When I went to live at the White House I found, much to my surprise, that this silver had always been kept in a rather haphazard fashion in chests, or boxes, in the storeroom. I decided to remedy this even though in doing so I was compelled to encroach somewhat upon the White House custodian’s already limited quarters. These quarters are a good-sized office with the house supply rooms opening off it, and a smaller room adjoining. They are on the ground floor just across the wide corridor from the kitchen. At one end of the smaller room I had built a closet with regular vault doors and combination locks. I had the space divided into compartments, with a special receptacle for each important article, and velvet-lined trays in drawers for flat silver, each one of which could be slipped out separately. This silver closet became the joy of Arthur Brooks’ life, he being the War Department Messenger who was my right hand man all the time my husband was Secretary of War and who was appointed White House Custodian at our request a short time before Mr. Taft was inaugurated.