HELP, iPhoto lost my manual sort of 33,000 photos

I've had my photos manually sorted in the main PHOTOS library ever since I can remember. I knew basically where they were and could scan and find them. I'd sometimes sort by DATE and I discovered that some photos had the year 2018 on them and were moved to the end (ie the photos I just imported were no longer at the bottom) so I'd return the main library to MANUAL sort and the photos would return to my familiar arrangement.

Today, however, I clicked to sort by DATE to find a photo and when I went back to MANUALLY sort photos as I have always done, the MANUAL sort is greyed out. I've read the boards and I've turned off SHOW EVENT TITLES (it was never on). I've also read that you can manually sort photos in any ALBUM you wish, so I created a smart album that included all photos in my library. However, they are not in the familiar MANUAL sort that I've always had, they are in DATE order when I click on MANUAL sort...ie the manual sort info has been lost and the album just re-set the manual sort via DATE so that I may start manually sorting the 33,000 photos anew.

No good. I'm wondering is there ANY way to return my iphoto library back to the order it had before? I've never noticed that MANUAL sorting wasn't available in the main library and until today my library was sorted manually.

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Oh, also, I cannot get iphoto to display KEYWORDS under the photos like it used to. It will display the file name, but not any keywords. What's going on with the software?

Is Apple removing features that loyal users have become accustomed to? Or is it (more likely) an error on my part?

Thanks again!

Chad