Musings - Library of Congress, What Is It?

 It's National Library Week, so it seems fitting to take a look at the Library of Congress.

What the heck is it?  

It is the U.S. National Library, but it's primary mission is research inquiries made by members of Congress.   

It also houses and oversees the United States Copyright Office.  Additionally, the library also administers the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, an audio book and braille library program provided to more than 766,000 Americans.  The sheer size and variety of it's total collection makes it the world’s largest library.

The library now consists primarily of three buildings. The main building dates from 1897. In 1980, it was renamed the Thomas Jefferson building. This is where you will want to head if you’re visiting Washington, D.C.  There is also the John Adams Building, the James Madison Memorial Building, and the Packard Campus for Audio-Visual Conservation.

An interesting bit of trivia, there was so much emphasis on the exterior architecture during the planning that they neglected plans for the interior.  An interior designer was brought on board and he made it just as impressive, if not more so.

The Library of Congress is open to the public, although only high-ranking government officials and library employees may borrow from the materials.  You can apply for a "reader card" but you can't take items out of the building.  Remember, it is primarily a research institution.

It was first conceived of by James Madison in 1783.  Before Washington D.C. was set as our Capitol and "in the years after the Revolutionary War, the Philadelphia Library Company and New York Society Library served as surrogate congressional libraries whenever Congress held session in those respective cities." Wikipedia  It was in April 1800 that the seat of our government was officially declared to be Washington D.C. and thus they needed a library to serve their needs for research.  The same decree that made D.C. the location of our government provided money for the purchase of books necessary for the nation's representative leadership to conduct research, as well as a place to house them.  It started with just 740 books and 3 maps.

Thomas Jefferson was deeply involved in the organizing of the libarary.  But in the war of 1814 with England, several government buildings were burned including the library of Congress with many of the then 3000 books burned.  It wouldn't be the only time it had a serious fire.  Thomas Jefferson's personal library of 6,487 books (including a two-volume translation of the Qu'ran) was purchased to restock the library.  Thank you TJ!  There is a wonderful round shelving display that contains Jefferson's library pictured here. 

In 1865, the Library was in the process of procurring a new fire-proof building when the Smithsonian's Castle experienced a fire that spurred the Smithsonian to donate their non-scientific books (40,000 in total) to the Library of Congress.  

At this writing the Library of Congress has:

- More than 32 million catalogued books and other print materials in 470 languages     

- More than 61 million manuscripts

      - The largest rare book collection in North America  

- The rough draft of the Declaration of Independence 

- Over 1 million U.S. government publications 

- 1 million issues of world newspapers spanning the past three centuries 

                --33,000 bound newspaper volumes 

  --500,000 microfilm reels 

      - U.S. and foreign comic books—over 12,000 titles in all, totaling more than 140,000 issues  

- 1.9 million moving images (as of 2020) 

- 5.3 million maps 

- 6 million works of sheet music 

- 3 million sound recordings 

- More than 14.7 million prints and photographic images including fine and popular art pieces and architectural drawings 

- The Betts Stradivarius Violin

- And the Cassavetti Stradivarius Violin

Yes, they have 15 million digital objects, the majority are available via their website.  They continue to digitize the collection.

Many of these facts about the Library of Congress I didn't know until I did research for this piece.  I hope this was as fascinating to you as it was to me.  I hope to visit there someday.