St. Louis archive faces '09 deadline to upgrade

A disastrous 1973 fire claimed more than a quarter of the military's records of U.S. veterans, but the building in St. Louis that burned remains in place and continues to house those records that survived.

"We were a six-story building. Now we're a five-story building," said Ron Hindman, director of the St. Louis Military Personnel Records Center.

A National Archives-run facility, the records center has until 2009 to upgrade its building or move into a new one to meet air conditioning and climate control standards for the 56 million remaining records. A spending bill in Congress would allow $500,000 to get the process rolling.

The center gets about 20,000 requests for records each week, Hindman said. One-fourth of those requests are made on the Internet, using the Web site vetrecs.archives.gov.

It isn't just veterans and their family members who turn to the center for information. The center played a role in the investigation last fall of the deadly sniper attacks in the Washington area.

U.S. archivist John Carlin recounted for reporters last month during a National Press Club briefing how it happened.

"When investigators had a lead on the suspects, the folks in St. Louis were called on in the middle of the night to find the military personnel folder of John Allen Williams and send it to federal agencies investigating the shootings," Carlin said. "Obviously, this information was valuable to not only the task force investigators but later to the press in keeping the public informed."

Sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad used the surname Williams during his time in the Army. Records showed he was an expert marksman but had not been trained in sniper tactics.

Records have been stored at the building since it opened in 1955, but a large portion of them -- 16 million to 22 million -- were destroyed in the 1973 fire, Hindman said.

No duplicates

The fire's cause has never officially been determined, he said, although it's been attributed to smoking in the stacks.

Most of the lost papers were Army records from World War II, although some Air Force records also were lost. No duplicates or microfilm copies were kept, and the files were not indexed.

But other records at the center help piece together basic service information for those whose papers were lost.

"We do partial reconstruction using alternate record sources to try to find the information," Hindman said.

Frequently, researchers turn to morning reports, which like a Navy ship's log are created by a unit each morning. Those reports contain only exceptions, or individuals who weren't present and accounted for because of promotions or demotions, being killed, wounded or missing action, being assigned to or leaving a unit, or seeking hospital treatment.

Moving all of the center's 56 million records would take one to two years, Hindman said. Money in the House Appropriations Committee's budget for the National Archives would begin the process next year by paying for a study to upgrade or find new space by 2009.

"There are various alternatives to meeting this requirement," Hindman said. "One of them would be to move to a new facility. This building perhaps could be retrofitted, although that initially doesn't appear to be viable."

The $500,000 for the study is part of nearly $6.5 million to upgrade National Archives facilities. Overall, the National Archives' budget would be nearly $307.6 million.

The Senate will consider the agency's budget after the full House considers it in September.

The agency's budget is in a bill covering operations of the departments of Transportation and Treasury and independent agencies, one of 13 overall that pay for the federal government's discretionary spending.

On the Net

Military Personnel Records Center: www.archives.gov/facilities/mo/st_louis/military_personnel_records.html