>> Hi everyone.
I'm Kaleena Black and I work in the Library
of Congress' Learning and Innovation Office.
Welcome to today's episode of "Online
Office Hours" from the Library of Congress.
Today we're focusing on exploring the history of
the Library of Congress through primary sources.
We're so glad you can join us either
here live or in the future by recording.
These informal sessions are meant to be short.
There's going to be a 20 minute presentation
and the sessions are being recorded.
You will then have the opportunity to talk
to each other and the presenters via chat.
Let's get started using chat.
Please in the chat box tell us your name,
where you're joining us from,
and what and whom you teach.
As I mentioned, today's episode is exploring
the history of the Library of Congress
through primary sources to help give us a deeper
sense of how the story of the library is told
through documents, photographs, and more,
particularly during significant
historical moments.
And today we're joined by Cheryl Fox
from the library's Manuscript Division.
She'll be talking to us about
the Library of Congress archives
and will be shedding more light on the
library during the World War II period.
If you have any questions at any time,
please share them in the chat box.
Our colleague Danna Bell from the Learning
and Innovation Office also is on the chat
to answer questions and post
URLs from today's presentation.
So now I'm going to turn things over to Cheryl.
>> Thanks Kaleena.
[Inaudible] talk about the
Library of Congress's history.
I work in the manuscript division and I take
care of a collection called the LC archives
which is the collective records of the Library
of Congress and includes also personal papers
of the librarians of Congress and
other important staff members.
So this is the 220th anniversary of
the creation of the Library of Congress
and it is also the 75th anniversary
of the end of World War II.
So to kind of bring those together, going
to [inaudible] going to take a look today
at the online presentation of [inaudible] which
is a [inaudible] a lot of the various activities
that took place during the war
years [inaudible] and [inaudible].
So Kaleena, can we go back
to the first slide please?
Okay. So the gentleman there on the left,
this is an [inaudible] Freedom's
Fortress presentation and the gentleman
on the left is the Librarian
of Congress Archibald MacLeish.
And behind them is a copy of the Magna
Carta which he is accepting on loan
from the British Ambassador
to the United States,
Philip Kerr or also known as Lord Lothian.
MacLeish was a [inaudible] an ardent
anti-fascist and he moved quickly
to provide additional resources for the federal
government through the Library of Congress
and he also used the symbolic power
of the library as the repository
of the nation's most important document
to build homefront support for the U.S.
to join the effort to defeat
the Nazi fascist threat.
And if you could advanced
to the next slide please.
So in slide number two you see a
different Librarian of Congress.
His name was Herbert Putnam and he is
physically installing the independence--
Declaration of Independence, in the
shrine in the Great Hall of the Library
of Congress building, the Thomas Jefferson
building which was a major tourist attraction
to the library for nearly 30 years.
Beginning in 1903, historical records
were transferred from the State Department
and other federal departments
to the Library of Congress
where they could be safely stored
and made accessible to scholars.
So this photo is not on the Freedom's
Fortress presentation but I just wanted
to give you a visual of the
shrine, this wonderful marble case
that was built just specially for this purpose,
and Librarian Putnam's hands-on
approach to installation in 1924.
So if we could go to slide three.
Librarian of Congress Archibald MacLeish
forged ties with the National Gallery
and other repositories in Washington, D.C. as
well as libraries throughout the United States
to develop standards to ensure the
safety of their historical collections.
He ordered staff members to evaluate
and designate LC collections
that were of the highest value.
And shortly after the Japanese attack
on the Pearl Harbor Naval Base in Hawaii
on December 7th, 1941, more than 5,000
custom built crates were transported
in over 29 vanloads under convoy to [inaudible]
facilities at the University of Virginia,
Washington and Lee University,
and Denison University in Ohio.
They were felt to be safer there away from
Washington, D.C. airspace and that was something
that a number of other cultural
repositories did as well.
Now the National Archives which had only been
founded in 1935 had a bomb-proof building.
It's, you know, a newer building on, in
Washington, D.C. And so prior to that time,
prior to 1935 that is, the State Department
transferred the Declaration of Independence,
the U.S. Constitution, and
other founding documents
to the Library of Congress for safekeeping.
And if we could go forward to slide four please.
So once the documents had been
stored at Fort Knox safely,
the Library of Congress continued
on with various other works.
MacLeish actually was transferred to the State
Department and was replaced with Luther Evans,
a former director of the WPA program
called the Historic Records Survey.
And here you see him seated with
representatives of the European Mission.
