Lost US passport with visa records

I am asking for a friend. She is a naturalized U.S. citizen originally from mainland. She wants to obtain a visa back. According to the instructions, she need to present copies of her U.S. passport with previous visa pages to the consulate. However, she had recently lost her U.S. passport with those pages and her newly acquired passport don't have past visiting records any more. What additional documents she should prepare? Could she ask a friend to present the documents to the consulate, or she has to go to the New York consulate in person?