Photochroms, published primarily from the 1890s to 1910s, are prints that were created by the Photoglob Company in Zürich, Switzerland, and the Detroit Publishing Company in Michigan. The richly colored images look like photographs but are actually ink-based photolithographs, usually 6.5 x 9 inches. You can learn more about them here.

The Library is looking toward the power of crowd-sourcing to help enhance our records about these images:

“Your addition of current place names is much appreciated! Some locations have changed names or even countries since 1900. And, the titles we had to work with from the photochrom publishers based in Detroit and Zurich tended to be English or German versions of the place names.”

(The included image, “Native girls, Marken Island, Holland,” from the Library’s Prints and Photographs Online Catalog and also online at Flickr.)

While the baseball season winds down and the excitement of another World Series chase begins, we’re celebrating the national pastime with a new book, Baseball Americana: Treasures from the Library of Congress (drawing rave reviews in places like Sports Illustrated) and a two-day symposium on baseball at the Library October 2-3, 2009.

Long before TV and the Internet provided coverage of every game and at-bat, Americans saw images of their favorite teams and players in books, newspapers  and magazines.  They saw them on tobacco and candy packages, on sheet-music covers  and in the movies.  People were playing baseball everywhere, and we found baseball everywhere in our rich visual collections.

Images and artifacts from the game are as old as our country and mark its heritage and history–in a children’s book published in Worcester, Massachusetts the same year that that U.S. Constitution was written, in a depiction of Civil War prisoners actively playing in a North Carolina camp, in baseball cards showing the first heroes and stars of the game, in the first Negro League World Series in Kansas City in 1924, in the games we’ve played ourselves in sandlots and fields around the country.

As a member of the Library’s Flickr pilot team, I’ve enjoyed watching that community discover and enjoy baseball pictures they’d never seen before.  To make selections for the book, my co-authors and I also had fun poring through thousands of images to find even more rare surprises. Why is Babe Ruth lying unconscious on the field? It’s not what you might think.  We put the Babe and a sampling of 22 other photographs from the book into this week’s new Flickr set.  Enjoy!

To see more historic baseball resources at the Library, visit the America’s Pastime page and a resources page here.  You can also purchase the Baseball Americana book and other baseball-related items in the Library’s online shop.

Into this fray stepped a New York-born schoolteacher named Jedediah Hotchkiss (1828-1899). Jed had moved to Virginia, and initially aided the Confederate war effort by hauling supplies. Before long, he was making maps for Brig. Gen. Richard B. Garnett, and eventually he became the mapmaker for Gen. Robert E. Lee and Maj. Gen. Stonewall Jackson.

These history-changing maps are the subject of a just-opened exhibition in the corridor outside the Geography & Maps Reading Room at the James Madison Building of the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.

Hotchkiss’ maps, many drawn from horseback, were extraordinary for their accuracy.  Jackson’s successes in the 1862 campaign were largely credited to those remarkable maps.  Hotchkiss, who rose to the rank of major, also was entrusted with choosing lines of defense and arranging troops during several crucial battles.

Over four years of war service, ending with Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Courthouse in 1865, Hotchkiss created some 600 maps and numerous drawings, which he was allowed to retain following the cessation of hostilities.  He returned to further teaching and mapmaking, and ran for Congress.  His maps eventually were  purchased by the Library of Congress in 1948, from Hotchkiss’ granddaughter.

The one considered his masterpiece — offensive and defensive points within the vast Shenandoah Valley — came to the Library in 1964.

Secrets_Success

With all the various reading rooms available at the Library, did you know there is one with a reference alcove dedicated to business?

The 5th floor of the John Adams Building on Capitol Hill, home to the Science & Business Reading Room, has a staff of business reference specialists to assist with your business-related questions and research needs.

They can assist you with all major business topics, including industry trends, commerce, banking, insurance, economics, finance, marketing, human resources and more.

Starting a business, or putting together a business plan? Need information on an old stock certificate or doing business history research? S&B has put together a number of guides and bibliographies to get you started. For something more in-depth, try the Business & Economics Research Advisor series intended to assist researchers on business- and economics-related topics.

You might be surprised at what can be found in the stacks of the Adams building (at 101 Independence Ave. S.E. in Washington). Looking for statistics? We have railroad statistics dating back to 1888, as well as many U.S. Census publications. Company research? In addition to a guide devoted to company research, the Science & Business Reading Room has a microfiche collection of corporate annual reports, some dating back to the early 1900s.

You business-history buffs might be interested in “The Secrets of Success in Business,” published in 1883. Within these pages you will find instruction on business writing, detecting counterfeit money, bookkeeping, and how to calculate interest, discount and insurance. Tips on how freight is received, handled, billed and delivered is in the pages dedicated to railroading and express business, and the 566-page book offers a glimpse at the world of Wall Street (as it existed then).

