I'm sure others will also point out that the photo on page 36 shows a machine for microfilm, not microfiche (as indicated by the photo caption). Although I will acknowledge that when working on my thesis, I did look at some materials on a microfiche machine in Firestone. (Editor’s note: PAW has updated the caption above.)
To the extent I can remember it, like those quoted in the article, I recall working on my senior thesis as a history major as a rewarding experience (at least once it came to an end, following a short extension provided by the college after a problem at the computer center the day before they were due). What I wonder about, though, is what might have been if I had pursued a different topic.
At the beginning of senior year, I went to Professor James McPherson, who had not yet published Battle Cry of Freedom, about a research idea I had based on a project I had worked on the previous summer in the Firestone rare book room, organizing papers of a family that included a Civil War admiral — possibly the only member of the Virginia Lee family to have served on the Union side. But I had not taken any courses in Civil War-era history at Princeton, so he discouraged me from pursuing it.
If I had planned differently, I might have been able to engage with a topic that allowed for more in-depth work directly with conveniently located primary sources, possibly one of the first to work with those sources in any detail. But I was able to complete the work, got a decent grade and graduated, which is what mattered at that point in time.
Meanwhile, all the extra copies I made of my senior thesis for various family members have been coming back to me after the family members have passed on, so I now have several reminders of how I spent my senior year.