From the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.
Made possible by the generous support
of the Rapoport Family Foundation,
the Gateway to Knowledge traveling exhibition completed a full year
of operation after its launch in Washington, D.C.,
at the National Book Festival, on September 25, 2010.
With a mission to introduce the Library's wealth of resources
to small towns and rural communities, the exhibition embarked
on an inaugural tour of sixty cities across the heartland of America.
The tour continued with additional support from the Bernard
and Audre Rapoport Foundation and the James Madison Council
to complete a full year on the road.
The traveling exhibition was presented in a state-of-the art,
1,000-square-foot, expandable, mobile unit.
Inside, visitors were guided through a history of the Library's origins,
information about Thomas Jefferson's personal library,
and a close-up look at selected collections.
These high-quality facsimiles included the rough draft
of the Declaration of Independence and drawings
from the very first Spider-Man comic book.
Multimedia displays and four computer terminals displaying
Library of Congress websites were also featured in the exhibit.
The websites included the Library's home page the Center
for the Book/Literacy Programs site, and sites pertaining
to U.S. collections, exhibitions,
and a special site for use by teachers.
The Gateway to Knowledge traveling mobile exhibition visited every
state east of the Mississippi River and several states in the Midwest
for a total of ninety communities visited in thirty-four states.
The population of the towns
and cities visited ranged from 10,000 to 60,000.
The venues were public libraries, town squares,
middle and high schools, museums, and college campuses.
During many of the tour stops, local, regional,
and national dignitaries attended ribbon-cutting ceremonies,
further promoting and celebrating the outreach of the Library
of Congress to local communities in a unique and tangible way.
The tour was experienced by more than 86,000 visitors,
including thousands of school children from elementary,
middle, and high schools.
A scavenger hunt was developed to engage school children
and provide an on-site learning opportunity at each stop.
At the tour's final stop during the 2011 National Book Festival,
record visitation occurred on both days for a total of 5,315.
In each city visited, the exhibition received an enthusiastic welcome
from the entire community, generating extensive media attention
with an estimated earned media value of nearly $2.0 million.
From the beginning, the tour demonstrated impressive results
in the number of visitors, the earned media value, the communities
that it visited, and the tour continued
to generate impressive statistics throughout the year.
Further evidence of the tour's success was the rise in traffic
on the Library of Congress website observed just before
and then after many tour visits.
This data further demonstrates the lasting effect the exhibition has
on the communities it visited.
A dedicated webpage provided visitor information,
including the tour schedule, an exhibit overview with updated blogs
from the driver-docent team, and images taken at each stop.
Visitors expressed praise, wonder, excitement,
and gratitude for the exhibition.
Positive comments about the tour and its content were consistently voiced
in the exhibit guest book, on blog sites,
and in person during interactions with the docent team.
Through the generosity of the Rapoport family,
with their strong commitment to education, and additional support
from the James Madison Council,
the Gateway to Knowledge tour was a highly visible advocate
for the Library of Congress.
In fact, advocacy for libraries was a great accomplishment of the tour.
The tour engaged communities at a grass-roots level, where they live,
providing an immersive way to experience their national library
and its online resources.
The Gateway to Knowledge tour has educated and cultivated new
and young patrons for the Library of Congress, and by extension,
libraries across the country.
The Gateway to Knowledge traveling exhibition is a highly visible,
experiential means of advocating for the Library of Congress
and a creative and dynamic way to promote libraries
in the twenty-first century.
By its presence and the resulting media exposure,
it demonstrated the value, worth, and impact of local libraries
and library systems in the communities it visited.
The tour encouraged people to explore the Library online,
visit the Library in Washington,
D.C. and generated a better understanding of the Library
of Congress as the largest repository
of knowledge in the world.
This has been a presention of the Library of Congress.