So this was a cooperative acquisitions
project established by American libraries
with the War Department and included librarians
and documents experts from various repositories,
university research libraries, the
National Agricultural Library, etcetera,
as well as the Library [inaudible] to
address the fact that nobody had been able
to find materials from Europe during the war
since all commerce and shipping
had been blocked.
So they decided to send a group of
librarians to Germany after the war
to buy any publications they could find
and distribute those to American libraries.
They worked cooperatively to purchase copies of
all materials published between 1933 and the end
of the war to be distributed to 350
American libraries, and at the same time
to reestablish the European book trade.
That is, the purchasing agreements
with publishers and book dealers.
Many libraries and publishers and
bookstores had been destroyed during the war
and vast quantities of material
had been stored in salt mines
and other hidden storage areas
outside of European cities.
So the European mission also played an
important role in finding and returning books
and documents wherever possible
which is similar to the monuments men
but they had a different role in that they
were buying simply for American libraries.
And in slide five we could trans--
there we go, just slide five--
this is also known as the Freedom's Fortress
site but I just wanted to give you an idea
of the condition in post-war Berlin.
The city was divided into four
occupation zones as was Germany.
And the military pass there
on the left was required
to travel to the various occupation zones.
So the members of the European mission were
there at the invitation of the War Department
and they were subject to all of the rules that
any other member of the military was subject to.
And it's sometimes portrayed as the European
mission went to Germany and just sort
of collected things on its own
but that's really not the case.
They had to do everything by the book.
And the military was in charge.
So the last slide that I want to show
you-- if we can advance to the next slide--
shows the transfer of the Declaration
of Independence and the Constitution
from the Library of Congress to
the National Archives in 1952.
So remember that the Declaration of Independence
and the Constitution had been
in Fort Knox during the war.
After the war they came-- were
returned to the Library of Congress
and remained on display until 1952.
It took years of negotiations to determine
that the Declaration of Independence
and the Constitution should be transferred
to the National Archives where they,
and the Bill of Rights, could be
displayed together for the first time
in the National Archives rotunda.
There were numerous preservation
security measures possible
in the new National Archives
building that had been impossible
to provide at the Jefferson building.
But much of the material that had been
transferred to the library since 1903 remains
at the Library of Congress including the
papers of 32 American presidents as well
as Thomas Jefferson's rough draft
of the Declaration of Independence
which is now among the Library
of Congress's top treasures.
And so I'll conclude my presentation and then
be glad to take any questions that anybody has.
>> Cheryl, this is Danna.
One question that came up was what was the
criteria used to identify the materials
in the 29 truckloads that were sent to
the various universities and Fort Knox?
>> Well one thing that they
sent was a card catalogue.
And you know we don't use the cards anymore but
that was absolutely essential to the library's,
you know, continued operations and so they
wanted to make sure that that was saved.
And other irreplaceable things
such as, you know, the documents,
very rare materials from various sources.
But individuals in the various divisions of the
Library of Congress were asked to determine--
actually much like we have now-- which
things were of the highest value.
And I mean, I'm sure that many people can
imagine there's lots of things at the library
that are irreplaceable because there's
only one of them, but these were things
that were considered absolutely essential to
continuing to operate as the national collection
and having various things-- maybe
the Gutenberg Bible that isn't really
about American history but
it is such a precious item.
Those sorts of things were sent off site.
>> Okay. Another question that came up was
one person noticed that there was one woman
in the image of the people from the
European mission and they were wondering
who she was and what her position was.
>> Her name was Janet Emerson.
She worked in the acquisitions division
of the library and she was the only member
of the mission who was there the
entire 20 months of the operation.
People, you know, subbed in and out and
there were people who had already been
in occupied Germany who took
part in the mission,
but she was the one staff member
who was there the entire time.
>> Thank you, Cheryl.
Hopefully my-- the folks that have joined
us, thanks for coming to this presentation.
We'll have other questions about the
Library of Congress, its history,
its activities during World War II, and so on.
And if you do, you can put them in the
chat box and I will share them with Cheryl.
Cheryl, sorry.
>> Cheryl, Kaleena is-- Kaleena here.
I-- just a question for you.
I'm really curious about this idea
of the LC archives and I wondered,
you've shown photographs and you know we've
alluded to letters, and I wondered what teachers
or student would be surprised
to know is, are in the archives.
Like what kinds of objects or kinds of items?
>> Well let's see.
About the earliest items that were collected,
you know, historical records that were not
in use anymore but the people thought was
historically significant and should be saved
to document the history of the library
were the Library of Congress's--
Librarians of Congress Letter books.
And so all of the correspondence having to do
with the operations of the
library were documented.
And as the library changed and grew,
there were different pieces of information
and artifacts even that were
passed from librarian to librarian
and I'll give you just one
exa-- or two examples.
