Library of Congress's Blog, page 136

Pic of the Week: Willie Nelson on PBS Tonight!

Willie Nelson receives a standing ovation at the conclusion of the 2015 Gershwin Prize for Popular Song concert at DAR Constitution Hall. Photo by Shawn Miller.

Make sure to tune in to PBS tonight for the star-studded concert tribute to Willie Nelson, the 2015 recipient of the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. The concert airs on PBS stations nationwide at 9 p.m. ET on (check local listings). The program also will be broadcast at a later date via the American Forces Network to U.S. Department of Defense locations around the world.

This year’s all-star tribute features performances by Nelson, as well as Edie Brickell, Leon Bridges, Rosanne Cash, Ana Gabriel, Jamey Johnson, Alison Krauss, Raul Malo of The Mavericks, Neil Young, Promise of the Real, Buckwheat Zydeco and past Gershwin Prize honoree Paul Simon.

“Willie Nelson: The Library of Congress Gershwin Prize” is a co-production of WETA Washington, D.C., and Bounce, a division of AEG. The executive producers of the program are Dalton Delan, David Mao, Michael Strunsky and Mark Rothbaum.

Nelson is considered one of the top country singers of all time. His six-decade career has produced more than 200 albums and has earned him numerous awards and accolades as a musician, author, actor and activist. As a songwriter and performer, this iconic Texan became the voice of the heartland with such hits as “Crazy” and “Funny How Time Slips Away,” but he has continually pushed musical boundaries. He diversified his repertory and turned pop standards such as “Blue Skies” and “Mona Lisa” into country hits and such pop tunes as “Always on My Mind” and “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before” into crossover favorites.

10 Stories: Mustaches in History! Chronicling America

In celebration of the release of the 10 millionth page of Chronicling America, our free, online searchable database of historical U.S. newspapers, the reference librarians in our Serials & Government Publications Division have selected some interesting subjects and articles from the archives. We’ve been sharing them in a series of Throwback Thursday #TBT blog posts.

So many mustaches: “Thirty Members of the Oregon House of Representatives,” Oregon Mist, Feb. 8, 1895.

Today we return to our historical newspaper archives for stories about the personal grooming choice that continues to take the hipster world by storm, the mustache. Proving once again that everything old is new (and vice versa), please enjoy these selections about the pros and cons of facial foliage.

“History of the Corps”

This article features Civil War Gen. Ambrose Burnside, remembered today for the lateral face-thatch to which he gave his transposed name, but who also sported some truly robust lip cover. The National Tribute (Washington, D.C.), Oct. 13, 1892.

“Modesty of the Average New Yorker”

In a sober assessment of the fashion of facial hair in the U.S., the New York Sun of June 11, 1905, notes that “The character of the American is shown in his distaste for anything spectacular in the way of a mustache” in a profusely illustrated article.

“Will Players Wear Whiskers?”

Apparently after a facial hair drought of some 15 years in the major leagues, a trio of Cleveland baseball players return from spring training bewhiskered. Here, Mr. Fullerton believes that the return of the mustache to baseball “will do some good.” Chicago Day Book, March 28, 1914.

“Ain’t Nature Wonderful?”

In the same publication two years later, an unnamed writer takes the opposing view, opening with “A mustache is an over-fed eyebrow,” and closing with “When the mustache becomes white, a beautiful autumn effect can be had by drinking coffee or by gnawing cut plug.” Ouch! Tell us how you really feel, sir! Chicago Day Book, September 16, 1916.

“Parisian Cafe Waiters and Their Mustaches”

Discrimination against mustaches was not limited to America. Apparently there was a fine of one dollar a day imposed upon professional waiters in French cafes when they began to show up to work with even the most perfectly-trimmed mustache. An outrage! Washington (D.C.) Evening Star, August 20, 1910.

“Club of Boomers of Mustache Meets in Boston”

Rallying against such rampant mustache-phobia, the aim of this gentleman’s dining club is to “increase the growth of mustaches on young men” (though it is unclear whether this means more mustaches or just bigger ones). “Today the lack of mustaches is largely due … to the wail of the scientist that ‘mustaches carry the greatest variety of germs and bacteria.'” The (White Earth, Minn.) Tomahawk, May 13, 1915.

