Library of Congress's Blog, page 91

Inquiring Minds: Sharing a Passion for Folk Music, Live from Brooklyn

An earlier version of this interview, conducted by John Fenn of the American Folklife Center, was published on “Folklife Today,” the center’s blog.

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Eli Smith (center) with his band, the Down Hill Strugglers. Photo by M. Smith.

A little over a decade ago, Brooklyn-based musician and promoter Eli Smith merged his passion for folk music with the inspiration he gets from fellow New York City artists and created the Brooklyn Folk Festival. Since then, Smith has engaged the Library’s American Folklife Center in numerous ways, doing research into the history of folk music, learning songs from the collections and brainstorming with staff on ways to excite interest in the center’s holdings. Here Smith answers questions from John Fenn of the AFC about the festival and collaborating with the Folklife Center.

Tell me about your relationship to folk and traditional music.

I became interested when I was a teenager, growing up in Greenwich Village. I heard recordings of Woody Guthrie and Mississippi John Hurt, as well as the New Lost City Ramblers. I read the liner notes and followed their sources. Smithsonian Folkways reissued the Harry Smith Anthology when I was in high school, and I got that. It was a revelation for me. When I heard that range of music—it was completely unlike anything I had heard before!

These were the kind of sounds that I’d been searching or hoping for, without even knowing it. Also the Deep River of Song series of Lomax recordings was being issued back then on CD, and those were also a revelation to me, along with the amazing reissues of music of old 78s on the Yazoo label.

I followed the music, listening as much as I could, learning about the musicians and the styles and sounds. I learned how to play the guitar, banjo and harmonica; some mandolin and fiddle; other instruments. Exploring the history of the music in my own neighborhood, going back into the 1960s but even earlier—the 1950s, 1940s, 1930s—and connecting with older generations of musicians and cultural workers was important for me. They played the music themselves, but were also devoted to presenting it and perpetuating the music by, among other things, bringing it to audiences and issuing recordings.

What inspired you to launch the festival?

There was such a good scene of musicians in New York City when I first thought of the festival in 2008 (and now) that I felt we needed a yearly festival to properly present the music. I wanted these wonderful musicians, who I felt were not receiving their due, to have an opportunity to play for a large audience and to help spread awareness and understanding about the music. I also felt, and still feel, that most music festivals that are calling themselves “folk” festivals are not presenting a true range of “folk” music. Most folk festivals are actually singer-songwriter/indie rock festivals. It’s false advertising! I wanted a folk festival that was more in line with the early Newport Folk Festivals or University of Chicago Folk Festivals from back in the early 1960s. By that I mean I wanted to present a folk festival that was really counter cultural—folk music being a cornerstone of the American counter culture—and a festival that really represented the huge diversity and deep roots inherent in the idea of folk music. We have made that our goal at the Brooklyn Folk Festival.

  What surprises you most about the festival, 10 years on?

I’m somewhat surprised that we managed to keep the festival going for 10 years. That’s a long stretch, especially for an event in New York, where things can be pretty tough. But I have to say, the time has flown by! The festival remains vibrant and we intend to keep it going.

I produce the festival with the Jalopy Theatre and School of Music, which is the home for folk and traditional music in New York City today. The first two years, the festival was at the Jalopy, but it outgrew our small space. We have moved to successively larger venues, and are now at St. Ann’s Church, a beautiful Gothic cathedral-type building in Brooklyn Heights. This space has allowed the festival to expand: two stages, an area for dances and workshops, film screenings and, new this year, the first-ever Brooklyn Fiddle Contest.

Tell us about the Archives Roadshow.

The collections at the AFC are so amazing and inspiring to me and my friends in our music scene here in New York. But they could, of course, be better known by the public.

Through conversations with Nancy Groce and Todd Harvey of the AFC, we established this idea of making a visual display that could be easily transported to different venues, combined with a touring group of musicians, whose work has been profoundly influenced by the collections at the AFC. These musicians would play pieces they had learned from the AFC’s collections, and speak about the recordings, their history and their own relationship to them.

We wanted to bring the music directly to audiences, live and in person! The idea was to make it exciting, immediate and relatable to people, and hopefully inspire them to visit the AFC in person. Or, at the very least, look at the online collections.

What other connections do you have to the AFC?

