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Posted by: Mark Hartsell
A shorter version of this story appeared in the July/August edition of the Library of Congress Magazine. The best clues to a person’s character lie right in the palms of their hands. That, at least, is what Nellie Simmons Meier believed. Meier, you see, was one of the world’s foremost practitioners of the “science” of …
Posted in: LCM, Manuscripts, Women's History
Posted by: Neely Tucker
One of the Library's most unusual holdings is hair -- lots of it. The Library has locks and tresses and strands from people in the arts such as Ludwig van Beethoven, Walt Whitman and Edna St. Vincent Millay; presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Quincy Adams, James Madison and Ulysses S. Grant; and any number of famous women, including Lucy Webb Hayes (first lady and spouse of President Rutherford B. Hayes); Confederate spy Antonia Ford Willard; Clare Boothe Luce and unidentified hair from Clara Barton’s diary. Nearly all of the hair stems from the 18th and 19th centuries, in the era before photographs were common and lockets of hair were seen as tokens that could be anything from romantic to momentous.
Posted in: Civil War, LCM, Manuscripts, Preservation and Conservation, Thomas Jefferson, U.S. Presidents
Posted by: Neely Tucker
The papers of Leonard Downie Jr., who started as an intern at The Washington Post in the 1960s concluded his career with a 17-year run as executive editor, are now available for researchers in the Library's Manuscript Division. They offer insight on the Post's inner workings on such stories as Watergate, the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, the Bill Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, the Valerie Plame affair, 9/11, the Unabomber and much more.
Posted in: Manuscripts, New Online, Newspapers, Washington DC
Posted by: Neely Tucker
Letters in the Library’s stunning collection of correspondence that has helped shape the world as we know it, stretching back more than a thousand years. Written by the famous and the forgotten in any number of languages and dialects from all over the world the letters are on everything from ancient vellum to dime store postcards. It includes letters from Wolfgang Mozart, Rosa Parks, Abraham Lincoln, Walt Whitman, George Washington and thousands of others. One of the most significant is a papal bull from Pope Alexander VI, giving Spain title to any "new lands" they might discover in the "new world," setting the stage for hundreds of years of colonialism.
Posted in: History, Manuscripts
Posted by: Neely Tucker
Ulysses S. Grant was born 200 years ago today, April 27, 2022. The Library has a huge collection of the former president's personal, military and political papers, including letters to his wife, Julia, and the manuscript of his bestselling memoir.
Posted in: Civil War, Manuscripts, U.S. Presidents, Writers
Posted by: Neely Tucker
“Double Indemnity” is one of Hollywood’s classic films, the standard-bearer for noir cinema and a career highlight for stars Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray. The Library has a fascinating exchange of letters between the “Double” stars and novelist James M. Cain, whose book was the basis for the film. The letters give us a glimpse into Hollywood history, how scandalous the movie was at the time and at the manners of a bygone era. It’s almost impossible to imagine this exchange taking place today.
Posted in: Film, Manuscripts, National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, National Film Registry, Writers
Posted by: Neely Tucker
Madeleine Albright, the first female U.S. Secretary of State, died today in Washington at the age of 84. The cause was cancer, her family said.. Albright, who donated her papers to the Library in 2014, was a key figure in the administration of Bill Clinton, serving both as ambassador to the United Nations and then as Secretary of State during his second term. Outspoken to the end, she wrote an essay for the New York Times in late February warning about the effects of a Russian invasion of Ukraine. She included her notes from her first meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, more than two decades ago: "Putin is small and pale...so cold as to be almost reptilian."
Posted in: Manuscripts, National Book Festival, News, Women's History, World War II, Writers
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
In this segment of a regular feature on authors who use the Library's collections, we interview Walter Stahr, a lawyer turned historian. His latest biography, published in 2022, is "Salmon P. Chase: Lincoln's Vital Rival," a look at the influential treasury secretary and later chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court during the mid 19th century.
Posted in: Abraham Lincoln, Civil War, Manuscripts, Researcher Stories, Writers
Posted by: Neely Tucker
Rosa Parks, one of the most consequential Americans of the 20th century, was born on Feb. 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama. Her activism was galvanized decades before the Montgomery bus boycott by the sexualized violence of whites against Blacks in her native Alabama. This activism is featured in this short documentary by the Library of Congress, which holds her papers.
Posted in: African American History, Civil Rights, Exhibitions, Manuscripts, Today in History