“Whiskers and Their Virtues”

Unhealthy? Not so, says Henry Underwood in the Washington (D.C.) Times, May 12, 1907. “In whiskers there is health,” he notes, and, perhaps more importantly, “whiskers are claimed as a right under the Constitution.”

“When Whiskers Fell Before the Razor’s Onslaught”

The Omaha Daily Bee of Dec. 15, 1912, takes considerable umbrage at the epidemic of clean-shavedness among prominent Nebraskans. “Such a butchery of whiskers of all descriptions as has been going on in Omaha during the last ten to fifteen years is rivaled in cruelty only by the ruthlessness of Timur when he “built the ghastly tower of 80,000 human skulls.” Some exaggeration, perhaps, but the article includes many before-and-after photos to illustrate the point (about mustaches, not Timur).

“The Mustache as a Disguise”

A few twists and a bit of wax can apparently allow the appropriately-haired detective to skulk about in guises ranging from parson to anarchist to retired colonel to banana vendor. Ottumwa (Iowa) Tri-Weekly Courier, April 5, 1910.

“The Many Sided Man Who Will, In All Probability, Be Our Next President”

William Howard Taft was hardly the first president to sport a fine mustache, but few wore it as well as he did. He looks pretty sharp in a straw boater hat, too. New York Tribune, June 14, 1908.

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“There Are Only a Few of Us Left,” illustration by Charles Dana Gibson. San Francisco Call, May 25, 1913.

“There Are Only a Few of Us Left”

We close with an illustration by Charles Dana Gibson of a Civil War veteran who eschews the clean-shaven fashion of the day with this splendid ‘stache and beard. San Francisco Call, May 25, 1913.

For more mustache merriment, followers of our collections on Flickr have selected several of our photos there with the tag, “Great Mustaches of the Library of Congress” — and they do not exaggerate. The Flickr Commons, which we helped launch in 2008, celebrates its eighth anniversary on January 16.

Speaking of Chronicling America, the National Endowment for the Humanities (our partner in the project) has launched a nationwide contest, challenging you to produce creative web-based projects using data pulled from the newspaper archives website. We’re looking for data visualizations, web-based tools or other innovative web-based projects using the open data found on Chronicling America. NEH will award cash prizes, and the contest closes June 15, 2016.

Launched by the Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) in 2007, Chronicling America provides enhanced and permanent access to historically significant newspapers published in the United States between 1836 and 1922. It is part of the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP), a joint effort between the two agencies and partners in 40 states and territories. Start exploring the first draft of history today at chroniclingamerica.loc.gov and help us celebrate on Twitter and Facebook by sharing your findings and using the hashtags #ChronAm #10Million.

 

Flickr Commons – Going Strong!

(The following is a guest post written by Helena Zinkham, chief of the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.)

Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, California. Photo by Carol M. Highsmith, 2012. Prints and Photographs Division. View the photo in Flickr.

Join us for a “photo countdown” to January 16, which marks the 8th anniversary of the Flickr Commons. The theme is bridges, because the Commons has grown to connect historical and contemporary photographs from more than 100 different archives, libraries and museums.

The Library of Congress joined with Flickr to launch The Commons back in 2008, and the original invitation stands: “Please help make the photographs you enjoy more discoverable by adding tags and leaving comments. Your contributions and knowledge make these photos even richer.”

 

When we posted the Tower Bridges photo to Flickr this week, people quickly added dozens of subject tags to make it easier to find the image. In the comments, a detailed account of the bridge’s operation and a view of the surviving rolling lift mechanism as public art enriched the story.

Tower bridges, Fort Point Channel, Boston, Mass. Photo by Detroit Publishing Co., 1904. Prints and Photographs Division. See photo in Flickr.

Most weeks, we post old news photographs that have incomplete and even erroneous titles. The steady addition of informative comments remains much appreciated, and we have folded almost 9,000 updated photo captions back into our own online catalog. The rapid deciphering of “Mystery Photos” that had no title at all is also very impressive!

