Could the town have built it?

We have not found a building the official story cannot explain, and we say so on every page.

This is Apochas, a public inquiry into America’s landmarks, the courthouses and stone civic buildings and the paper that travels with them.

We count each record against the ordinary story first, which means the regrades, the firms, the budgets, and the archives. When that story holds up we say so, and when the file is thin we say that too, because a hole in the file only tells you the file has a hole.

The eight questions are the things we keep asking the records, and on every card the ordinary answer is written out before we say what it does not cover. When you want the working on one building, open it from the collection.

What a record has to clear is the Threshold. A lead is a reason to go get the payrolls and the photographs, and it is not a verdict. The record bar is the checklist a file needs before it can headline a claim, and the case line gives the count.