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Posted by: Mark Hartsell
Half the world, journalist Jacob Riis once said, doesn’t know how the other half lives, and it doesn’t know because it doesn’t care. Riis, a social reformer, author and newspaper reporter, used his work to make society take notice, exposing the squalid living and working conditions in late 19th-century New York during the height of …
Posted in: Collections, Curators, Events, Exhibitions, History, Photos
Posted by: Erin Allen
Library experts involved in making the papers of Rosa Parks available online answered questions in a Reddit “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) session on Tuesday. During the Reddit AMA, experts from the Library of Congress Manuscripts Division, the Prints and Photographs Division and Educational Outreach took questions about Rosa Parks and about how the Library cataloged, preserved, digitized, and …
Posted in: Civil Rights, Collections, Curators, Education, Events, History, LC Web site, Manuscripts, Photos, Pic of the Week, Women's History
Posted by: Erin Allen
This week marks the beginning of the National Cherry Blossom Festival, an annual event held in Washington, D.C. to commemorate the gift of some 3,000 Yoshino cherry trees given to the city in 1912 as a symbol of friendship between Japan and the United States. The grounds of the Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building are home …
Posted in: Audiovisual, Capitol Hill, Collections, Events, Exhibitions, Photos, Pic of the Week, Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington DC
Posted by: Jennifer Gavin
(The following is a guest post by Information Technology Specialist Michelle Rago.) Library experts involved in making the papers of Rosa Parks available online will answer your questions in a Reddit “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) session beginning at 9 a.m. (ET) on March 29, 2016. Join us on the AskHistorians subreddit. The collection contains some 7,500 …
Posted in: Collections, Curators, Education, History, Manuscripts, Photos
Posted by: Erin Allen
On Wednesday, poet Allison Hedge Coke was honored as the 2016 Witter Bynner Fellow. She was selected and introduced by Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry at the Library of Congress, Juan Felipe Herrera. In his selection, Herrera said he sought to honor Hedge Coke “for her precision of Earth, of suffering in and out of …
Posted in: Capitol Hill, Events, Photos, Pic of the Week, Poetry, Washington DC
Posted by: Erin Allen
“You’re never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book and read with a child.” ~ Dr. Seuss On Wednesday, children gathered at the Library’s Young Readers Center for “Read Across America” day, which also coincides with the birthday of Dr. Seuss. The National Education Association’s signature program is now in its …
Posted in: Books, Capitol Hill, Education, Events, Libraries, Photos, Pic of the Week, Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington DC
Posted by: Erin Allen
Louis W. Sullivan, former secretary of Health and Human Services, discussed his new book, ”Breaking Ground: My Life in Medicine” (University of Georgia Press, 2014), on Wednesday during an author talk presented by the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress. A video of the presentation will be available in the coming weeks. Sullivan spent …
Posted in: Books, Capitol Hill, Events, Photos, Pic of the Week, Washington DC
Posted by: Erin Allen
The Library of Congress on Wednesday honored the recipients of the Library of Congress Literacy Awards – three groups working to alleviate the scourge of illiteracy in this country and around the world. Recipients were First Book ($150,000 David M. Rubenstein Prize), United Through Reading ($50,000 American Prize) and Beanstalk ($50,000 International Prize).The Literacy Awards, first announced in January 2013, help …
Posted in: Books, Capitol Hill, Education, Events, Literacy, Photos, Pic of the Week, Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington DC
Posted by: Erin Allen
(The following is featured in the January/February 2016 issue of the Library of Congress Magazine, LCM. You can read the issue in its entirety here.) Nearly 1.6 million people came to the Library of Congress in 2015 to conduct research in its 21 reading rooms on Capitol Hill. More than 60 million users visited the …
Posted in: Abraham Lincoln, Books, Collections, LC Web site, LCM, Manuscripts, Photos