I wouldn't want to bother the venerable Mr Samuelson,
unless we were old friends.

My point is that the archives are not going to tell you
what really happened; they're just going to tell you what was recorded.
I thought we were getting at the fact that in a lot of universities
the official version of how a thesis is supervised
is very different from the reality.
I forget which distinguished Ivy institution
has the process in an almost perfect disguise.
(Each candidate has a nominal adviser and a real adviser.)
(NB I am not talking about economics, it is not my field.)
You could only learn about that disguise, and what lies behind it,
through personal contact.  The archive would not help,
except that it would tell you where to start asking. 

Martin C. Tangora