To learn more about the Library’s Business Reference section and view the variety of resources available, visit Business Reference Services online. It also has a number of databases and e-resources available for on-site use. If you’re not in the neighborhood, try the Library’s Ask a Librarian service.

Thanks to Business Reference Specialist Donna Scanlon of the Science, Technology & Business Division for this post!

Where is the outrage?

Well, for an amazing 72 years, it was on editorial pages, especially that of the Washington Post–in political commentary by the influential cartoonist Herblock (Herb Block), who made presidents and other public figures, from Herbert Hoover to George W. Bush, ink-stained and wretched.

The Library of Congress is the home of the Herb Block Collection, and its first exhibition of Herblock cartoons, titled “Enduring Outrage,” will become part of myLOC.gov as an online exhibition.

That will be a toasty warm-up to Herblock!, a major exhibition slated to open Oct. 13 in the Library’s South Gallery of the Thomas Jefferson Building in Washington, D.C.  This exhibition will celebrate the 100th anniversary of Herb Block’s birth and offer 82 original drawings from the Library’s vast collection, illuminating the man as well as his mastery of the political cartoonist’s art.

Denounced by Sen. Joseph McCarthy … dubbed “a master of sick invective” by President Richard M. Nixon …

It’ll be outrageous!

I was watching a new episode of History Detectives last night on PBS (one of the few shows to which I am hopelessly addicted). Tukufu Zuberi did a segment about a letter purportedly written by the father of John Wilkes Booth to President Andrew Jackson threatening to assassinate Old Hickory.

The piece turned up some interesting tidbits supporting the notion that at least thoughts of assassination ran in the Booth family, such as what appears to be a contemporaneous apology for the letter from Booth the elder to Jackson in a Philadelphia newspaper.

The Library of Congress in the past had done some pretty exhaustive work of which I was unaware that signals our letter’s authenticity. Quoting Barbara Bair of the Library’s Manuscript Division:

[A]ccording to research by an LC conservator who specializes in manuscripts [Mary Elizabeth (Betsy) Haude], and who has examined the letter, the paper used in the Junius Booth to Andrew Jackson letter of July 4, 1835, as evidenced by the watermarks (dove, and A KELTY), was that of the paper maker Anthony Kelty. He operated a paper mill from 1830-1840 on Buck Run, near Coatesville in East Fallowfield Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania. [The letter was dated July 4, 1835, and addressed from Philadelphia.]

One of the unsolved mysteries regarding the letter was why the word “anonymous” had been scrawled in blue on the letter’s docketing (an identifying inscription on the letter’s covering). Again, Bair quotes Library conservators:

Pinpointing the origin of the inscription of “anonymous” that was added in a different hand to the docketing/address portion of the document is difficult without scientific analysis. It is possible that the blue ink is made from Prussian Blue, often referred to as the first modern/synthetic/artificial pigment. It was in use from approximately 1774.

It’s also possible that the blue ink is made from an aniline dye. Aniline dyes were manufactured in the mid-to-late 19th century. Both indigo and Prussian blue were added to iron-gall ink. However the blue ink on the Junius Booth document does not exhibit the qualities of iron-gall ink. And it is quite vivid in color. Aniline dye-based inks came into use after the 1850s. This does not determine to any precise degree when the notation was written, but that it appears to be 19th century in origin, and most likely written after Jackson had died (which was in 1845).

So why did Booth write the letter? It has been well-established that Junius Booth, a renowned Shakespearean actor of his time, was a heavy drinker who was given to insane outbursts, even during his on-stage performances. For instance, Bair relates an account from the book “American Gothic: The Story of America’s Legendary Theatrical Family—Junius, Edwin, and John Wilkes Booth” by Gene Smith. As the story goes, the character played by Junius was about to kill the character played by his son Edwin when they were heckled by a drunk, to whom Junius, still in character, raged: “Beware. I am the headsman, I am the executioner!”

It’s unclear how President Jackson responded to the letter, especially given the published Booth apology and the fact that Booth and Jackson were actually friends. (The Booth letter states, “You know me! Look out!”) But it’s possible that the old general and hero of the War of 1812 held little fear of death at the hands of another: Earlier in 1835, when a man tried to shoot Jackson at the Capitol and his gun misfired, the president personally fended off the would-be assassin with his cane as observers merely stood agape.

The Library has made the Junius Booth letter available to historians for some time, but I’ve also included in this post links to high-resolution images of the letter and its docketing for any other “history detectives” out there.

And watch “History Detectives” on Aug. 17, when another piece featuring the Manuscript Division will air. I hope to write about it at the time.

There’s no doubt right now that times are tough all over.  The news media is among the industries that have been hit especially hard–in this case, by factors including changing technology and news-consumption habits, but also by lower ad revenues from the weak economy.

If there is a silver lining to be found behind that big ol’ cumulonimbus, however, it is that those same news media are generously donating much of their unsold ad inventory to important public-service messages.

