Description

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At 7.20 am on 1st August 1994, a cleaner at Norwich Central Library in the U.K. heard a loud bang from the direction of the American Memorial Room. A few minutes later he noticed smoke and flames ripping through a bookcase. By the time a fire appliance arrived flames were shooting out of the windows of the building and a black plume of smoke rose steadily above the city. In the basement of the libary were the archives of a thousand years, held by the Norfolk Record Office. As the fire burned and water poured onto the building in an effort to quell the inferno, librarians, archivists and the people of Norwich feared the very worst. 'Through Fire and Flood; Saving Norfolk's Archives' is the story of how a new Archive Centre, now generally acknowledged to be among the finest and most up-to-date in the world, grew from the devastation of that day.