I have done research at the AFC, for my own edification and knowledge as a musician, but also to compile and release on the Jalopy Records label the album “Lost Train Blues: John and Alan Lomax and the Early Folk Music Collections at the Library of Congress.” Everyone at the AFC is so great, welcoming and knowledgeable when I come to do research.

What is your favorite discovery from the AFC archives?

That’s hard to answer. I loved hearing more of Jess Morris’ playing, the great Texas fiddler. I really enjoyed hearing everything he recorded with John Lomax back in 1942 (listen to an example below). I have also loved exploring recordings that Sidney Robertson Cowell made, or Willard Rhodes’ recordings of, for example, Cherokee Christian hymns. Also hearing the Gant Family was amazing.  And Jesse Wadley’s recordings. But there’s so, so much! It’s crazy.

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2018 National Book Festival Poster Evokes Thrills and Discovery

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2018 Library of Congress National Book Festival poster. Illustration by Gaby D’Alessandro

Original art is once again part of this year’s Library of Congress National Book Festival as the design for the 2018 festival poster is being unveiled this week. The illustration was created by Gaby D’Alessandro, 31, a Dominican illustrator based in New York City. The poster includes a whimsical hot air balloon carrying a young reader into space.

D’Alessandro studied fine art and illustration at Altos de Chavón and moved to New York City in 2008 after receiving a scholarship to Parsons School of Design. She graduated from Parsons in 2010, with a BFA in Illustration. D’Alessandro shares some thoughts on this year’s design and her love of reading ahead of the National Book Festival, which is scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 1 at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center.

Tell us about your background. What drew you to want to become an artist and illustrator?

I’m very introspective, and I’ve always enjoyed telling stories as a way to express myself and connect with others. When I was in high school, my main creative outlet was theatre, and a few years before going to college I discovered I also liked drawing and I learned that I could tell my stories through illustration, so I eventually decided to pursue that as a career.

Your design for this year’s National Book Festival poster includes a colorful hot air balloon flying into space. What was your inspiration? Tell us about your creative process.

The creative brief for this assignment was very open, and I had the freedom to experiment and come up with an image that felt personal and exciting to me. I was asked to convey the joy of reading and show how books promote the discovery of new ideas and exploration of new worlds. I kept this in mind and tried to find the right visual symbols to communicate how I feel when I’m reading something inspiring. I wanted my image to evoke the thrill and sense of discovery that books bring into my life.

Why were you interested in being part of this year’s National Book Festival?

I felt honored to be given the opportunity to collaborate with the National Book Festival and to have a platform to reach so many people with a positive message. I strongly believe in the importance of reading, so I was very happy to work on a piece that would be used to promote that.

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Illustrator Gaby D’Alessandro. Photo by Isaac Weeber

Tell us about what you enjoy reading or a book that made an impact on you.

I enjoy reading magical realism by authors like Gabriel García Márquez, Julio Cortázar and Jorge Luis Borges. I also like books that explore human relationships and emotions, like “The Neapolitan Novels” by Elena Ferrante. And I’m interested in non-fiction books about human behavior and the role we play in the world, like “Sapiens” by Yuval Noah Harari. I think each of these themes influence my work as an artist.

Your clients as an illustrator include magazines, newspapers, museums and other organizations. What kinds of pieces do you create most often? Is most of your work in editorial illustration and helping to tell a story? How do you approach your various projects?

Yes, most of the assignments I receive are for editorial illustration, but my process is similar for other types of projects as well: After reading the article or brief I’ve been assigned, and taking notes, I try to research the topic further and begin collecting reference images. I later brainstorm and write down preliminary ideas and work on quick thumbnail roughs, from which I choose around three favorites to develop into more detailed sketches that I send to the client. Once a sketch is approved, I work on the final in Photoshop, using a Wacom tablet. I sometimes work traditionally for personal and gallery pieces, but I choose to draw digitally for illustration assignments because it streamlines the process and allows me to make quick changes.

What kinds of challenges would you like to take on as an artist – perhaps something you haven’t tried before?

I would love to work on children’s books and perhaps write and illustrate my own story someday.

Baseball Americana: “Laws of Base Ball,” Babe Ruth’s Shoes and Jackie Robinson’s Letters to Be Displayed in New Exhibition

This is a guest post by Brett Zongker of the Communications Office.

