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Posted by: Wendi Maloney
This is a guest blog post by Malavika Kannan, a senior from Seminole High School in Sanford, Florida. She is a national winner of the 2017–18 Letters About Literature contest, a reading and writing competition for students in grades four through 12 that involves reading a work and writing to its author (living or dead). …
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
This is a guest post by Danna Bell of the Library’s Educational Outreach Office. It first appeared in “A Library for Kids,” the September–October issue of LCM, the Library of Congress Magazine. The issue is available in its entirety online. Why do pigeons bob their heads when they walk? Are children allowed in the Library …
Posted by: Carla D. Hayden
What is a library? “A quiet place for study and reflection” is one answer that might spring to mind. If you take advantage of story times and author talks, you might say, “A social place for programs and gatherings.” Our view here at the Library of Congress is the image of a treasure chest, filled …
Posted in: LC Web site, Libraries, New Online, New Visitors Experience
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
For more than two centuries, American library architecture aspired to accommodate the physical dimensions of books and the furniture and spaces designed to store and display them. “American Libraries 1730–1950”—a new book by Kenneth Breisch—celebrates the history of that architecture, from classical temples to ivy-covered campus citadels to modern glass boxes—whose roofs now house more …
Posted in: Libraries, Photos, Researcher Stories
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
Today, the Library of Congress celebrates its 218th birthday. On April 24, 1800, President John Adams approved an appropriation of $5,000 for the purchase of “such books as may be necessary for the use of [C]ongress.” The first books purchased were ordered from London and arrived in 1801. The collection of 740 volumes and three …
Posted in: Capitol Hill, Libraries, Thomas Jefferson Building
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
A new book from Library of Congress historian John Y. Cole, “America’s Greatest Library: An Illustrated History of the Library of Congress,” tells the story of the nation’s oldest federal cultural institution and how it came to be the world’s largest library. Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden calls the Library “a place where you can …
Posted by: John Sayers
This post is reprinted from the November–December issue of LCM, the Library of Congress Magazine. The entire issue is available on the Library’s website. John Cole has enjoyed a remarkable 51-year career at the Library, culminating with his most recent appointment as the first official Library of Congress historian. Throughout his long tenure at the …
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
The following is a guest post by Helena Zinkham, chief of the Prints and Photographs Division, about “American Libraries 1730–1950,” published this fall by W.W. Norton and Company in association with the Library of Congress. You can find libraries at the heart of many different communities, from the center of a town or a college …
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
This is a guest post by Elizabeth Fulford, a librarian in the Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access (ABA) Directorate, and Susan Morris, special assistant to the ABA director. The Library of Congress provides many resources to support information professionals worldwide. To streamline access to that content, we’ve redesigned our portal for librarians and archivists. The new …
Posted in: LC Web site, Libraries, New Online