From a humble beginning as a small reference library in a dusty room in the Capitol, the Library of Congress — unique among cultural institutions in the United States — is the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States and the largest library in the world.

Library of Congress Reading Room - maveric2003

The Library of Congress began in 1800 with a set of 740 books and 30 maps. Two major fires, 13 librarians, and 200 years later, its collections have grown from that original set of books and maps to about 32 million catalogued books, 4.8 million maps, and over 138 million items that range from the largest collection of legal materials in the world to microfilms, newspapers, comic books, movies, and 13 million prints and photographic images. In 2007, it hosted 93 million visitors to its library while still fulfilling its mandate as the primary research arm of the U.S. Congress.

In keeping with its mission to “make its resources available and useful to the Congress and the American people and to sustain and preserve a universal collection of knowledge and creativity for future generations,” the Library of Congress, in partnership with the photosharing service Flickr, has made available online nearly 3,000 public domain images as part of the Commons project — beginning a year ago this Friday.

Who can borrow books from the Library of Congress?

By law, only the 535 members of the U.S. Congress, the president and the vice president, and Supreme Court justices may borrow books from the Library of Congress. Members of the public, however, are allowed to peruse the collections providing that the items do not leave the library’s premises.

What’s in the Library’s Collections?

A total of 138,313,427 items make up the Library’s collections today, including:

1. 20,854,810 books catalogued in the Library of Congress classification system
2. 11,478,022 books in large type and raised characters, incunabula (books printed before 1501), monographs and serials, music, bound newspapers, pamphlets, technical reports, and other printed material
3. 105,980,595 items in the nonclassified (special) collections
4. 2,955,493 audio materials, such as discs, tapes, and talking books
5. 61,432,879 total manuscripts
6. 5,317,279 maps
7. 14,833,797 microforms
8. 5,517,882 pieces of sheet music
9. 14,364,982 visual materials, including:

» 1,204,781 moving images
» 12,520,442 photographs
» 92,960 posters
» 544,142 prints and drawings

What else does the Library of Congress do?

The Library of Congress has offices all around world dedicated to the cataloguing, preservation, and acquisition of library and research materials from countries where such materials could not be obtain through conventional means.

In addition to the Commons, the Library of Congress is collaborating with institutions internationally to develop the World Digital Library, a project that aims to freely make available over the Internet primary materials from cultures around the world.

See for yourself

• Search for material in the Library of Congress catalogs
• Browse the Library of Congress’s digital collections
• Ask a librarian a reference question
• Take a tour when you’re in Washington, DC

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 14th, 2009 at 1:42 pm and is filed under Articles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.