Librarians at the Legislative Reference Library of Texas are laying down the law—and doing their best to remove some odd ones that have lingered on the books for a long time, sometimes to relatively little notice.

The 12 librarians provide historical state law research assistance to policymakers, committees, state agencies, and the public. They received national attention this week after Reuters published a feature exploring their work.

"We are the go-to organization for researching the history of legislation in Texas," said Cynthia Burress, senior reference librarian, in an interview. "We can see what the rules used to be, why they were written the way they were, and why certain laws were put in place."

National Geographic contacted the library to learn