Why Celebrate New Year’s?
Posted by: Josh Levy
Read about anthropologist Margaret Mead's thoughts on annual observances of the New Year's holiday.
Posted in: Holidays
Category: Holidays
Of Note: A Dessert Straight Out of History
Posted by: Andrea J. Briggs
The author recounts her culinary adventure attempting to recreate an original 1890s recipe for gingerbread found in the Rodgers Family Papers.
Of Note: Trust Your Gut: A Civil War Soldier’s Thanksgiving
Posted by: Andrea J. Briggs
Excerpts from a letter written November 27, 1864, by Lieutenant Samuel E. Nichols of the Union Army provide insight into the surprise contingencies that afflicted soldiers in his unit on Thanksgiving Day during the Civil War.
Posted in: Holidays, Letters, Of Note, War and Society
Halloween Greetings
Posted by: Ryan Reft
Discover some of the most haunting items in the Manuscript Division's collections.
Posted in: Diaries, Digital Collections, Holidays, Literature Culture & the Arts, Uncategorized
An Irishman, a U.S. President, and the First Hanging in the District of Columbia
Posted by: Josh Levy
The first man hanged in Washington, D.C., was an Irishman. His trial provides a unique lens on the early republic and its nascent national capital. The case drew national attention, particularly among Federalist newspaper editors, who used it to expose the threat of Irish immigrants and their hold over the sitting U.S. president, Thomas Jefferson.
Posted in: Early America, Holidays, Politics
Winter Readings and Season’s Greetings
Posted by: Josh Levy
Season's greetings from the Library of Congress Manuscript Division!
Posted in: Holidays
Diplomatic Holiday Greetings
Posted by: Elizabeth Novara
The holiday cards of Mary Marvin Breckinridge Patterson convey more than season’s greetings, providing insight into her career as a photographer in the 1930s and her life as the spouse of a U.S. foreign service officer from 1940 to 1958.
Posted in: Holidays, War and Society, Women's & Gender History
“I did not see the use of being uncomfortable on Thanksgiving day”: Tight Clothes and Big Meals in 19th-Century America
Posted by: Michelle Krowl
In an 1861 letter to her mother, sixteen-year-old Louisa Russell recounted a Thanksgiving feast that battled against her "considerably tight" clothing.