Would you like to celebrate with us and explore the infinite possibilities of the Commons? All you need to do is visit The Commons and enjoy looking at the pictures and reading the stories. And, if you have a Flickr account, pick your eight favorite photos and tag them “Happy Birthday Flickr Commons.” Make a gallery of bridge photos and share the link through a comment. After all, “The key goal of The Commons is to share hidden treasures from the world’s public photography archives.”

 

Discover more:

Follow the countdown with the tag “Happy Birthday Flickr Commons”
Dip into Flickr highlights through the “Picture This” blog
Look at the variety of albums available through the Library of Congress Flickr account, and learn more about our Flickr project.

Red Jacket concrete bridge dedication, Minnesota. Aug. 22, 1911. Prints and Photographs Division. View the photo in Flickr.

Newly Acquired Arabic Manuscript on Early Astronomy and Mathematics

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A table of relative dimensions of the extensions and retractions of planetary orbits, taken from “Tahrir al-Majisti,” by Nasir al-Din al-Tusi. African and Middle Eastern Division.

(The following is a guest post by Anchi Hoh, program specialist in the African and Middle Eastern Division.)

The Library of Congress’s African and Middle Eastern Division recently added to its treasure trove a very important 15th century Arabic manuscript on astronomy and mathematics. “Tahrir al-Majisti” (“Commentary on the Almagest”), by Nasir al-Din al-Tusi, is part of the corpus of major commentaries by Muslim scholars on Ptolemy’s “Almagest,” many of which date back to the 8th century. In his treatise, al-Tusi challenges some of Ptolemy’s theories and reformulates the Ptolemaic planetary model, producing a system in which planets move in uniform circular motion.

Although the original work was written in 1247 by al-Tusi (1201-1274), this manuscript was probably produced in 1467 in Turkestan, in Central Asia. It is illustrated with numerous diagrams and tables in red and black ink and includes astronomical theorems, information on solar eclipses, descriptions of the movement of planets, the regressions of Mars and Mercury and attempts to measure the distance between the Sun and the Earth.

So who was Nasir al-Din al-Tusi?[image error]

A page regarding trajectories of planets from “Tahrir al-Majisti.” African and Middle Eastern Division.

Al-Tusi’s full name was Nasir al-Din Muhammad ibn Muhammad al-Tusi. A philosopher, astronomer and mathematician who knew Arabic, Persian and possibly Greek, al-Tusi was born in Tus (in today’s Iran) into a family of Shi’ite jurists. While raised in a religious environment, al-Tusi followed in his uncle’s footsteps and at a young age began studying science, including physics and mathematics. This laid the foundation for his scientific accomplishments in his later years.

Al-Tusi’s scientific journey started in Tus and flourished in Maragha (in today’s Azerbaijan). During his lifetime, the Mongol empire expanded from Beijing in the east to Europe in the west, and al-Tusi’s talents did not go unnoticed by the new rulers. First he served as a scientific advisor to the Mongol administration and then was put in charge of the ministry of religious bequests. Later he directed an observatory in Maragha. This observatory was his brainchild, which the then ruler, Hülegü Khan (c. 1217-1265), fully funded because of Hülegü’s belief in astrology.

Al-Tusi’s foresight also led to the inclusion in this facility of an excellent library and a faculty of notable Islamic and Chinese scholars. The Maragha Observatory, which was considered one of the greatest astronomical observatories of its day, continued to operate for many years until it fell into disrepair due to lack of funds, war and earthquakes.

The work done there represented a new wave of scientific research in the Islamic world in early medieval times and played a key role in the development of astronomy. The Maragha Observatory would become the model for several observatories that were subsequently built in Persia and Asia Minor up to the 17th century. Today in Azerbaijan a new observatory by the same name has been erected on the location where it is believed al-Tusi’s observatory once stood.

Approximately 150 works left by al-Tusi are known today, ranging from astronomy and mathematics to philosophy and theology. One of his most important works, “Tadhkira fi ‘ilm al-Hay’a” (“Memoir on Astronomy”), written later in his life, may be viewed through the Library’s online exhibition “Rome Reborn: The Vatican Library & Renaissance Culture.” The exhibit also contains several editions of Ptolemy’s “Almagest.”

