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Category: LCM

Three people moving along a waterway on an airboat with clear blue sky in the background. A woman sits on the front row, a pilot and videographer sit behind and above her on the second row.

Indigenous History Kept Alive at the Library

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

The Library's American Folklife Center and the Mellon Foundation have teamed up over the past several years to set up a series of grants that help preserve traditions that may otherwise be absent from the national record. For the most recent year, these include dances of the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of the Potawatomi, artistic creations of the Comanche Nation of Oklahoma and traditional Hawaiian music. These works are then preserved in Library collections for future generations.

Half length portrait of woman with straight, long black hair, looking seriously at the camera. Her elbows are on an art studio table and her chin rests on folded hands. On the table in front of her is colorful artwork in geometric patterns.

Wendy Red Star, Searching for Chief Plenty Coups

Posted by: Neely Tucker

Wendy Red Star is a Native American visual artist whose work has received widespread acclaim and been awarded the MacArthur Fellowship, commonly called the "genius grant." Her work is also collected at the Library. In this short essay, she writes about a research trip to the Library and how the collections inform her work.

A closeup image shows the title page shows the "Whole Books of Psalmes" title page.

A Pearl-Studded Book of Psalms, from the 17th Century

Posted by: Neely Tucker

If you were a well-born English lady in a 17th-century family, you might be just as likely to accessorize your satin gown with earrings or a fan as you would an elaborately embroidered prayer book. The Library preserves a customized 1641 Book of Psalms, a marvel not only for its diminutive size, but also for its remarkable condition and lavish decoration. At more than 380 years old, its golden threads remain unfrayed and its intricate swirls of tiny seed pearls — hundreds of them — are perfectly intact.

Near dusk, a woman in a heavy parka stands in her snow-covered front yard, surrounded by dozens of chunks of whale meat. Two lights are on in the house behind her.

Native American (Artistic) Visions

Posted by: Neely Tucker

The Library has worked for more than two decades to boost its holdings of modern Native American art and now has more than 200 prints and photographs by more than 50 contemporary Indigenous printmakers and photographers from the United States, Canada and Latin America. These include dazzling works by artists and photographers such as Wendy Red Star, Kay Walkingstick, Brian Adams, Zig Jackson and Rick Bartow.

An ink and watercolor sketch of the burned U.S. Capitol Building in 1814. The roof is gone and fire and smoke damage is visible.

Book(s) Burning: The Library Survived Two 19th-Century Fires

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This article also appears in the March-April issue of the Library of Congress Magazine. The Thomas Jefferson Building has awed visitors ever since it opened its doors in 1897. The grand building is more than a marvel of art and architecture, though; it’s also a monument to function and safety — fire safety in particular. …

George Washington and King George III — Exhibit Showcases Common Ties

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

A major new Library exhibition, “The Two Georges: Parallel Lives in an Age of Revolution,” uses original documents such as letters, diaries, maps, newspapers and political cartoons to shed light on striking likenesses between men long supposed to be polar opposites -- George Washington and King George III. The two opposed one another during the Revolutionary War, but actually shared many personal and leadership traits. The exhibit, a joint project between the Library of Congress and the Royal Archives, runs at the Library through next March. It is also online via the Library's website and in a companion book.

Color photo of artist Maya Freelon standing in a room with tissue-paper figures.

Reimagining the Lives of Enslaved Children

Posted by: Neely Tucker

Maya Freelon’s immersive exhibition “Whippersnappers: Recapturing, Reviewing, and Reimagining the Lives of Enslaved Children in the United States” at Historic Stagville in Durham, North Carolina, drew on Library materials to a new lens on the lives of enslaved children at a former plantation.

Two head and shoulders photos of Arthur Singleton, one in his military uniform and the other in a suit and tie.

World War I: Two Soldiers’ Stories

Posted by: Neely Tucker

The Arthur Singleton and Jessie Lockett collections are the Veterans History Project’s first from African American veterans of World War I, and their letters, journals and photographs offer glimpses into the adversity and resilience that characterize the African American experience of that war. They are small time capsules into another era of American life.