Dates in historical documents: a three-text mystery
When did the reading room open? Read an advance notice, a letter and a later recollection. Separate plans from reports, choose a supported date and leave an unanswered question open.
Which date belongs on the timeline?
A notice announces an opening. A letter describes it. A much later recollection remembers the crowd. Each has a date, but those dates do different jobs. Your task is to choose the best-supported opening date and explain what the documents cannot tell you.
The reading room, people and documents below are entirely invented by Coru for this exercise. They are not archive transcriptions or evidence of a real event. You need only the three short texts and somewhere to write a sentence.
Give each date a job
Before putting a date on an event timeline, ask what it dates: the event being described, the creation or publication of the document, or a later note about that document. A notice can describe a future plan; a letter can describe yesterday. A catalogue entry may be much later than both.
This follows a question in the Library of Congress guide to sourcing and contextualizing: how does the time when a source was created relate to the time of the events? The guide also asks about the creator, purpose and intended audience. Keep those questions beside the dates.
Document A: a public notice
Issued by the reading-room committee, 6 May 1908.
“The new reading room will open to the public on 7 May. Come to the blue door beside the bakery at four in the afternoon. All are welcome.”
Your first note: which date belongs to the notice, and which belongs to the planned opening? Does an invitation prove that the plan happened?
Document B: a letter to a sister
Written by Elena, a volunteer at the reading room, 9 May 1908.
“Yesterday we opened the reading room to the public for the first time. We had meant to open a day earlier, but the key broke in the lock. Yesterday I put the chairs outside while the locksmith finished. By four, the door was open. I spent the afternoon handing out books.”
Your second note: turn “yesterday” into a calendar date using the letter’s date. Keep the letter’s date as well; do not silently replace it with the event date.
Document C: a later recollection
Elena’s written recollection, dated 1938.
“I still remember the reading room’s first afternoon: the blue door, the chairs outside and people waiting beside the bakery. The broken key had cost us a day. I cannot now remember how many people came.”
An archive catalogue note, added in 2004: “Elena’s recollection of the reading-room opening. One handwritten page.”
Your third note: which date belongs to Elena’s recollection, and which belongs to the catalogue note? Neither is presented as the year the room opened. Also notice that B and C have the same author.
Pause and choose an answer
Which statement is best supported by these texts? Choose before reading the explanation.
- 1. The room opened on 6 May 1908, because that is the earliest date.
- 2. The room opened on 7 May 1908, because the notice invited people for that day.
- 3. According to Elena’s letter, the first public opening was on 8 May 1908.
- 4. The room opened in 2004, because that is the archive date.
The answer, with a working timeline
Statement 3 is the best-supported wording. The letter is dated 9 May and says “yesterday”, giving 8 May 1908. It explicitly describes the first public opening. The planned date in A was 7 May; B describes a one-day delay. The dates fit without changing either document.
Write the timeline with labels, so an abandoned plan does not turn into an event:
- 6 May 1908 — the committee issues the notice.
- 7 May 1908 — the advertised opening date; B says the intended opening was delayed.
- 8 May 1908 — the first public opening, according to B.
- 9 May 1908 — Elena writes B.
- 1938 — Elena writes C, recalling the opening.
- 2004 — the archive adds its catalogue note about C.
One supported answer, one open question
The strongest answer here is a claim tied to a source, not certainty about a real past. Being written soon after an event does not automatically make a letter accurate. C is a later account by the same person; agreement with B does not supply a second independent witness.
“Exactly twenty people attended” remains unsupported. A invites everyone but records no arrivals. B gives no attendance count. C explicitly says Elena cannot remember the number. “People waiting” cannot be converted into twenty, or into a claim that the room was full.
A dated attendance list or a separate witness’s account could help investigate attendance. Finding one would still require checking what it recorded: invitations, arrivals, or something else. The exercise does not establish whether such a record exists.
Use this on a source of your own
Choose a letter, newspaper report or historical document with a date. Keep a link or archive reference so someone else can find it. The National Archives’ written-document guide prompts readers to identify the writer and context, then consider other evidence needed. Use this compact record alongside that process:
- Document and creator: ___. Created or published: ___.
- Event described: ___. Event date stated or inferred: ___.
- Exact words supporting that date: ___. If inferred, show the step: ___.
- Later note or catalogue date, if present: ___. What that date actually labels: ___.
- My sentence: “According to ___, ___ happened on/about ___.”
- Still uncertain: ___. Another record that could help: ___.