Since 1987 Dr. Billington has served as the 13th Librarian of Congress. During his tenure the Library has moved into the digital age, with its award-winning and widely popular Web site (www.loc.gov). The site is also reaching new constituencies — Americans across the country who are unable to make the trip to Washington to use the collections. Many of the collections that are electronically available are also among the collections that are particularly significant for the Librarian. Recently, he briefly discussed those materials as the Library celebrates its 200th birthday this month:
The Marian Carson Collection of Americana
In 1996, the Library acquired this collection, believed to be the most extensive existing private assemblage of rare materials relating to the nation's history. The Carson family of Philadelphia had collected such precious materials as a rare broadside printing (only two copies known) of the Declaration of Independence, printed circa July 10-20, 1776; an 1839 photographic self-portrait of Robert Cornelius, believed to be the earliest extant U.S. portrait photograph; a chalk drawing of George Washington, made within a year of his death in 1799. These and the many other items in the collection have reinforced the Library's preeminence as a source of materials relating to American history.
Opening ceremonies of the Spirit of Vincennes Rendezvous, which has been documented as a Local Legacy in the American Folklife Center. - Bernie Schmitt, Vincennes (Ind.) Sun-Commercial
Presidential Papers Collection
With the papers of 23 U.S. presidents, the Library is the foremost source for the study of the leader of the free world. Beginning with the Founding Fathers — Washington, Jefferson, Madison — to the Civil War era presidencies of Lincoln, Johnson and Grant; to the 20th century's Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson and Calvin Coolidge, these papers provide a personal view of history no textbook can offer.
Prokudin-Gorskii Collection
As a student of Russian history and culture, I am of course intensely interested in the Prokudin-Gorskii Collection of Imperial Russia in the early 20th century. Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii was one of the first Russians to experiment with color photography. At the outset of the revolution in 1917, the photographer escaped to Paris with his 1,900 glass-plate negatives, providing a remarkable look at Russia in 1909-1911.
Left, a page from the Giant Bible of Mainz, inscribed by hand, c. 1455, and on permanent display with the Gutenberg Bible in the Library's Jefferson Building; center, in 1839 Robert Cornelius created this image of himself with a homemade camera in the earliest surviving American photographic portait; right, windmills in the Yalutorovsk, one of 1,900 photos taken by Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii after Czar Nicholas II commissioned him to survey his empire. Prokudin-Gorskii fled Russia in 1917 and brought the photos with him.
American Folklife Center
Established by an act of Congress in 1976, the American Folklife Center holds the largest archives of the nation's distinctive cultures. The center's collections will increase significantly with the Local Legacies project, which is providing a snapshot of American creativity at the turn of the century. Local Legacies is the premiere project of the Library's Bicentennial effort and is jointly sponsored by the U.S. Congress.
Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection
This collection of illustrated books from the 15th through 20th centuries stands out among the distinguished resources of the Library's Rare Book and Special Collections Division. Among the many reasons why this collection is so rich is the presence of an amazing number if unique books of such great rarity that only a handful of copies are known. For example, the assemblage of books, plates, drawings and engravings by William Blake is one of the finest ever brought together. The magnificent 15th century manuscript known as the Giant Bible of Mainz is kept on permanent display in the Library's Great Hall, and one of only two known copies of the 1495 edition of Epistolae et Evangelia, called by some the finest illustrated book of the 15th century, are but two of this collection's many rarities.
