Top of page
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
A log cabin, a city row house, and a Baptist church. As a list of buildings, it is unremarkable. When I describe these three structures with a focus on their places in history, the list gets much more interesting. They are also: the slave quarters on the Tennessee plantation owned by Pres. Andrew Jackson, the …
Posted in: African American History, HABS/HAER/HALS, Photographs
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
April is National Arab American Heritage Month. Save an hour this Wednesday afternoon to get a peek into how the Prints & Photographs Division’s collections provide visual insight into the lives and accomplishments of Arab Americans. Sara W. Duke, Curator of Popular and Applied Graphic Art, will share a wide array of images related to …
Posted in: News & Events, Photographs, Portraits
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
What do a carousel horse, Theodore Roosevelt, and a lighthouse have in common? Look closely at the drawing below from the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) of the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial – can you spot two Roosevelts? There is, of course, the large drawing of the Roosevelt statue featured at the memorial on Theodore Roosevelt …
Posted in: Architecture, Drawings, HABS/HAER/HALS, Visual literacy
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
In his November 1933 proposal to create the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) in partnership with the Library of Congress and the American Institute of Architects, the National Park Service’s Charles E. Peterson sounded this call to action: “Our architectural heritage of buildings from the last four centuries diminishes daily at an alarming rate. The …
Posted in: Architecture, Drawings, Photographs
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
From the most recent Library of Congress blog post for the Library intiative Of the People: Widening the Path, we learn about the work of visual artist Maya Freelon, and her visit to the Library of Congress to explore the collections for her current project, Whippersnappers: Recapturing, Reviewing, and Reimagining the Lives of Enslaved Children in …
Posted in: African American History, Photographs, Portraits
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
Join reference librarian Jon Eaker and associate curator of photography Michelle Smiley this Wednesday, September 20th at 3:00pm EDT for an illustrated tour through the many facets of Civil War medicine seen in the collections of the Library of Congress. Register here for the virtual presentation. This talk will be recorded, so if you cannot …
Posted in: Drawings, News & Events, Photographs, Prints
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
Read about collections that are newly available and ready for research from the Prints & Photographs Division, including color slides by American architect Paul M. Rudolph, color images of Idaho, Montana, Nevada, and Utah by photographer Carol M. Highsmith and letterpress posters by printmaker Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr.
Posted in: Architecture, Photographs, Posters, Prints, Ready for Research
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
As Women’s History Month draws to a close, I was inspired to look back at the archives of the Picture This blog and to note the many ways we have celebrated the contributions of women in history. We have written posts about women making their mark, such as Shirley Chisholm and Amelia Earhart. And we …
Posted in: Photographs, Prints, Women's History
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
If you are in the D.C. area, please join us on Thursday, March 16, to celebrate Women’s History Month with Women in Photography, Stories from the Not an Ostrich Exhibition, from 6 to 8 p.m., in the Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building. Photojournalist Sharon Farmer, the first woman and the first African American to be director …
Posted in: Exhibitions, News & Events, Photographs, Women's History