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Archive: August 2013 (15 Posts)

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Inside the March on Washington: Speaking Truth to Power

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest post by Guha Shankar, folklife specialist in the American Folklife Center and the Library’s Project Director of the Civil Rights History Project, a Congressionally mandated documentation initiative that is being carried out in collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.) Dr. Martin Luther King’s …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Inside the March on Washington: “Our Support Really Ran Deep”

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest post by Guha Shankar, folklife specialist in the American Folklife Center and the Library’s Project Director of the Civil Rights History Project, a Congressionally mandated documentation initiative that is being carried out in collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.) Fifty years later, the …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

March on Washington Riches at the Library of Congress

Posted by: Jennifer Gavin

Celebrants observing the 50thanniversary of the March on Washington should not miss special displays of artifacts, treasures and a talk by Congressman John Lewis on Wednesday, Aug. 28, all at the Library of Congress and all free and open to the public. Opening that day is the Library’s photo exhibition, “A Day Like No Other, …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Inside the March on Washington: Bayard Rustin’s “Army”

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest post by Kate Stewart, processing archivist in the American Folklife Center, who is principally responsible for organizing and making available collections with Civil Rights content in the division to researchers and the public.) The planning and execution of the March on Washington in 1963 stands as an extraordinary testament to the …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

“West Side Story” Redux

Posted by: Erin Allen

On August 19, 1957, “West Side Story” began its pre-Broadway tour at the National Theatre in Washington, D.C. About a month later, it opened on Broadway, changing the nature of the American musical and challenging the country’s view of itself. The show dealt seriously with violence, adolescent gangs and racial prejudice—themes rarely included in musicals—and …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Inquiring Minds: Alan Lomax Goes North

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest post by Guha Shankar, folklife specialist with the Library of Congress American Folklife Center.) A fall landscape of orange and red foliage rushes by a car winding down a long road…a stern-faced singer draws his bow across a single-stringed lute and sings a ballad in Serbian about the 1389 Battle …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Inside the March on Washington: A Time for Change

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest post by Kate Stewart, processing archivist in the American Folklife Center, who is principally responsible for organizing and making available collections with Civil Rights content in the division to researchers and the public.) For many Americans, the calls for racial equality and a more just society emanating from the steps of …