Since 1897 the Library's Main Reading Room has been the dazzling center of the Library's collections. Its circular design was inpsired by the British Museum Library, its art based on the classics of Western civiilization and its mission settled on fulfilling the American ideal of knowledge and education. Today, although much of the Library's collections have spread to other reading rooms and are available online, it is still a vibrant research center and the go-to tourist attraction for visitors.
Maria Sibylla Merian, a 17th-century natural scientist, artist and engraver, gained lasting fame for her pioneering scientific illustration techniques, enabling her to bring a soft, delicate touch to her brilliantly shaded work.
The papers of Jonathan Larson and Leonard Bernstein are among many of the Library's musical holdings that have been used extensively by composers, actors and musicians in producing works on Broadway and in Hollywood. Lin-Manuel Miranda drew on Larson's papers for his production of "tick...tick...BOOM!" and the creative team behind the Bernstein documentary "Bernstein's Wall" and the feature film "Maestro" used Library collections for their works.
Linnea Vegh was working at a large, well-lit workspace in the Conservation Division on a recent day, considering an unusual problem in an 1869 Persian-Arabic dictionary published in India: Snakeskin. Five thin, scaly pieces, all likely used as bookmarks that got left behind for more than a century. Welcome to the weird world of “inclusions,” an ecosystem known to archivists the world over in which they come across all sort of things readers have purposefully or inadvertently left between a book’s pages.
Literacy Partners, a 52-year-old New York City nonprofit that works with families, both parents and children, won the top prize in the 2025 Library of Congress Literacy Awards, taking home the $150,000 David M. Rubenstein Prize. Since 2013, the Literacy Awards have handed out 247 prizes, totaling more than $4.3 million, all from philanthropic donations. More than 200 organizations from 42 countries have been recognized for their work.
Cassandra Gardner started working for the Library while still in high school. She never left and, forty years later, is retiring this month. Next year, she says, she'll look for a parttime job "for travel and casino money" because "life is too short not to enjoy yourself."
The Library’s Jefferson Building was the largest library building in the world when it opened in 1897; today, it’s still one of the world’s most beautiful libraries. Want some inside advice about what to see? Check out some favorite spots from the Library's visitor engagement staff.
We're talking today with David Baron, author of “The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze that Captured Turn-of-the-Century America,” who will be at this year’s National Book Festival on Sept. 6. It’s about the public fascination between 1890-1910 with what looked to be the very real possibility of life of Mars. The main cultural artifact of this belief might be H.G. Wells’ 1898 novel, “The War of the Worlds,” which imagined hostile Martians invading Earth in spectacular fashion. But as Baron writes, most of the views were utopian, picturing Martians as a far advanced, heroic people.
During World War II, the Office of War Information recorded news and American propaganda onto 16-inch discs which were then broadcast domestically and overseas. The Library acquired tens of thousands of these discs after the war and has been working to preserve them ever since. Colin Hochstetler, a Library Junior Fellow, talks about his work with these time-capsule discs in this question-and-anwer session.