W elcome to the blog series for “Baseball Americana,” a major new Library of Congress exhibition opening June 29. We’ll be publishing nine posts – one each Thursday – leading up to the opening, then we’ll feature posts about different topics related to the yearlong exhibition. This first post is an overview of the exhibition. As a bonus, we’re counting down the innings to the exhibit’s opening by asking baseball fans a question each week. Your first question is at the bottom of this post. Join the conversation!  

[image error]The 1857 handwritten “Laws of Base Ball,” cited by historians as the game’s “magna carta,” will be among the artifacts featured in the new exhibition “Baseball Americana” opening June 29 at the Library of Congress. The exhibition will explore baseball’s past and present and how the game has forged a sense of community for players and fans across the country. Also on display will be Babe Ruth’s shoes, the Rockford Peaches uniform and Jackie Robinson’s letters.

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The “Laws of Base Ball” as decided during the Base Ball Convention of 1857. The handwritten corrections reflect negotiations that took place during the proceedings.

The founding documents of baseball that would shape the modern game as our national pastime were ironed out in January and February 1857 at a convention called by the Knickerbockers Base Ball Club in New York City. Corrections were made by hand as the details were negotiated by New York-area ball clubs, including whether to play seven, nine or 12 innings to a game. The convention established a uniform set of rules, many of which are still in use today, including nine players on a side, nine innings to a game and 90 feet between bases.

Long thought to be lost, the original “Laws of Base Ball” manuscripts were saved by an heir of a Knickerbocker delegate to the convention. They resurfaced in 1999 and sold at auction, but their significance was not understood. They were sold again in 2016, and the buyer is lending the documents for their first major exhibition.

In addition to the extensive baseball holdings of the Library of Congress, “Baseball Americana” also will feature items from the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, including Babe Ruth’s shoes and his 1921 agreement with the New York Yankees, Dottie Key’s uniform from the Rockford Peaches and Ty Cobb’s 1908 contract with the Detroit Tigers. A selection of baseball gloves, bats, balls, shoes and catchers’ masks from past and current professional players will show how the game has evolved over the centuries.

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Babe Ruth’s shoes. Photo by Shawn Miller.

Featured artifacts from the Library will include Jackie Robinson’s letter of thanks and appreciation to baseball executive Branch Rickey after Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier, the first handwritten and printed references to “baseball” in America from the 1780s, historical images, early baseball cards, film footage from the 1890s to the present, broadcasts of iconic baseball moments and rare interviews with Hall of Fame players.

ESPN’s Statistics and Information Group collaborated with the Library to develop original content in the form of statistics, trivia questions and historical comparisons to offer new insights into America’s game for everyone, from rookies to the most die-hard baseball fans. These items are designed to give a unique spin on the Library’s collection, spark conversation and compare baseball present with baseball past.

Major League Baseball is also contributing video footage from its massive and incomparable archive for the exhibition to help create an immersive experience for visitors.

“Baseball Americana” will open June 29, just before Nationals Park in Washington, D.C., hosts Major League Baseball’s 89th All-Star Game on July 17. An All-Star Family Day program is planned for Saturday, July 14, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., with a variety of activities for all ages.

The yearlong exhibition will be on view in the Library’s Thomas Jefferson Building, 10 First St., S.E., Washington, DC. The exhibition will be free and open to the public Monday through Saturday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

To coincide with the exhibition, Harper Perennial will release an updated edition of “Baseball Americana: Treasures from the Library of Congress” in May. This illustrated history of baseball includes more than 350 images and numerous milestones of the game.

The exhibition is made possible by the Library of Congress Third Century Fund, the James Madison Council and Democracy Fund.

“ Baseball Americana ” features items from Library of Congress collections and those of its lending partners to consider the game then and now – as it relates to players, teams and the communities it creates. The Library is partnering with ESPN, Major League Baseball and the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in presenting the exhibition.

BONUS QUESTION

How did you become a baseball fan? Include your answer in a comment to this post!

 

 

 

Mystery Photos: Who Am I?

This is a post by Cary O’Dell of the Library’s National Recording Preservation Board. It was first published on the blog of the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, “ Now See Hear !”