One, we often talk about how
the Thomas Jefferson Library had
such an impact o the library's collection
when it was purchased in 1815 and, you know,
one of the things about it is that
it's not just the books that were in it
but the arrangement of them that is significant.
And that arrangement remained
in use until the early 1900's.
So when Spofford was introducing the new
Librarian of Congress to the collection,
he or he had somebody, draw up a tree which
shows all the various branches and departments.
And so the arrangement of the
Library of Congress collections.
And then this was very essential
for people coming up with Library
of Congress classification system
to be able to know what was
in the collection and how it had been arranged.
And then another interesting
thing is that when Librarian
of Congress Herbert Putnam was librarian,
Abraham Lincoln's granddaughter--
or is it grand-niece?
Now I'm going to forget.
Anyway, she entrusted the contents
of Abraham Lincoln's pockets
on the night he was assassinated
to the Librarian of Congress.
And Putnam packed them up and put them
away in the safe in his librarians office
where they stayed until much later, like 1980
or so when Daniel Boorstin because Librarian
of Congress because he had put them in a
package that said for the librarian only.
So, you know, possibly two or three
librarians of congress after Putnam took a look
at the package, maybe opened it, maybe
didn't open it, and put it back in there
and just waiting for what would be
a more appropriate moment to be able
to disclose what those items were.
>> Wow. That's really interesting.
If I could ask one more question.
I wondered if you had a sense at all of the
kinds of questions that might come from patrons
or through Ask a Librarian, just kind
wonder what kinds of questions they get
about the materials in the archives.
>> What kind of questions I get?
>> Um hum.
>> Well it interesting somebody
wanted to know about Janet Emerson
because I often get questions from
people saying well my grandmother or my,
you know some relative, used
to work at the library.
What did he or she do there?
And we made contact with the grandson of a
man who was an electrician at the Library
of Congress beginning, you know, in 1897
when the Jefferson Building was built.
More recently we've been in contact with the
son of Librarian of Congress Daniel Boorstin
about some things that he wrote
during his time at the Library.
So I mentioned that papers of the Librarians
of Congress, we have substantial papers
for many Librarians of Congress-- only a
few things for the early ones-- and in the--
I should have mentioned much earlier
that the Freedom's Fortress--
all material from the LC archives,
there's not great chunks of the archives
that have been digitized at this point,
but this Freedom's Fortress presentation
is a nice selection of publications
and original documents and photographs
from that 1939 to 1952 time period.
>> Thank you.
Well hopefully-- any other questions
please put them in the chat box.
Any questions about anything
that we've talked about here
or things you've been curious
about, please share.
One thing that I wanted to ask you Cheryl,
while we're letting others post their questions,
is how did you get to the library?
I know that you're a history specialist but I
wondered what led you to the manuscript division
and then ultimately to the LC archives?
>> Well I studied American history in
graduate school and also museum studies.
And for a while, about 10
years, I was a museum curator.
And I came to the library to do public
programming initially but eventually made my way
to the manuscript division and I was really,
really just fascinated by the collections
of the library-- rather the records
of the Library of Congress and began
to work to specialize more in that.
There's just so many fabulous stories about
people at the library and the, you know,
how materials were acquired over the years
I think is very interesting and important.
And how the collection has grown.
And the collections sort of shape
the trajectory of the library.
But at the same time, Librarians
of Congress of course,
and outside events shape what the library
does as well and what the library collects.
>> Related to that, a question came in saying
what sorts of things do you think will go
into the LC archives as a result of what's
been going on over the last nine weeks?
>> Well I imagine that the-- that like
the official records of, you know,
sort of the documents that are created
will go one place but I'm hoping
that the more ephemeral material
will come to the LC archives.
I mean I just have to differentiate there
are the official records of the library
which are taken care of by our records
management service, and they are--
some small amount of them are
sent to the National Archives.
But the LC archives has been
more a repository for things
that an individual might have collected
around-- I should say during this time period.
For example, if somebody's at home and documents
their work on a project that has to do with,
you know, the reopening of the
library, then maybe that type
of material would become
available at some point.
>> Thank you Cheryl.
Are there any other questions
from people in the audience?
We'd love to hear from you.
>> I wondered if there are any
other moments-- historical moments--
that are, you know, well documented
in the LC archives that, or elsewhere,
about the library's history that are available
online that teachers might be interested in?
>> I think probably the library's earliest
history is the best documented on the website,
particularly I'm thinking of the
time period between 1864 and 1897
when Ainsworth Rand Spofford
was Librarian of Congress.
