Dominating the news in February was the Jan. 31 announcement of a $2 million grant awarded to the Library of Congress by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to digitize thousands of works in the public domain. The project, titled "Digitizing American Imprints at the Library of Congress," will focus on "brittle books" and U.S. history volumes along with the development of suitable page-turner display technology, capability to scan and display foldouts, and a pilot program to capture items such as tables of contents, chapters, sections and indexes. (See story on page 49.)
Covering the Sloan Foundation grant were media outlets such as Network World, The Associated Press, Technology Daily, Roll Call, TG Daily, CNN.com, The State in Columbia, S.C., The Chronicle: Wired Campus Blog, The Columbus Dispatch in Ohio, Ventura County Star in California, Wilkes Barre Times Leader in Pennsylvania and Managing Information.
As the co-chair of the Iraq Study Group, Baker offered guidelines for effective U.S. foreign policy, including advocating the need to be flexible, opening dialogue with the country's enemies and changing course if necessary. "America must be prepared to talk to our enemies," he said.
"War and Peace" by Leo Tolstoy was a close second, followed by "The Possessed" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, "Moby-Dick" by Herman Melville—which the Librarian described as "an amazing adventure that gets us all on the boat in pursuit of something other than happiness"—"The Nature and Destiny of Man" by Reinhold Niebuhr and any poem by John Keats.
Showing a bit of whimsy, Billington admitted one of his favorite books that he shared with his own children was "The Book About Moomin, Mymble and Little My" by Tove Jansson. "I should say all these deeper things [about the book] … but it's just an awful lot of fun," he said.
The Library's Great Hall was praised in an article in a recent issue of American Spirit. - Carol Highsmith
Gimpel's article focuses on the relationship between the Founding Fathers and the nascent congressional library. An interview with Gerard Gawalt of the Library's Manuscript Division revealed that those charged with drafting the nation's new laws consulted reference books, legal tomes, maps and travel books. According to Gawalt, these volumes expanded congressional minds and experiences during a time when access to books was not widespread.
Gimpel also explains Thomas Jefferson's legacy with regard to the Library's collection: The Library "rose phoenix-like from the ashes of British immolation," thanks to Jefferson selling his personal collection of 6,487 books to Congress following the 1814 burning of the Capitol, in which the congressional collection was originally housed.
"Jefferson's collection changed our mission because it forever expanded it," said John Cole, director for the Center for the Book, who was also interviewed for the article. "[Jefferson believed] in having educated citizens as the basis for a democracy."
This meant that Congress was responsible for sharing the knowledge and opening the Library to the citizens—a mission that today has grown to encompass the world.