For the past year or so, we have been inviting readers of our “Now See Hear!” blog to help us identify some super-obscure photos from the world of film, TV and music. We’ve had a success rate of over 50 percent, but we still have some enduring “unknowns.”

To try to facilitate some more solutions, we’ve gathered 30 of our remaining mysteries below, and we’re asking readers of the Library of Congress blog to help us out.

To increase the size of a photo, click on its thumbnail below. Please add your guesses or solutions to the comments section of the original post on “Now See Hear!” We’ll be updating the post as each image is identified.

(Note that the photo numbers differ slightly in the original post as a result of some photos being identified and thus not included in this post. Please refer to the original numbers when you comment.)

Thank you!

(1) This gentleman with the bow-tie looks familiar but we don’t know his name.

[image error](2) We’d like to know the name of this trio – either as a group or individually.

[image error](3) Anyone recognize this guy? Could he be Irish actor Noel Willman?

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(4) We thought this gent was Bruno Ganz, but we’ve since had that disproved. Could he be French actor Jean-Louis Trintignant?

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(5) The rest of this photo is NSFW. Can anyone recognize her face?

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(6) This is not Dana Delany, Stephanie Zimbalist or Bonnie Bedelia. Who is she?

[image error](7) Does anyone recognize this lady with the hoops? Could she be former Miss America Debbye Turner?

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(8) This photo might be U.K. in origin due to where it was found in the collection. Who is this song-and-dance lady?

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(9) There’s a two-letter code on this photo: TC. That might be the initials of the woman in the photo or the initials of the film she is appearing in – or it might be neither.

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(10) This photo is from White Studios, a busy New York vaudeville and Broadway photographer. But who is the subject?

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(11) We are still trying to ID this actress, or the exotic film she is in.

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(12) No one, so far, has recognized this duo. We thought this might be Wendy and Lisa, but they say no. The Jacobites? Christian Death?

[image error](13) And who is this well-dressed man?

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(14) Is this the local horror host? Is he from Jekyll and Hyde?

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(15) Who is the man with the glasses? British comedy writer Denis Norden?

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(16) This one has frustrated many. He looks very familiar. But we don’t know who he is.

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(17) Here’s a series of styled shots for an unknown personality. Thomas Jane?

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(18) We’d like to know the names of either of these two young men.

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(19) Someone thought this was Shel Silverstein, but it’s not. The cartoon in the background is by Herb Gardner, but it isn’t Gardner, either. Any guesses?

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(20) These creatures must be in a movie or TV production of some sort, but which?

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(21) We assume that this is a musical group, but the names of its members are so far unknown.

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(22) This has got to be a production of “Knickerbocker Holiday” based on the set, costumes and date on the stage. But it doesn’t sync up with the Hollywood version or the Broadway debut.  Suggestions?

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(23) This fetching lass is so far without a name.

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(24) At one time, we thought this was British actress Suzy Mandel – even Mandel said it looks like her – but it’s not. Who is she?

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(25) Blond ambition: This might be from a film – but which one? The woman in the foreground is wearing a graduation cap with an “86” on it.

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(26) So many people thought this was Juliet Prowse that we reached out to the late Ms. Prowse’s son, who tell us it isn’t his mom.

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(27) This shot is probably from a Brazilian film due to the stamp on the front, or from another country south of the border. But we haven’t been able to identify the film or the lady in the photo.

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“Not an Ostrich”: Library Photos on Exhibit in Los Angeles

This is a guest post by Beverly Brannan, curator of photography; Adam Silvia, associate curator of photography; and Helena Zinkham, chief of the Prints and Photographs Division. It was first published on “Picture This,” the division’s blog.

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This exotic bird is not an ostrich but a prizewinning “Floradora Goose.” Actress Isla Bevin holds it at the 41st Annual Poultry Show, held in 1930 at Madison Square Garden.

The Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles has created a lively exhibition called “Not an Ostrich: And Other Images from America’s Library.” In support of the show, more than 300 digitized images from the Library are newly available online for everyone to see! An estimated 200 of the pictures are free to use and reuse. The selections come from the Library’s Prints and Photographs Division, home to one of the largest and most diverse photography collections in the United States.