[image error]Al-Tusi also invented a device, known today as the “Tusi Couple,” for generating linear motion along the diameter of the outer circle from two circular motions. This device enabled him to correct the Ptolemaic planetary models by proposing a system in which all orbits’ movements may be accurately predicted. Some believe that al-Tusi’s new theories may have been read by Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543) in the development of his sun-centered cosmological theories.

In addition to this latest acquisition, the African and Middle Eastern Division also houses a rich collection of Arabic science manuscripts as part of its 1,700 manuscript collection. The subjects of these science manuscripts in this collection include agriculture, arithmetic, medicine, astronomy, physics and time measurements. Some of these manuscripts have been digitized and are available to view via the Library of Congress Online Catalog and on the World Digital Library. [image error]

Among the digitized astronomy manuscripts are “Suwar al-kawākib” (“The Book of the Constellations of the Fixed Stars”), by ʻAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʻUmar al-Ṣūfī (903-986), a Persian astronomer; and “Qāḍīʹzādah ʻalá al-Mulakhkhaṣ fī al-hayʼah” (“Commentary on “The Compendium of Plain Astronomy”),by Mūsá ibn Muḥammad Qāḍīʹzādah, an astronomer and mathematician born in Bursa (in today’s Turkey).

“Suwar al-kawākib” depicts celestial constellations and serves as an authority on Arabic names for the stars and constellations. Persian note before beginning of the text claims that the manuscript was created in 1417, but the note probably dates from the 18th century when the book was rebound. Published/created in the 17th century, “Qāḍīʹzādah ʻalá al-Mulakhkhaṣ fī al-hayʼah” is a treatise about theoretical astronomy by Maḥmūd ibn Muḥammad Jighmīnī (d. ca. 1221), a renowned Persian mathematician and astronomer.

Pic of the Week: Gene Luen Yang

Acting Librarian of Congress David Mao appoints Gene Luen Yang as the 2016-2017 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. Photo by Shawn Miller.

During a special ceremony yesterday, the Library welcomed comic book author and graphic novelist Gene Luen Yang as the National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature.

The National Ambassador is selected for his or her contributions to young people’s literature, the ability to relate to kids and teens, and a dedication to fostering children’s literacy as a whole. The selection is based on recommendations from a CBC-ECAR-CFB-appointed committee comprising educators, librarians, booksellers and children’s literature experts.

Gene Luen Yang looks over a display of his work outside the Library’s Young Readers Center. Photo by Shawn Miller.

 

 

 

Yang succeeds beloved and esteemed authors Jon Scieszka (2008-2009), Katherine Paterson (2010-2011), Walter Dean Myers (2012-2013) and Kate DiCamillo (2014-2015) in the position. Gene Luen Yang is the first graphic novelist and first Asian American to be named National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature.

A New Ambassador for Reading

(The following is a story written by Mark Hartsell, editor of the Library of Congress staff newsletter, The Gazette.)

Gene Luen Yang addresses the audience at the 2014 National Book Festival gala. Photo by Amanda Reynolds.

There’s something special, author Gene Luen Yang says, about the first time a reader encounters a literary character that shares the same cultural background.

In his case, the character was Jubilation Lee, an X-Men comic-book figure who, like Yang, was a Chinese-American with immigrant parents but who, unlike Yang, could release explosive plasmoids and detonate matter at a subatomic level.

Jubilation, aka Jubilee, was one of the few Asian-American characters Yang saw in any media as a child in California in the 1980s – a lack of cultural diversity he felt keenly then and wants authors today to correct.

“For readers who are part of the majority culture, it’s important to have diversity because one of the functions of literature is to grow empathy and compassion in the reader,” Yang said by phone last week. “You need windows into other people’s lives in order to do that.

“For readers from minority communities, you need the diverse books just so you can see yourself reflected. Maybe it’s superficial, but there is something validating about seeing your story portrayed on a page.”

Yang now has a new platform to share that message: This week, the Library of Congress, the Children’s Book Council and Every Child a Reader named him national ambassador for young people’s literature – the first graphic novelist to serve in the position.

