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Posted by: Erin Allen
The following post is by Elizabeth Pieri, one of 36 college students who participated in the Library’s Junior Fellow Summer Intern Program. She’s in her fourth year at Rochester Institute of Technology, as a motion picture science major. Because her program focuses on the fundamental imaging technologies used in the motion picture industry, she was …
Posted in: Collections, Education, Libraries, Maps, Technology
Posted by: Erin Allen
The “hero of two worlds” – as the Marquis de Lafayette has been called – has recently been in the news. A replica of the 18th century French frigate that ferried him to America on his most important mission has been making the rounds of the East Coast, on a journey to commemorate the …
Posted in: Books, Collections, Congress, History, Manuscripts, Maps
Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is a story in the January/February 2015 issue of the Library of Congress Magazine, LCM. You can read the issue in its entirety here.) Conservation Division chief Elmer Eusman discusses conservation treatment options for a variety of prized collection items. Pre-Columbian Objects “Collections such as this classic Maya whistling vessel, dated A.D 400-600, …
Posted in: Collections, Manuscripts, Maps, Photos, Preservation, Science, Technology
Posted by: Erin Allen
(From time to time, we’ll feature the story of one of our many researchers here at the Library and the discoveries they made using our collections. The following is the story of Meg Kennedy Shaw, who conducted research on her father, a British desert explorer, botanist and archaeologist.) Meg Kennedy Shaw has made many trips to …
Posted in: Capitol Hill, Collections, Libraries, Maps, Researcher Stories, Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington DC
Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is a guest post by Julie Miller, early American specialist in the Manuscript Division.) People who visit the Manuscript Division at the Library of Congress often ask where our collections come from. Sometimes the answers are surprising. This is true for a journal kept in 1783 by a Revolutionary War veteran from Pennsylvania …
Posted in: Exhibitions, History, Manuscripts, Maps
Posted by: Erin Allen
The idea was as big as the planet itself: Gather and digitize the globe’s cultural treasures, assemble them on one website and make them available to the world for free and in multiple languages. Such a project, Librarian of Congress James H. Billington said in proposing it, would bring people together by “celebrating the uniqueness …
Posted in: Collections, Education, History, LC Web site, Manuscripts, Maps, Music, Photos, Today in History
Posted by: Erin Allen
On Dec. 16, 1773, a group of Bostonians dressed as Mohawk Indians boarded ships docked in Boston Harbor and dumped some 340 chests of tea into the water. Today marks the 240th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party. “A number of brave & resolute men, determined to do all in their power to save their …
Posted in: Collections, Education, Events, History, Manuscripts, Maps, Today in History, Uncategorized
Posted by: Erin Allen
One in 10 people living in the United States of America is of Mexican origin. One in five Americans is Hispanic. The Library of Congress is hosting a special “Celebration of Mexico” next month to honor this segment of the population and provide some important educational opportunities along the way. The Library has the largest …
Posted in: Audiovisual, Collections, Events, Exhibitions, History, Maps, Video
Posted by: Erin Allen
Purchased through an act of Congress in 1867, the Peter Force Library became the foundation of the Library’s Americana collections. As the nation sought to reconstruct the Union after the Civil War, so, too, did the Library of Congress seek to build a collection that documented fully America’s history. At the time, the nearly 100,000 volumes …
Posted in: Civil War, Collections, History, Manuscripts, Maps, Newspapers