“Each photograph exposes us to just a fraction of the millions of American stories held in the Library of Congress, from the iconic to the absurd,” said Annenberg Foundation chairman of the board, president, and CEO Wallis Annenberg. “Though cameras and technology have changed over the years, this exhibition shows us that nothing captures a moment, a time or a story like a photograph.”

The title of the exhibit, “Not an Ostrich,” reminds us to ask “What are we really looking at?” It also suggests the whimsical quality of many photographs in the show. Other photographs, however, provoke serious reflection on different cultures and social and environmental conditions.

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Interior of a Chinese pharmacy in Los Angeles in 1904. Photo by Detroit Photographic Co.

Renowned photography curator Anne Wilkes Tucker worked closely with Library of Congress curators, reference librarians, catalogers and digitization specialists for several years to identify engaging, surprising and beautiful images.

The resulting selections combine such Library icons as “Migrant Mother” and the earliest known photographic portrait made in the United States with new discoveries. More than 1 million pictures were online before this project began. But with 15 million photographs in the collection typically described in groups of related images, the individual pictures can often feel uncataloged and unfindable. Browsing among the files and soliciting staff suggestions revealed many fascinating images to include in the exhibition: It’s always a good idea to Ask A Librarian!

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An integrated group poses on a porch, circa 1903–04. Photo by Richard Riley.

The exhibit includes a daguerreotype that dates all the way back to 1839, recently created digital photography and everything in between, thus telling the history of photography in the United States as well as revealing dramatic moments in personal lives.

The thematic sections highlight strengths of the collections: the arts, leisure, sports, built environment, business and science, civil action, daily life and portraits. Selections from the Detroit Publishing Company, the Carol M. Highsmith Archive and the Camilo J. Vergara Archive provide insight into changes in urban and rural America over time. A special section features photographers in action.

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A photographer, probably Emery or Ellsworth Kolb, dangles from a rope in the Grand Canyon in 1908 to take a photo while a man above him straddles a cliff opening to hold the rope. Photo by Kolb Bros.

A documentary movie made by the Annenberg Foundation will also be available. It includes interviews with several photographers, plus behind-the-scene views at the Library. Museumgoers on the West Coast can enjoy the exhibit in person from April 21 to September 9, 2018. Displaying primarily on large screens where the images change, the exhibit offers a chance to experience an eye-catching array of more than 400 pictures.

Learn More:

View photos digitized for the “Not an Ostrich” exhibit, including the many free to use and reuse photographs.
Explore featured content and events for the exhibition at the Annenberg Space for Photography.
Read an interview between Anne Tucker and Jim Estrin from the New York Times’ blog “Lens”: “The Power of Pictures: Viewing History Through America’s Library.”
Have a look at the Library’s press release about the exhibition.

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Advertising in Los Angeles for the “Not an Ostrich” exhibition. Photo by Roswell Encina.

Pic of the Week: French President Visits the Library

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Grant Harris, chief of the Library’s European Division (left), discusses a rare book from the Library’s collections with President Emmanuel Macron of France. His wife, Brigitte Macron, stands on his right. Photo by Shawn Miller.

President Emmanuel Macron of France and his wife, Brigitte Macron, viewed a display of Library treasures in the Great Hall of the Thomas Jefferson Building on Wednesday; some of the materials they saw will be incorporated into a new bilingual website about French-American history. The Macrons’ visit coincided with an announcement by Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden and Laurence Engel of the Bibliothèque nationale de France about a collaboration between the Library and the Bibliothèque nationale to provide digital content for the website.

It will build on an earlier online collaboration, “France in America,” launched in 2005, and will highlight historical connections between France and North America from the 16th through the 19th centuries through digital access to books, maps, prints and other documents. Other U.S. institutions, including the National Archives, will support the effort.

“The Library of Congress is thrilled to continue these mutual efforts with the National Library of France to collect, preserve and provide access to the rich cultural heritage of France and French-Americans,” Hayden said. “Together, we have a substantial collection of materials reflecting the deep historical and cultural connections between France and the United States, as well as materials documenting and celebrating French-American life.”

“Since the epic story of the New France, our two nations share also a common history,” said Engel, president of the Bibliothèque nationale. “The future website, a joint initiative of the Library of Congress and the National Library of France, will associate prestigious American institutions such as the National Archives to bring it to life for the benefit of all.”

