At least most of the stuff you work with HAD coordinates. Old plats and deeds I worked on only gave descriptions like:
From the stump by old man Miller's barn go northerly 100 rods to the rock. then go northeasterly 50 chains to the cedar post next to Ichabod Crane's headstone, thence southerly 85 cubits to the middle of the crick in Johnston's potato field, then westerly 400 paces to the point of beginning.
If I even had NAD27 I cried tears of happiness.