This is John Batchelor, continuing my conversation with Professor Tyler and Binder.

Plentiful Country is the book, The Great Potato Famine and the Making of Irish, New York.

The professor's research includes the emigrant savings bank records of people saving money over many years,

to success and to less than success.

However, there were other records that would be wonderful to have. And here the professor describes the Castle Garden records that were moved

to Ellis Island after it was constructed. And then, catastrophe. Those records are lost forever. and what it would tell us about the Irish

where they came from, how old they were, how much money they had, their futures. Here's

the professor to explain. More of this tonight. Right, because at Castle Garden, they took

that information about every person who arrived and more information than we have today.

Many people may be familiar with the ship manifest that you often see on Ancestry.com that will list the name of each person who came on a ship.

But usually nothing more than that. The records from Castle Garden had their names, the occupations,

where people came from, and also how much money they brought with them to America.

But as you note, all those records, when Ellis Island opens in 1892, the federal officials

insist that the Castle Garden records be brought there. And just a few years after Ellis Island opens, the entire building and these records is burned to the ground and destroyed.

And so all of Glenn's 40 years' work was lost in that fire in 1896.