(The following was written by Barbara Bair, historian in the Library’s Manuscript Division.) As a special collections repository, the Library of Congress holds the largest collection of Walt Whitman materials anywhere in the world. The Manuscript Division has already made available online the Thomas Biggs Harned Collection of Walt Whitman Papers and the Walt Whitman …
(The following was written by Julie Miller, Barbara Bair and Michelle Krowl, historians in the Library’s Manuscript Division, for the January/February 2017 issue of the Library of Congress Magazine, LCM. You can read the issue in its entirety here.) Presidential candidates have used popular culture to promote their campaigns for nearly 200 years. Today’s political …
(The following is a guest blog post written by Elizabeth Gettins, Library of Congress digital library specialist.) This month, in honor of Mary Todd Lincoln’s birthday on December 13, we will depart from our literary theme and look at some of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division’s “special collections.” While these items are not …
(The following is a feature story from the November/December 2016 Library of Congress Magazine, LCM, that was written by Helena Zinkham, director of the Library’s Collections and Services Directorate and chief of the Prints and Photographs Division. You can read the issue in its entirety here.) What do Marilyn Monroe, Civil War soldiers and the Wright Brothers …
Last Monday, the Library of Congress welcomed thousands of visitors into its Main Reading Room for the twice-yearly open house. New this year was an open house a few miles down the road at the Library’s Packard Campus for Audio-Visual Preservation, where the free tour tickets quickly “sold out” on Eventbrite in advance of the …
(The following is a guest blog post written by Elizabeth Gettins, Library of Congress digital library specialist.) This week, we not only celebrate the birthday of author Edgar Lee Masters (Aug. 23, 1868) but also observe the untimely death of Ann Rutledge (Aug. 25, 1835), who figured in his best-known work. Masters spent his childhood …
(The following is a guest post by William Kellum, manager in the Library’s Web Services Division.) July was a relatively quiet month for the Library’s websites, highlighted by the long-planned retirement of THOMAS, covered in this excellent blog post from the Law Library’s In Custodia Legis blog. New in Manuscripts The William Henry Harrison Papers have recently …
The month of May saw the Library of Congress in a variety of headlines. In April, the Library announced that THOMAS.gov, the online legislative information system, will officially retire July 5, completing the multi-year transition to Congress.gov. David Gewirtz for ZDNet Government wrote, “You have to wonder what Thomas Jefferson would have made of the …
(The following is written by Michelle Krowl, a historian in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division.) On May 10, 1867 Colonel Nathan W. Daniels celebrated his 31st birthday. He noted in his diary, “Learned to day that I had been recommended and nominated by Chief Justice Chase as Register under the Bankrupt Act for the …