The program was established in 2008 to highlight the importance of young people’s literature to lifelong literacy, education and the betterment of young people’s lives. The ambassador serves a two-year term, appearing at events around the country and encouraging young people to read.

A Natural Storyteller

The young Yang wasn’t an especially prolific reader.

Early in grade school, a teacher would line up students from Yang’s class by the number of pages they’d read in a month. The leaders would take first pick from a table of prizes. Yang, usually near the end of the line, got the leftovers – the Tootsie Rolls no one else wanted.

“I was one of the slowest readers in my class,” he said.

Still, Yang felt naturally drawn to storytelling.

Both of Yang’s parents immigrated to the U.S. – his father, an electrical engineer, from Taiwan and his programmer mother from Hong Kong. Mom and Dad, seeking a way to connect their son with the culture they’d left, told Gene “a ton” of stories from their homelands.

Yang soon found he wanted to tell stories of his own. Early in grade school, he began keeping a notebook of his drawings and writings.

“It was always there,” Yang said. “Storytelling seemed natural to me, largely because of the kind of family I was growing up in.”

Eventually, Mom bought him his first comic book – DC Comics Presents Superman #57 – and Yang discovered the medium that would change his life.

“There’s something about the combination of words and pictures that really fascinated me,” Yang said. “[Words are] a much more precise instrument of communication. But when you’re trying to communicate emotions through pictures, it’s almost like you can put an emotion directly in a reader’s gut – almost like bypassing their brain.”

Finding a Calling

Yang didn’t expect to make writing a career. He majored in a “more practical” subject – computer science – at the University of California, Berkeley, with a minor in creative writing.

He figured he’d hold a full-time job and do graphic novels on the side – a self-published, money-losing labor of love.

“I just thought that whenever I put out a comic I would be losing anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars because I would be printing it up with my own money,” Yang said. “Some people, they play golf for fun and they lose a ton of money at that. I will make comic books for fun.”

That’s what happened, at first. After graduating in 1995, Yang took a job writing software code. But it didn’t feel quite right.

In college, he’d been involved in youth ministry, a gratifying experience. “It felt like something I was meant to do,” he said.

So, Yang embarked on a five-day silent retreat to think through his life.

“It’s hard not to talk that long,” he said. “But what it allowed me to do was think a little more clearly about my life without all the noise and make some decisions.”

The big decision: Quit code-writing and teach computer science and math at Bishop O’Dowd, a Catholic high school in Oakland, California.

He loved it.

“There is something like a teacher’s high,” Yang said. “There’s something about sitting down with a student and watching them struggle and seeing it click that is extremely satisfying. That makes you feel like it’s a pointer to the meaning of life.”

A Blossoming Career

All the while, Yang was writing.

In 1997, he began self-publishing his own comics with “Gordon Yamamoto and the King of the Geeks.” More followed, and Yang eventually signed with a publisher.

In 2006, he published “American Born Chinese” – the first graphic novel to be named a finalist for the National Book Award and the first to win the Printz award as the best book for young adults. In 2013, his “Boxers and Saints” also was named a National Book Award finalist.

Following the success of “American Born Chinese,” Yang increasingly found himself pulled away from teaching by his blossoming writing career.

Last June, after 17 years at Bishop O’Dowd, Yang quit to devote himself full-time to writing and, for the next two years, to his work as ambassador.

Yang frequently discusses the importance of diversity in literature – diverse books, diverse characters, diverse authors – and chose as his platform “Reading Without Walls.”

That is “just a fancy way” to say he hopes to get children to explore through reading – different literary forms, different cultures and the lives of people who are different from them.

“Stories can be both a mirror and a window,” Yang said. “They can be a mirror into your own experience and a window into somebody else’s. In order for stories to effectively serve both of those purposes, we do need diverse books.”

 

Library in the News: December 2015 Edition

While the new year is upon us, the Library’s headlines in December are worth looking back on.

Topping the news was the announcement of the new selections to the National Film Registry. Outlets noted recognizable films such as “Ghostbusters” and “Top Gun” along with some of the list’s more obscure titles.

“If there are any ghosts lurking in the Library of Congress, they’d do well to watch their backs, because they’ll soon be keeping company with a cadre of their fiercest enemies,” wrote Eliza Berman for .