Many of those messages are made possible by the Ad Council, which works with ad agencies on a pro bono basis, in conjunction with partners such as government agencies, to produce important public-service campaigns.  A couple of well-known examples are Smokey Bear’s anti-forest-fire admonitions, and Vince and Larry, those wacky crash-test dummies.  An article in The New York Times examines this trend.

The Library of Congress for the past several years has proudly been one of those Ad Council partners–initially promoting the value of learning history, and now getting out the word about reading.  One of the outcomes of that partnership has been our great (if I must say so myself) website, Literacy.gov.

To date, our Ad Council partnership has yielded a donated media value of more than a quarter of a billion dollars–billion, with a B–for these important messages.  (Coincidentally or not, The New York Times has been one of the single biggest supporters of our literacy campaign.  I’ve noticed a few of our full-page PSAs in that newspaper in the past several months.)

Hard times are known to bring out the best in people, so it is good to see a few of the ways some folks are giving of themselves to help others.

This past Friday morning, the site hosted more than 975,000 pages. That same day, the system was updated, bringing the total to 1,249,747 pages. Not to be too specific.

A text-heavy page of this morning’s Washington Post took me about 14 minutes to read, top to bottom. At that rate, I could read day and night for the next 33 years and still not get through every page on Chronicling America.

As I reported last week, the site itself has also been upgraded and enhanced for users.

If you haven’t taken the time to explore Chronicling America, give it a shot — but beware: If you love history, or if you delight in the quaint prose of American journalism circa 1900, you might find several hours elapse seemingly in minutes. As the media have reported (here and here, for instance), there are many great discoveries to be made.

As participants in the event noted, even though the pages are digitized from microfilm, searching them is a far cry from the days of hunching over a microfilm reader and turning a crank in (often vain) hopes of spotting the right article. The database is fully text-searchable, and searches can be restricted by a variety of variables such as date, state and newspaper. It also includes a sprawling listing of 140,000 newspapers published in America since 1690 with details on where to find those that don’t yet exist in digital form.

High-resolution images can be saved and printed, along with basic PDFs, and each page has its own permalink. Wouldn’t it be great to see some of them start showing up on sites like Wikipedia — for instance, the page above linked to the entry about the 1906 San Francisco earthquake?

A few months back, I speculated about what the 1 millionth page might be. Turns out it was too hard to pick just one, especially when so many partners are contributing so much. Instead, the partners picked 11 ceremonial “1 millionth pages” [PDF link], each with an interesting story to tell.

After the jump is an excerpt from remarks made at the news conference by Associate Librarian for Library Services Deanna Marcum. (Below she is pictured at the podium with Acting NEH Chairman Carole Watson in the background. Photo courtesy of NEH by frasierphoto.com.)

As a resource for local history, no form of publication captures the day-to-day life of a community and its citizens better than the local newspaper. Alongside the headlines proclaiming great and small events are editorials, human interest stories, obituaries, sporting news, and business reports that, as a whole, provide the record of the communities in which those events take place.

For historians, genealogists, and other scholars, newspapers provide first-hand, and sometimes the only, account of local news. Even in the most extreme instances, when the editorial content of the newspaper reflects journalism at its most outrageous, the ordinary details of life can still be found and appreciated. As a primary source for local history information, all newspapers – metropolitan dailies, suburban papers, rural weeklies, and the rich ethnic press – are worthy of retention and preservation by libraries and archives.

Technical improvements in online texts in the past decade make possible what was heretofore only a set of research goals. Commercial conversion approaches have sustainable business models for “most desired” titles – titles the public is willing to pay to access. However, most commercial activities include use of proprietary services, methodologies and information architecture, and thus create access, interoperability, and preservation challenges.

Today we celebrate a growing, freely available national digital newspaper collection.

A century ago, the use of halftone images was beginning to revolutionize newspapers and bringing the immediacy of photography to the masses.

Today the Library launched a new photostream on our Flickr page to celebrate this visual heritage. It is a series of 52 weekly supplements in the New-York Tribune, beginning 100 years ago in 1909. About 50 new pages will be added to the stream every month.

More details can be found here and here.

The timing of the new photostream is deliberate: The Library of Congress and the NEH, our partner in Chronicling America, will make some exciting announcements on Tuesday about the program — which I, of course, don’t want to preempt here.

By the way, the image in this post comes from a Sept. 26, 1909, Sunday supplement. It is a photograph taken at the North Pole by explorer Frederick Cook, whose papers are held by the Library of Congress.

Another fave pointed out by staff is this image (click on the large image or visit the persistent URL for higher resolution). It presents relative size comparisons of things such as annual sugar and tobacco consumption in the United States, versus the height of buildings such as the Pyramid at Cheops or the Washington Monument.

What are some of your favorites?

Details about the National Recording Registry can be found here