The National Digital Library Program is a part of the Library of Congress. The group is working to digitize the distinctive, historical Americana materials from the Library's collections and to make them available online to users worldwide. These materials include photographs, manuscripts, rare books, maps, recorded sound, and moving pictures. To achieve its goal, this unique public-private program also works in cooperation with members of the Digital Library Federation and other libraries and archives.
Yes, the National Digital Library Program is collaborating with other institutions. You will find the results of some of these projects available on the Library's website:
No. The web site will augment ever-growing services provided by traditional libraries. Online primary sources held by many different institutions will be made available through the American Memory Historical Collections. By increasing access to these sources, it will enhance the broad intellectual and research support already provided in libraries and classrooms.
No. Of the millions of books, photographs, prints, drawings, manuscripts, rare books, maps, sound recordings, and moving pictures held by the Library, only a small fraction are in digital form. The work on the American Memory Historical Collections will focus on digitizing the Library's unique American history holdings.
The American Memory Historical Collections, a major component of the Library's National Digital Library Program, are multimedia collections of digitized documents, photographs, recorded sound, moving pictures, and text from the Library's Americana collections. There are currently more than 100 collections in the American Memory Historical Collections.
Our digital materials are available from several areas on our web site. American Memory includes numerous collections of digital materials. To search the American Memory Historical Collections, you might review the list of collections through the Collection Finder. From there a complete list can be found by clicking on List All Collections. You may also use the American Memory Collection Search that can be employed to find items in most American Memory Collections. You may search across collections that contain items of a particular format, like photographs, documents, maps, motion pictures, and sound recordings. Finally, you might want to visit the Search Guide pages on the Learning Page or search the Today in History archive.Another place to find digital materials is in our Online Exhibitions area. These materials represent most of the exhibitions that have been displayed at the Library over the last few years or are currently on display. Some of these are special exhibitions of Library of Congress materials. Others are of materials that were lent by other institutions for a short time specifically for a special exhibition.
You will also find digital material in Library of Congress Publications and on the America's Library website.
Yes, there are many new collections currently in progress. A complete list can be found on the Future Collections page.
The program carefully selects unique Americana that will be of greatest value to students, researchers, and educators. Selection is based on cultural and educational value, expected demand, input from the NDL Advisory Committee, and the ability of current technology to capture the content.
A variety of technical issues are addressed in American Memory's Background Papers and Technical Information. Each collection also has technical information linked to its home page. The Digital Libraries Initiative site includes administrative and technical information related to digital collections.
Information on viewing and listening to these collections can be found in the American Memory Historical Collections pages.
The Learning Page of the American Memory Historical Collections provides guidelines, examples, and links to other resources about citing electronic sources. Additionally, all collections offer information on appropriate guidelines for citing the material under the heading "Copyright and Other Restrictions" on the collection's home page.
The Library does not grant or deny permission to use the content mounted in the American Memory Historical Collections. Consult the notice and restriction statements about copyright and other rights of the American Memory Historical Collections materials. Each American Memory Historical "collection" is accompanied by a copyright statement. Additionally, The Learning Page includes general information about copyright and fair use. Bibliographic records for individual items often includes specific copyright information. You must make your own, independent assessment of the legal rights that may exist in the American Memory Historical Collections.More on copyright can be found on the U.S. Copyright Office home page.
If downloading does not suit your needs, you may order reproductions of most American Memory items in a variety of formats. Visit the Ordering Reproductions page for more information.More specific information on obtaining reproductions for items in a particular collection is often available from the collection home page or a Rights and Reproductions link from an item record.
When you search the American Memory collections, many of the web pages displayed are created 'on the fly' by the computer in response to a request. 'On the fly' pages create problems for linking and bookmarking since the web address is temporary. Thus, if you bookmark an 'on the fly' page, you will not be able to reach the address later. Follow this link to directions for Linking and Bookmarking in American Memory.
Because the Library of Congress is a public, federal institution, anyone may link to the American Memory Historical Collections without permission from the Library of Congress. A graphic button is available to illustrate your link.We like to hear how our site is being used. We also ask that links not give the impression that the Library of Congress or the American Memory Historical Collections is making an expressed or implied endorsement of any particular product or service.
The Library of Congress does sometimes link to other quality, relevant, web sites. To make a suggestion, contact the "comments" address on the appropriate Library of Congress web page.
To report a problem in the American Memory Historical Collections, please use our error report form. (If your browser does not display forms, please send your comment to ndlpcoll@loc.gov).If you would like to make a general comment or ask a reference question about the American Memory Historical Collections, please see question 24.
The Learning Page is designed for teachers, school librarians, students, and life-long learners. It has tools to help users navigate the American Memory Historical Collections, activities, lesson ideas, teacher-created lesson plans, and other information to help guide educators and their students in using the American Memory Historical Collections' primary sources in classrooms.
You might want to review the list of collections first. This list can be found by clicking on the List All Collections link on the American Memory Collection Finder Page. Then, use the American Memory Collection Search tool to find items in most of the American Memory Historical Collections. It is a good idea to follow the link that answers the question, "What American Memory resources are included in this search?" You may also search across collections that contain items of a particular format, like photographs, printed texts, maps, motion pictures, and sound recordings. Each individual collection has a search tool or other ways of navigating within it.You might want to visit the search guides on the Learning Page or search the Today in History archive. Finally, there is an online workshop for American Memory searching on the Learning Page.
The Library of Congress does not provide information on the current market value of personal property. Such a search would require extensive examination of published sources, and the results would not necessarily indicate the price that the item in your possession would bring in the market. Standard reference sources on the price of valuables, available in most large libraries, contain records of auction sales and may list pertinent transactions. See a reference librarian at your local library for assistance.
Some people have been lucky and have found photographs and narratives by and about their ancestors in the American Memory Historical Collections. However, most people aren't so lucky. Use the American Memory Search Page and enter your family name and its variations. Some full text collections allow searching of the contents of the documents from the individual collection search pages. When the people in American Memory Historical Collections' photographs are known, their names are searchable since they are included in the bibliographic records.The Library's Local History and Genealogy Reading Room offers some bibliographies, guides and web links for genealogy research. Additional information is available online via the National Archives and Records Administration. You will also want to contact your local libraries, historical societies, genealogical societies, state libraries and archives, and similar organizations in the places where your family lived.
Although the originals are held at the National Archives, other versions, including early printed versions of The Declaration of Independence and Constitution, can be found in several places on the Library of Congress web site. Both of these documents are included in the collection, "Documents from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, 1774-1789". Early drafts of the Declaration of Independence are also available in two of the Library's electronic exhibitions, the American Treasures of the Library of Congress and Declaring Independence: Drafting the Documents. Text versions of these documents are available in the "historical documents" section of THOMAS, the Library's Legislative Information database.
The Library of Congress is not soliciting scanned materials from individuals for the American Memory Historical Collections. Acquisitions of new materials to the Library's collections are handled by subject specialists and format specialists and are considered on a case-by-case basis. Potential donors should contact the appropriate Library of Congress Reading Room or the Library's Acquisitions Department.
Library of Congress
(02/14/03)
