Top of page

Archive: May 2017 (23 Posts)

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

Journalism, Behind Barbed Wire

Posted by: Mark Hartsell

For these journalists, the assignment was like no other: Create newspapers to tell the story of their own families being forced from their homes, to chronicle the hardships and heartaches of life behind barbed wire for Japanese-Americans held in World War II internment camps. “These are not normal times nor is this an ordinary community,” …

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

Our Founding Uncle, Thaddeus K.

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This is a guest post by Jennifer Gavin, senior public affairs specialist in the Library’s Office of Communications. We hear a lot about our “Founding Fathers,” who started a fight with their overlords, then went on to win it. But in that war of rebellion, there were also many brothers (and sisters), cousins and uncles-in-arms—many …

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

Civil War Diary: “This Hell-Upon-Earth of a Prison”

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This is a guest post by Michelle Krowl, a historian in the Manuscript Division, about the experience of Samuel J. Gibson, a Union soldier who was incarcerated in the Confederate military prison in Andersonville, Georgia. He arrived on May 3, 1864—153 years ago today—and his diary is now available online. “I don’t know for whom …

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

Inquiring Minds: Copyright Records Hint at Early America’s Preoccupations

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

Copyright records are a valuable primary source for scholars seeking to understand the development of almost any aspect of American life. So wrote John Y. Cole, Library of Congress historian, in introducing a volume the Library published 30 years ago documenting the nation’s earliest copyright records—those dating from 1790 to 1800. They include copyright registrations …