This post is by Jen Reidel, 2019-20 Library of Congress Teacher in Residence.
The Library of Congress has more than 168 million items in its collections—and millions have been digitized and are available on the Library’s website at www.loc.gov. Every digitized item is accompanied by an item record that can be a valuable research tool. Using specific links from the record may lead you and your students down some interesting and unexpected research rabbit holes.
Typically, an item record includes an image of the item. Directly below the image is its title, a summary, contributors’ names, date of publication, rights and access information, citation information, and suggestions for more items. In addition, the right side of the item record provides links to additional information related to the item including possibly its lot grouping, contributors, and related subjects. The contributor link wil