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Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is a guest post from Ryan Reft, modern U.S. historian in the Manuscript Division.) “No son has ever left home whose family had greater pride in him than we have in you,” wrote prominent Washington D.C. lawyer and African American civic leader William LePre Houston to his son, Charles Hamilton Houston in September …
Posted in: Civil Rights, Collections, Curators, Education, History, Manuscripts
Posted by: Erin Allen
To say that Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden is all smiles, excitement and curiosity is an understatement. On her first official day in office last Thursday, her inquisitiveness and thirst for all things was almost palpable. Hayden began her day with a meeting on the National Book Festival. “This is so exciting,” she said, a …
Posted in: Capitol Hill, Collections, Congress, Curators, Education, History, Manuscripts, Maps, Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington DC
Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is a guest post by Margaret Wood, a legal reference librarian at the Law Library of Congress.) Six weeks after the declaration of war against Germany on April 6, 1917, ch. 1, 40 Stat.1, Congress passed the Selective Service Act. Initially, President Woodrow Wilson and Congress had hoped the needed 1 million men …
Posted in: Collections, Congress, Curators, Education, History, Law Library, Manuscripts
Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is a guest post by Katherine Blood of the Prints and Photographs Division.) Illustrator Charles Dana Gibson was already a celebrity when tapped in April 1917 to lead the federal government’s Division of Pictorial Publicity — an arm of Woodrow Wilson’s Committee on Public Information. He was enlisted by Committee head George Creel, …
Posted in: Collections, Curators, Exhibitions, History, LC Web site, Photos
Posted by: Erin Allen
(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 …
Posted in: Abraham Lincoln, Books, Collections, Curators, History, Manuscripts, Music, Poetry, Rare Book of the Month
Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is from the July/August 2016 issue of the Library of Congress Magazine, LCM. You can read the issue in its entirety here.) Matt Barton in the Library’s Motion Picture and Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division discusses some of the nation’s most iconic radio broadcasts. DATE OF INFAMY SPEECH President Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed a Joint …
Posted in: Audiovisual, Collections, Congress, Curators, History, LCM, Music, Preservation
Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is a post by Arlene Balkansky, reference specialist in the Serial and Government Publications Division, and Will Elsbury, military history specialist in the Humanities and Social Sciences Division.) The Library of Congress’ historical newspaper collections are extensive in their coverage of World War I. From the beginning of the war to America’s involvement to …
Posted in: Collections, Curators, History, LC Web site, News, Newspapers
Posted by: Gayle Osterberg
Next April begins the centennial of America’s involvement in World War I, from April 6, 1917, when the U.S. Congress formally declared war on the German Empire. It concluded November 11, 1918, with the armistice agreement. I am going to risk embarrassment by confessing that I have retained very little of what I learned about …
Posted in: Collections, Curators, Education, Exhibitions, History
Posted by: Mark Hartsell
As a hospital chaplain during the Civil War, William Oland Bourne collected the names of the wounded soldiers he tended and, in doing so, noticed a terrible trend: Many soldiers used their left hands to sign his autograph book because their right arms were missing. How, Bourne wondered, could these grievously wounded men adapt – …
Posted in: Civil War, Collections, Curators, History, LC Web site, Manuscripts, New Online