Inquiring Minds: Finding “Something Wonderful” in the Rodgers and Hammerstein Papers

The following is a guest post by Todd S. Purdum, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, a senior writer at Politico and author of “Something Wonderful: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Broadway Revolution,” published this month by Henry Holt. For more about Broadway, keep an eye out for “Brilliant Broadway,” the May–June issue of LCM, the Library of Congress Magazine. The issue, to be published shortly, will be available in its entirety online.

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Todd Purdum. Photo by Jeffrey MacMillan.

For a lover of musical theater and the Great American Songbook, entering the quiet precincts of the Performing Arts Reading Room at the Library of Congress is akin to sneaking into the cave of Ali Baba or King Tut’s tomb, a magical realm full of hidden treasures and unexpected gems. The weeks I spent there over the last three years, researching my new biography of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, were a golden time.

The Music Division is home to the manuscripts of George and Ira Gershwin, Irving Berlin, Marvin Hamlisch and many others, including, of course, Richard Rodgers, and it also houses the vast bulk of the letters, papers, draft lyrics and libretti of Oscar Hammerstein. (Rodgers’ literary papers are mostly archived at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center in Manhattan.)

The Library of Congress acquired the Oscar Hammerstein II Collection piecemeal after Hammerstein’s death from stomach cancer in 1960. In 2015, when I began my research, the papers had long been open to scholars, but had yet to be fully organized or processed. So my dogged digging through them was both a rare privilege and a special challenge. Some of the papers were stored in the moving boxes in which they’d originally arrived, and a manila folder labeled “Farm Equipment” might well instead contain bowdlerized lyrics for the film version of “Carousel.”

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Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, 1959.

But the papers, which have since been more formally processed, constitute a rich survey of the American theater for the first two-thirds of the 20th century, beginning with Hammerstein’s early work with Jerome Kern, Sigmund Romberg and others, before he teamed up with Rodgers in 1942. A virtual Who’s Who of American political and artistic life parades through the hundreds of folders and dozens of boxes, with Hammerstein’s own wise, wry voice at the center of everything.

It was hard to peruse some discoveries without having the hair go up on the back of your neck. For instance, there was Hammerstein’s hand-drawn map of Claremore, Oklahoma, showing the locations of the characters’ homes in “Oklahoma!” Or his fragment of a draft lyric for “My Favorite Things” from “The Sound of Music”:

Riding down hill on my big brother’s bike

These are a few of the things that I like

Or his personally annotated copy of James A. Michener’s “Tales of the South Pacific,” in which he made red grease-penciled checkmarks in the margins, and notes about characters and plotlines.

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Scrapbooks Hammerstein compiled for his wife, Dorothy, from the Music Division’s Hammerstein Collection.

There were other less expected finds as well, like the series of red leather-bound scrapbooks, with silk moire endpapers, that Hammerstein compiled for his wife, Dorothy, for each of his shows with Rodgers, starting with “Oklahoma!” And his collection of autographs from 19th-century literary figures like Mark Twain. And his wide-ranging correspondence with world-famous figures and ordinary people alike.

The Music Division, and its deeply knowledgeable and friendly staff, is a precious national resource. Blessedly for a researcher who was also a transcontinental commuter from my home in Los Angeles, it is also open on Saturdays, making each weeklong visit to Washington just that much more productive. It’s no exaggeration to say that the division contains more than a few of my favorite things. It probably has some of yours, too.

This post first appeared on “In the Muse ,” the blog of the Library’s Music Division.

New Poetry Podcast Series Launches

This is a guest post by Anne Holmes of the Poetry and Literature Center.

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U.S. poet laureate Tracy K. Smith speaks with Rob Casper of the Poetry and Literature Center for the inaugural recording in the center’s new podcast series, “From the Catbird Seat.” Photo by Anne Holmes.

As April winds down, our celebration of National Poetry Month at the Library of Congress is still going strong: Today we launch “From the Catbird Seat,” a new poetry podcast series from the Poetry and Literature Center. Each Thursday for the next eight weeks, we’ll explore poetry’s past, present and future.

Join us—Rob Casper, head of the Poetry and Literature Center, and yours truly, Anne Holmes—as we pull archived recordings from nearly 80 years of literary events featuring poets reading and discussing their work at the Library of Congress. Starting in 1943, these events were largely recorded on magnetic reels as part of the Archive of Recorded Poetry and Literature (which we’ve begun to digitize and stream online); since about 2001, events have been videotaped and archived as webcasts available to stream on the Library’s website.

