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Posted by: Wendi Maloney
Michael Stratmoen is a program specialist for the John W. Kluge Center. In this question-and-answer, he talks about growing up in D.C. and working with the Kluge Center's scholars and their projects.
Posted in: Copyright, Events, Gazette, Kluge Center, LGBTQ, Library Work and Employees, My Job, Washington DC
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
It started, the story goes, with a back-to-school jam in the Bronx in 1973. There, in a basement rec room, DJ Kool Herc — aka Clive Campbell — stood between two turntables, switching between records to extend the instrumental breaks so his sister’s friends could dance longer. His parties became so popular he had to …
Posted in: Alexander Hamilton, Copyright, Lavine/Ken Burns Prize for Film
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
This is a guest post by Flynn Shannon, who interned this summer in the Library’s Communications Office through the Junior Fellows Program. He is a student at Kenyon College, where he is pursuing a degree in classical mathematics with a concentration in scientific computing. The post was first published on “The Signal,” a blog covering …
Posted in: Copyright, Free to Use and Reuse, LC Web site, Social Media, Technology
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
Teachers and filmmakers have long relied on primary sources to make history come alive. Ben West, director, performer and musical theater historian, is also drawn to them—but with a novel purpose. He is using unpublished manuscripts, papers of Broadway authors, copyright records and more to tell the story of the American musical—through a musical. His …
Posted in: Collections, Copyright, Manuscripts, Music, Researcher Stories
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
Mark Twain impersonators routinely don a white suit to evoke the persona of the famous author. But Twain himself did not make a habit of wearing white at all times of the year until very late in his life. He unveiled his signature style on December 7, 1906, at age 71, when he testified about …
Posted in: Collections, Copyright, Photos
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas 54 years ago today. Last month, to much anticipation, historians and the public awaited release by the National Archives of the government’s final records on the investigation into his murder—a law passed in 1992 set October 26, 2017, as the deadline for public disclosure of all assassination-related …
Posted in: Copyright
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
November is National Native American Heritage Month. This annual recognition of the contributions of Native Americans to our national culture began in 1986, when President Ronald Reagan proclaimed November 23–30 of that year “American Indian Week.” In 1990, President George H. W. Bush extended the observance to an entire month. Every year since then, U.S. …
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
The Statue of Liberty arrived at its permanent home on Bedloe’s Island in New York Harbor at 1 p.m. on June 19, 1885, “snugly packed in the hold of the French transport Isère,” according to a New York Times report the following day. Multiple delegations of dignitaries, 20,000 citizens, and “every species of craft known …
Posted in: Collections, Copyright, Film, Photos, Today in History
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 …
Posted in: Collections, Copyright, Researcher Stories