Indiewire highlighted the diversity of the films, including those that featured the work of African Americans, both as main subjects and major creative forces.

Deadline called the validation by the National Film Registry better than the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval.

Charles Bramesco of Screen Crush wrote, “The United States government does a whole lot of unsavory things … But from time to time, the government also does wonderful things that make us very happy, and that is where the National Registry of Film comes in. Devoted specifically to the preservation of ‘culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant films,’ the NRF is the Library of Congress’ way of securing the future of countless important films for generations to come.”

Other national outlets running stories included CBS News, The Associated Press, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, Entertainment Weekly and PBS Newshour.

In other movie news, “Star Wars” has been everywhere lately, and the Library has gotten in on some of the action. In December, the Library hosted a slate of children’s authors behind Disney’s Star Wars saga books.

“If there is any doubt whether the next generation — the new hope — will embrace the forthcoming Star Wars film, the hundreds of excited shrieks bouncing off the Library of Congress walls yesterday should be taken as the sound of high-decibel reassurance,” wrote Michael Cavna for The Washington Post.

“And to the librarians in attendance, as well as to a journalist, could anything be more encouraging than the ear-piercing cry of hundreds of happy kids shouting: ‘May the books be with you!’?”

Fast Forward covered the event and did brief interviews with the authors.

Mashable writer Lance Ulanoff had the opportunity to watch the original, unrestored 1977 “Star Wars” film.

“The librarian finds my name on a Post-It Note and directs me to a nearby desk with a Dell Computer running Windows 7,” he wrote. “On it are six files that comprise the entirety of the original ‘Star Wars’ negative transfer.

“If ‘Star Wars’ had finished its theatrical run and then been played on TV for the next near-half century without any extra care given to its image quality or aesthetics, this is likely how it would appear for everyone. It’s kind of a thrill.”

Also in entertainment, the Library acquired a collection of kinescopes, videotapes, 16 mm and Super 8 home movies of legendary comedian Ernie Kovacs and his wife, singer-actress-comedienne Edie Adams. Broadcasting & Cable, The Hollywood Reporter and Variety ran stories.

The Library also acquired a significant collection of oral histories provided by responders to the devastating Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the New York World Trade Center. Time, DCist and the Associated Press picked up the announcement.

Speaking of collections, NPR gave an animated take to the Library’s series of panoramic photos of the Thomas Jefferson Building during construction. Enjoy!

NPR also wrote a great piece on the Library’s map collections, and spoke with Library curator John Hessler.

“As beautiful as these maps are, no one will ever again use them to get from point A to point B. So what’s the point of the collection?” said reporter Ari Shapiro. “‘Most maps aren’t to get from point A to point B,’ Hessler says. ‘Most maps are about how we as a civilization, as different cultures, perceive our lives in this box that we live in. All human activity takes place in space, and cartography is the thing that lets us keep track of that space.’”

And, the Library continues to receive accolades for its various projects and initiatives. Slate named the American Archive for Public Broadcasting as a top digital history project for 2015. The Daily Beast named “Facing Change” as a top photography book in 2015. And, Red Tricycle called the Library’s Young Reader’s Center a place every D.C. parent should know about.

To Come A Calling

“‘Le jour de l’an,’ as the French call the first day of January, is indeed the principal day of the year to those who still keep up the custom of calling and receiving calls. But in New York it is a custom which is in danger of falling into desuetude, owing to the size of the city and the growth of its population. There are, however, other towns and ‘much country’ … outside of New York, and there are still hospitable boards at which the happy and the light-hearted, the gay and the thoughtful, may meet and exchange wishes for a happy New-Year.” ~ “Manners and Social Usages,” by Mrs. John Sherwood, 1887.

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Happy New Year. Published by Currier & Ives, 1876. Prints and Photographs Division.

I love going through the Library’s collections of historical documents – whether its books, letters, newspaper articles, pamphlets or dance instruction manuals, I always find a little slice of history that makes me laugh a little, scratch my head or be appreciative for the things we can learn from the past.

While the quadrille or polonaise may no longer be the fashion, etiquette never really goes out of style. Some themes are universal and the advice rings true.

