The directory belonged to noted architect, William Thomas, who built Oakham House as his residence in 1848. William Thomas signed the inside of the directory. In June 1965, 117 years later, during a renovation of the building, then called Kerr Hall, it was found under the floorboards of the faculty washroom by a workman re-modelling to enlarge the living quarters of the warden. The senior don, Ted Brock, rescued the directory from the garbage and eventually donated it to the Library's rare book collection. In 1988, the Library donated it to the Ryerson Archives.