As the title of this exhibition suggests, Witness and Response: September 11 Acquisitions at the Library of Congress features the collections that the Library has amassed and is still receiving about the tragic events of one year ago. It is an exhibition that reveals much about the Library of Congress as an institution, its astounding collections, and its equally remarkable staff. At its core, this exhibition is the story of how the 9/11 materials in this national institution arrived here and today reflect what America has experienced while providing assurance that the record will be here in the future for America's citizens and others to recall and scholars to study.
Within hours of the attacks in New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania, offices within the Library mobilized to record and gather for posterity first-hand accounts and images. Other offices of the Library here and abroad collected the written and recorded reports of 9/11, acquiring in the process a wide-range of responses. Over the past year and in almost every section of the Library of Congress, staff have sought and received an abundance of original material including prints, photographs, drawings, poems, eye-witness accounts and personal reactions, headlines, books, magazines, songs, maps, videotapes, and films. The Library even acquired physical remnants from two of the attack sites. The collection of 9/11 material is in the tens of thousands and continues to grow steadily.
September 7 – October 26, 2002
Mondays - Saturdays, 10:00am - 5:00pm
Great Hall, Thomas Jefferson Building, Library of Congress