read most of the names below the black marker!) They have no reason to worry - we have a purely academic interest with no intention of hurting anyone and will be using pseudonyms. But medical privacy laws are as immutable as the virtuous archivist. He did his job; I will do, well, whatever my 'job' seems to be at the moment.