In Sherwood’s book, there is a whole chapter on gentlemen making calls on New Year’s Day.

“To those who receive calls we would say that it is well, if possible, to have every arrangement made two or three days before New Year’s, as the visiting begins early – sometimes at eleven o’clock – if the caller means to make a goodly day,” the book notes.

As someone who can’t stand it when people pop by last minute and unannounced, I can get behind this polite request.

The manual also encourages hostesses to provide refreshment for her callers.

“A lady who expects to have many calls, and who wishes to offer refreshments, should have hot tea and coffee and a bowl of punch on a convenient table … The best table is one which is furnished with boned turkey, jellied tongues, and pâtés, sandwiches, and similar dishes, with cake and fruit as decorative additions.”

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Drawing by William Leroy Jacobs, 1917. Prints and Photographs Division.

I’m from the South, and it’s par for the course to always attempt to feed visitors, whether they are family, close acquaintances or complete strangers.

The chapter continues with some social mannerisms that might not have their place in today’s society. Calling cards anyone? We would just text or Facebook.

“Manners and Social Usages” is part of an online collection of more than 200 social dance manuals, anti-dance manuals, histories, etiquette treatises and other related content dating from 1490-1920.

The Library’s collections include numerous books on etiquette. A quick catalog search on “etiquette” revealed more than 430 books, most with an electronic resource available through the Internet Archive or HathiTrust.

“The multiplicity of other entertainments, the unseen yet all-powerful influence of fashion, these things mould the world insensibly. Yet in a thousand homes, thousands of cordial hands will be extended on the great First of January, and to all of them we wish a Happy New Year,” concludes the chapter in Mrs. Sherwood’s book. Sage words that resound today.

Reddit AMA on VHP Jan. 4

The following is a guest post by Monica Mohindra, head of program coordination and communication for the Library’s Veterans History Project.

Bob Patrick

Bob Patrick, director of the Library of Congress Veterans History Project (VHP), along with VHP staff, will answer your questions in a Reddit “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) session beginning at 9 a.m. (ET) on January 4, 2016.

Established in 2000 via a unanimous act of Congress, VHP collects oral histories and memoirs from U.S. veterans, as well as original photos, letters, artwork, military papers and other documents.  Reliant completely on volunteers to record and submit these firsthand accounts, we have amassed more than 99,000 collections, and that number grows every week.

It’s easy to create a historic collection at the Library of Congress with and for the veteran in your life. All it takes is a veteran willing to tell his or her story, an interviewer to ask them about his or her service, and a recording device to capture the interview. Eligible collections will include a 30-minute (or longer) interview; 10 or more original photos, letters or documents; or a written memoir of 20 pages or more. Tips, guidelines and the required forms are in the VHP field kit.

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Edwin Mark Trawczynski, in uniform, standing against a jeep at Charlie Aid Station, Vietnam, March 1969. Veterans History Project. http://memory.loc.gov/diglib/vhp-stor...

To make these collections available and accessible for generations to come, we stabilize, preserve and securely store them here at the Library of Congress. We make the original materials available to researchers, Congress and the general public in person at the American Folklife Center Reading Room in the Library of Congress. Additionally, some 16,000 collections are available online.

On January 4, please ask us anything about how we collect, preserve and make available our collections, the individuals in our archives and their stories, how to participate, or any other aspect of the Veterans History Project.

On the day of the AMA, join us on the AskHistorians subreddit. To participate, you must have a Reddit account. If you don’t make it to the AMA in time to have your question answered, you can always email us at vohp@loc.gov.

Pic of the Week: Oh Christmas Tree!

Great Hall Christmas tree. Photo by Shawn Miller.

Once again, the Library of Congress has decorated the Great Hall with a tall tree for the holidays, full of lights and ornaments for the enjoyment of visitors. It makes a lovely temporary addition to the magnificence of the space and never fails to put me in a festive spirit. If you’ve had the chance to visit the Library and enjoy the tree, make sure to follow us on Instagram at @librarycongress and post your own photos tagging the Library as well.

We at the Library of Congress blog wish you and yours a merry Christmas and wonderful holiday season!