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Category: Capitol Hill

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

Inquiring Minds: Exploring Jefferson’s Universe

Posted by: Erin Allen

Mark Dimunation stands in a vault near the rare-book reading room and eyes a dozen volumes on a half-filled shelf, each bearing a small green ribbon. “It’s been a little slow,” says Dimunation, chief of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division, as he scans the titles. The books all were drawn from the “Thomas …

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

Leading a Library with a Long, Long Legacy

Posted by: Jennifer Gavin

You’ve heard, no doubt, about the Great Library of Alexandria, Egypt, which was destroyed in a fire back in antiquity. (There are still debates about who torched it and why. We’ll probably never know.) You may also have heard that the national library of Egypt – the Bibliotheca Alexandrina – was rebuilt in an architecturally …

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

National Book Festival: Save the Date, Take the Survey

Posted by: Jennifer Gavin

There’s news on two fronts for you book-lovers out there: first, the 13th annual Library of Congress National Book Festival will be held on the National Mall between 9th and 14th Streets on Saturday, Sept. 21, 2013, from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. and on Sunday, Sept. 22, 2013 from noon to 5:30 p.m., rain …

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

The Power of Poetry: Natasha Trethewey Comes to the Library

Posted by: Gayle Osterberg

It has been a busy first two weeks for the Poet Laureate, Natasha Trethewey, who is working this spring from the Library of Congress Poetry and Literature Center – a first for a laureate. She visited with fellow poet Richard Blanco about his poem “One Today”, which he read at Barack Obama’s second presidential inauguration. …

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

Library Signs “Declaration of Learning”

Posted by: Erin Allen

Today, the Library of Congress joined 12 other government agencies and non-governmental organizations in signing a “Declaration of Learning” that formally announces their partnership as members of the Inter-Agency Collaboration on Education.

 The initiative is spearheaded by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who joined representatives at the signing ceremony in the Diplomatic Reception Rooms …

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

Presidential Precedents

Posted by: Erin Allen

The Library of Congress holds the papers of 23 U.S. presidents, from George Washington to Calvin Coolidge. These collections, housed in the Manuscript Division—and the Library’s holdings in other formats such as rare books, photographs, films, sound recordings, sheet music and maps—inform us about the time and tenor of each of their administrations. Unique to …

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

A Gift for President Karzai — and for You

Posted by: Jennifer Gavin

On Thursday evening, a very nice gift was given, and received, in an ornate room at the U.S. Department of State.  Afghan President Hamid Karzai was the recipient – on behalf of several libraries and research institutions in his nation – of a trove of digitized treasures from the Library of Congress and its associated …

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

The Sensei from Sioux City

Posted by: Jennifer Gavin

Today marks 19 years since the passing of one of the world’s great management thinkers—W. Edwards Deming. After World War II, the U.S. did something remarkable in the history of war – it helped its friends and even its former foes get back on their feet economically.  In Europe, that was accomplished through the Marshall …