From time to time, we ask ourselves: Where is the outrage? Well, for an amazing 72 years, it was on editorial pages, especially that of the Washington Post–in political commentary by the influential cartoonist Herblock (Herb Block), who made presidents and other public figures, from Herbert Hoover to George W. Bush, ink-stained and wretched. The Library …
I have corrected a recent post about increased visitorship at the Library. Visitation at the Library from January–May 2009 was up 47 percent, not 69 percent between January and April, as previously stated. April itself, however, was up 64 percent—possibly an all-time record.
I thought I would pass along a statistic that has been floating about for the past couple of days: Our total number of visitors from January to April 2009 increased a whopping 69 percent over 2007! (We’re comparing against 2007 because the same period in 2008 had too many variables, including an extended building closure …
Last week was one of the busiest (if not the busiest) week I’ve seen since coming to the Library. There was the Library’s presentation of the $1 million Kluge Prize for Lifetime Achievement in the Study of Humanity. There were a lot of great, new interactive features that came online in the Library of …
If you haven’t yet seen the exhibition that David McCullough calls the one “every American ought to see,” you might want to make a trip to the Library within the next few days. The original rough draft of the Declaration of Independence in Thomas Jefferson’s hand, with edits by John Adams and Ben Franklin, will …
USA Today writes about a pair of different map exhibits?one in Chicago, and another that begins Dec. 13 at the Library of Congress. (Full disclosure: In today?s hard-copy version of the newspaper, the story mistakenly referred in a single instance to the exhibit?s being held at the National Archives.) The famed 1507 Martin Waldseem?Map will …
There is so much history around this sprawling place that sometimes a milestone or two worth mentioning will slip beneath the radar. The Politico reported that yesterday (Nov. 1) was the 110th anniversary of the opening of the Library of Congress?s Thomas Jefferson Building on Capitol Hill (although the ?TJB? moniker wouldn?t come until many …
The front page at LOC.gov will be getting a bit of a facelift in a couple of weeks.? (In fact, the plan is to time it to the 20th anniversary of the Librarian of Congress’s tenure on Sept. 14.) The changes won?t be radical, but we do hope they will be viewed as improvements.? You …
A partial image of page 1 of the rough draft of the Declaration of Independence, with a gradient fade applied A couple of notes about recent TV appearances, and then an on-topic digression (which is after the jump). First of all, as previously mentioned, Dr. Billington, the Librarian of Congress, was the guest July 1 …