With such a rich history of literary events, and with so much of that history archived and at our fingertips, why not start a podcast?

On this first season of “From the Catbird Seat,” we’ll explore eight of our signature events or series from the last five years. Each week will include highlights from a single event or series. As an added bonus, each episode will also feature a special guest who can provide some behind-the-scenes context to the event.

Since this month marks the end of Tracy K. Smith’s first term as 22nd poet laureate consultant in poetry—maybe you attended her closing event last week—we’re kicking off our “From the Catbird Seat” podcast series today with Tracy as our first guest.  Tune in as our laureate sits down with Rob Casper to reflect on her first term and look ahead to her second term; then we’ll play some highlights from her September 2017 inaugural reading—a fitting way, we think, to celebrate our inaugural episode.

In the upcoming weeks, we’ll feature recordings of chats with Natasha Trethewey, Juan Felipe Herrera, Kwame Dawes and many more. Stay tuned.

To listen and subscribe to “From the Catbird Seat,” visit our podcast site or find it on iTunes.

New Online: Joseph Holt Papers

This is a guest post by Michelle Krowl, a historian in the Manuscript Division.

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Joseph Holt, pictured in the February 16, 1861, issue of Harper’s Weekly.

The papers of Joseph Holt (1807–94), now available online, document his career as a lawyer, commissioner of patents, United States postmaster general, secretary of war and judge advocate general of the United States Army.

Holt is best known for his service as judge advocate general during the Civil War and for presiding over the military trial of the Abraham Lincoln assassination conspirators, which is recorded in affidavits, depositions, transcribed testimony; correspondence regarding the commission that tried the conspirators; and various versions of the charges against them, as well as Holt’s correspondence about the trial long after its conclusion.

But in addition to the correspondence, diaries and legal papers that are often used to document the life of a historic figure, the Joseph Holt Papers offer abundant ephemera in the form of bills and receipts, calling cards and invitations dating from the 1820s to the 1890s that shed light on Holt’s daily life and provide evidence of the business activity and built environment of the places where he lived and visited.

The bills and receipts, for example, suggest that the Holt household really liked ice cream. In December 1863 alone, he bought almost 20 pints of ice cream from Joseph Shaffield of Washington, D.C. In 1867, he received at least five bills for cakes and multiple pints of ice cream from Shaffield’s successor, C. White, a “dealer in all kinds of fruits, confectionary and ice cream” (see Feb. 1, March 4, July 3, Aug. 1, Sept. 30).

One could speculate that Holt did some Christmas shopping at jewelers M.W. Galt, Bro. & Co. in December 1877, purchasing a brooch, a turquoise and pearl ring, a gold watch and chain and cameo buttons. He paid with a check from Riggs & Co. bank, also in the Holt Papers.

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Canceled check from Riggs Bank for jewelry purchases, 1877.

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Bill for plants purchased from John Saul, 1883.

Bill and receipts record household costs and improvements made to his house at 236 New Jersey Avenue, S.E., in Washington, D.C., including a variety of paints purchased from L. Martin and awnings ordered from M.G. Copeland in 1876.

Holt paid his gas bill to the Washington Gas Light Company, his water rent and real estate tax to the District of Columbia.

Judging from the bills from nurseryman John Saul over the years, Holt had an abundant garden or bought plants for others. Some varieties were not unusual for a mid-Atlantic garden, but others, like yucca, indicate some horticultural adventurousness on Holt’s part. The illustrations on John Saul’s billheads suggest he sold exotic plants, enticing customers with images of Dracaena Goldieana, Lantania Borbonica, Washingtonia Robusta and Filamentosa.

Bills for now-defunct businesses record their existence in a city, and sometimes illustrate the spaces they once occupied. Plumbers and gas fitters Alexander R. Shepherd & Bros., hatter B. H. Stinemetz and the dry goods company of Perry & Brother included their Pennsylvania Avenue buildings on their billheads. In 1835, Brown’s Indian Queen Hotel in Washington, D.C., looked different from Brown’s Hotel in 1854 and from the greatly expanded Metropolitan Hotel in 1893.

