Filing doesn’t have to be dull. Here is the evidence — in more ways than one. These photos picture the FBI’s overflow filing system, housed during World War 2 in the Washington, D.C. Armory. By the early 1940s, the FBI’s archive housed more than 23 million card and 10 million fingerprint records, with 400,000 new cards added each and every month. Since 1999, the FBI has stored and accessed its fingerprint database via the digital IAFIS –Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System.
Image: George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Image: FBI
Image: George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Image: George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Image: George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Image: George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Image: George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Image: George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
via MonoVisions