And so he became-- he was appointed by Abraham
Lincoln and he had a huge impact on the library
because he convinced congress that the
U.S. copyright operations should be handled
at the library.
And what that meant practically speaking was
that the library had access to two copies
of everything published in the United
States for free because those had
to be turned in for the copyright deposit.
Now the library has never collected everything
that is published in the United States,
but it had access to any of those materials.
And some of the really amazing things
that we have are a result of that.
For example, really old films-- or
I should say the earliest films--
were copyrighted by sending in a
paper print of their-- of the film.
Not the film itself, but a paper copy.
And those films that are no longer available
anywhere, at least we have a copy of them
and we've been able to restore
those for people to be able to see.
And also I think the copyright deposit gives
the Library of Congress an incredible collection
of popular culture that other libraries
that don't have access to those types
of materials can't collect
as effectively because--
material that's more ephemeral like comic
books or baseball cards or sheet music.
>> Thank you.
>> Another question came in.
What are your favorite items in the LC archives?
Scrapbooks?
Letters? Other materials?
>> I think about my most favorite materials
are the letters that Librarian of Congress--
former Librarian of Congress Ainsworth
Spofford mailed, or exchanged,
with the current Librarian
of Congress Herbert Putnam.
After Putnam became Librarian of
Congress in 1899, he was gracious enough
to offer Spofford the opportunity to travel
to Europe and do some acquisition trips.
And, or as Putnam put it, in order to travel
as an ambassador of the Library of Congress
and acquire materials on its behalf.
Or something along those lines.
So it was a very esteemed position
for Spofford to be able to have
and it was an experience of
a lifetime for him, I'm sure.
And it just-- it's touching to me that Putnam
was so respectful of all that he had done
for the library that he gave him
an opportunity to make those trips
when he really would not have needed to, and
perhaps he even wanted to go himself instead.
>> That's wonderful.
If people want to read more about the
history of the Library of Congress,
are there published materials that would be
something that someone might want to obtain?
>> So the most recent publication on the history
of the Library of Congress is a new version
of a chronology of the library's history and
it's-- it's just a wonderful publication.
The first chronology that John
Cole, the Historian of the Library
of Congress did some years ago is vey
sparsely illustrated and this one has lots
of color pictures and much
more extended description
of the events in the library's history.
And of course it takes you from 1800 all the way
up to the current Librarian
of Congress Carla Hayden.
>> That's wonderful.
Another question that just came in, someone
asks if the Library of Congress was involved
in any way with getting library books to
troops in World War I and World War II.
The person knows that ALA was
involved, but was the library?
>> So the World War I war
service-- or what is it called?
I think it's war service.
Was actually headquartered at the
Library of Congress and they received--
they received requests, sometimes
handwritten notes or telegrams
from military personnel all
over requesting specific books.
And then it was determined that it would
be better to establish camp libraries.
And so the ALA established
libraries at American military camps
in the United States and in Europe.
And personnel could go there and read and borrow
books and it was a really successful means
for people from all walks of life--
of course there was a draft then--
and so there were people from many different
backgrounds involved in World [inaudible]
to obtain an education in an era where the
literacy rate is not as high as it is now.
In World War II there's been some
writing about the library's--
the Library of Congress worked with publishers
to publish popular books in small enough form
that they could be carried with army personnel.
Like smaller than a paper bag.
Yeah, the Armed Services Editions.
And the library actually has a pretty complete
collection of all of those that were published
and there are really famous and interesting
authors whose work is represented among them.
>> Thank you Cheryl.
That's wonderful.
Are there other questions?
>> Great, well I will just say thank you so much
Cheryl for sharing all that you know with us
and leaving us with lots of food for thought.
I'm going to put your-- the start
of the slides so everyone can see.
And if they have questions,
please let us know after the fact.
Thank you all for joining us.
Just to let you know, this Thursday, May 14th at
2 p.m. our next "Online Office Hour" will focus
on historical children's books
at the Library of Congress
and we'll be sharing the online collection
of rare children's books with you and hear
from a children's literature specialist.
And also we do-- we'll be starting to offer
webinar Wednesdays starting next week.
These are professional development
opportunities-- free one hour sessions.
And so next week, May 20th at 2:00 our webinar
will be on the "Shall Not Be Denied" exhibition
so it's related to women's suffrage.
And if Danna or Kathy [assumed
spelling] you could post a link
to the professional development page
so that the participants can follow up.
Please do join us.
If there aren't any more questions, thank you
so so much for joining us again and we hope
to see you at a future "Online Office Hour"
or we hope that you enjoy the recording.
>> Thanks.
>> Thanks so much, Cheryl.