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1835 bill

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1854 bill

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1893 letter

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Holt’s international and domestic travels are chronicled in hotel bills, many of which display idealized views of the properties. In the 1840s and 1850s, Holt stayed in Baden, Cairo, Cologne, Geneva and Naples. Within the United States, Holt visited a number of hotels and resorts, including the Girard House in Philadelphia, Barnum’s City Hotel in Baltimore, the Mountain House in Virginia and the International House in Niagara Falls in 1862 and 1876.

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Joseph Holt calling card

Clues to Joseph Holt’s professional and social circles are found in the calling cards and invitations he received. While serving in the Buchanan administration, he met Senators Jefferson Davis, Judah P. Benjamin and Stephen A. Douglas, and was invited to events at the White House. His circle during the Civil War and beyond included the Lincolns and General William T. Sherman, among others. In the 1880s, Holt’s circle of friends also included three dogs: Frank, Haddie and Nig, for whom he bought licenses.

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Advertisement for Sun Dial Gas Cooking Stoves

Ephemera also records changes in home technology and trends in printing techniques. Bills could double as advertisements for cooking and heating stoves and refrigerators. They displayed a range of paper colors, including green, pink, gold and purple. Some billheads included embossed cameo stamps that were not only colorful and attractive, but also illustrated the nature of their trade. Thomas Geary’s carriage rental cameo further promised hacks could be “furnished for funerals at the shortest notice,” apparently a selling point in 1866.

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Invoice from Thomas Geary stables, 1866.

 

This Day in History: Happy Birthday LOC!

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The Thomas Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress. Photo by Shawn Miller.

Today, the Library of Congress celebrates its 218th birthday. On April 24, 1800, President John Adams approved an appropriation of $5,000 for the purchase of “such books as may be necessary for the use of [C]ongress.”

The first books purchased were ordered from London and arrived in 1801. The collection of 740 volumes and three maps was stored in the U.S. Capitol, the Library’s first home. At the time, it was not yet much of a building—only its north wing had been completed.

From 1802 to 1805, the small collection was located in a room previously occupied by the House of Representatives. It was later moved to various places in the Capitol until August 24, 1814, when the British burned and destroyed the Capitol, including the Library.

To replace the loss, Thomas Jefferson in 1815 sold his personal library of 6,487 volumes—which was then unrivaled in America—to Congress. Sadly, a second fire on Christmas Eve of 1851 destroyed two-thirds of those volumes. But the Jefferson books nonetheless remain the core from which the Library’s present collections grew.

A little more than a decade later, Ainsworth Rand Spofford, Librarian of Congress from 1864 to 1897, took on the mission of transforming the fledgling Library into the nationally significant institution we know today.

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An 1889 photograph by Levin C. Handy shows early stages of the Thomas Jefferson Building’s construction.

Appointed by Abraham Lincoln, Spofford obtained approval in 1865 for adding two new fireproof wings to house Library materials, which he soon filled. Then the copyright law of 1870, whose passage he had supported, helped to flood the shelves with two copies of all copyrighted items—copyright owners who registered their works had to submit copies for the Library’s use. Spofford noted in his 1875 annual report that the Library was already out of shelf space, and he pressed Congress to approve his request for a separate building.

It took more than 20 years for Spofford’s great achievement to come to fruition—the majestic Thomas Jefferson Building opened its doors in 1897—but the struggle for its completion and its ultimate success brought the Library of Congress public attention and a new public role.

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A stereograph card copyrighted in 1898 by T.W. Ingersoll shows the Thomas Jefferson Building not long after its opening.

The Jefferson Building was followed in 1938 by the John Adams Building and in 1981 by the James Madison Memorial Building. The Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation opened in Culpeper, Virginia, in 2007. The Library also stores and cares for collections in off-site storage facilities.

Today, the Library of Congress is the nation’s oldest federal cultural institution and the world’s largest library, with millions of books, recordings, photographs, newspapers, maps and manuscripts in its collection. It retains its original role as the research arm of Congress. But it makes its resources available to everyone, providing access to a rich, diverse and enduring source of knowledge to inform and inspire users of all backgrounds and ages in their intellectual and creative endeavors.

To find out more about us and explore our collections and resources, visit our website!