The Library of Congress

JOIN US! The Library of Congress is saluting 250 years of America fashion during the month of June. Visitors are invited to test their knowledge of 250 years of American style during a special edition of "Who Knew?" trivia on June 4 – and dance the night away during a fashion-themed costume ball in the Great Hall on June 11.

Live! At the Library to Feature Fashion and Jazz in June Live! At the Library to Feature Fashion and Jazz in JuneLineup Features Fashion Through the Ages Costume Ball, Trivia on American Style and Jazz Programs The Library of Congress is saluting 250...

Photographer Dorothea Lange was born on this day in 1895. Many of her photos, including these, are in the U.S. Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information photograph collection at the Library of Congress.

The first image shown here, known as "Migrant Mother," is one of the most famous photographs of the 20th century. It's the most well-known shot of a series taken by Lange in March 1936 of the same family of "destitute pea pickers" in Nipomo, California.

The photographs of the Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection form an extensive pictorial record of American life between 1935 and 1944. This U.S. government photography project initially documented cash loans made to individual farmers by the Resettlement Administration and the construction of planned suburban communities. The second stage focused on the lives of sharecroppers in the South and migratory agricultural workers in the midwestern and western states. As the scope of the project expanded, the photographers eventually turned to recording both rural and urban conditions throughout the United States as well as mobilization efforts for World War II.

Images: Dorothea Lange's famous "Migrant Mother" photograph features a mother holding a baby. Small children are leaning on each of her shoulders with their faces turned behind her, away from the camera. Their clothes are tattered. They are sitting under a lean-to tent structure in the middle of an empty field. The mother wears a look of concern. Each of the other photographs features essentially the same scene, of the mother holding the baby, but with the woman's other children in different configurations around her. In the final photograph, taken with a wider angle, there are a total of three other children around the mother, in addition to the baby she's holding.

In honor of Memorial Day: The Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress collects and preserves firsthand recollections of U.S. military veterans.

But did you know Gold Star Family members may also contribute accounts about their loved ones? Learn more. ⬇️
https://ask.loc.gov/veterans-history/faq/304254?loclr=fbloc

NEWS: The Library of Congress will make a trailblazing contribution to the America250 Time Capsule in Philadelphia in July: a tiny metal vial holding synthetic DNA encoded with digital copies from the Library’s collections.

The Library initiated a molecular data storage feasibility study in response to a request from Congress in 2024. As a result, the Library has been examining the storage capabilities of a new medium, synthetic DNA. An entirely manufactured molecule, synthetic DNA is designed to replicate the exceptional information density of nature’s best storage medium: DNA itself.

Working with the University of Washington’s Molecular Information Systems Lab, the Library has converted selected digital data into synthesized DNA strands encased in a metal vial about the length of a pencil eraser.

Learn more here:
https://newsroom.loc.gov/news/library-to-add-cutting-edge-molecular-data-storage-device-carrying-digitized-collections-to-america-/s/a091ed78-3d12-4d4a-8e60-673f8cffb825?loclr=fbloc

Images: A one gigabyte synthetic DNA storage pellet encoded with digital copies of Library collection items is displayed alongside Thomas Jefferson's handwritten draft of the Declaration of Independence, one of the many items molecularly stored, May 14, 2026. The DNA pellet will be buried in a time capsule in Philadelphia to mark America's 250th birthday, and is set to be reopened in 2276. Photo by Shawn Miller/Library of Congress.

A one gigabyte synthetic DNA storage capsule containing digitized versions of Library of Congress collections treasures (next to a U.S. quarter for scale), is prepared to be included in a time capsule for America's 250th anniversary this summer. Photo by Shawn Miller/Library of Congress.

There’s a lot of talk about the Founding Fathers of the U.S. as we celebrate the nation’s 250th birthday, but what about the Founding Mothers? One name that should be considered for this title is Mary Katharine Goddard, an accomplished printer and publisher whose name appears on the second printing of the Declaration of Independence.

In January of 1777, after fleeing Philadelphia for Baltimore, the Continental Congress commissioned Goddard to print a second issue of the Declaration of Independence. This time, those who signed the Declaration in July of 1776 reasserted their commitment to the cause of Independence by allowing their names to be printed on the broadside. Mary Katharine Goddard put her name in print, too.

Printing this document was an act of treason. By printing this broadside and including her name, Mary Katharine Goddard was bravely aligning herself with the same risks that the signers had undertaken.

There are only 11 known surviving copies of the Goddard broadside, making it a very special treasure in the Library's collections.

To learn more about the Goddard broadside, visit the links below.

https://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2018/03/rare-book-of-the-month-a-revolutionary-woman-and-the-declaration-of-independence/?loclr=fbloc

https://www.loc.gov/item/video-10718/?loclr=fbloc

Image: A cropped and zoomed-in image of the Goddard Declaration of Independence with Mary Katharine Goddard's name highlighted at the bottom, and an illustration of Goddard in the upper righthand corner.

Reminding you on this International Museum Day: We may not have "museum" in our name, but we still have wonderful exhibitions. Plan your visit today! loc.gov/visit

Today is the 130th anniversary of the Supreme Court's 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson ruling, which established that racial segregation laws did not violate the U.S. Constitution. In the Library's Prints & Photographs collection, there are many visual examples of the “separate but equal” doctrine that was in practice for more than half of the 20th century as a result.

While the high court's 1954 Brown v. Board of Education ruling ultimately declared racial segregation illegal, many states resisted compliance with the mandate for some time.

Images: Photograph shows a man entering the Crescent Theatre in Belzoni, Mississippi through the "colored" entrance. Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. Marion Post Wolcott, photographer. October 1939.

Black men stand around the outside of "Rex Billiard Hall For Colored" on Beale Street in Memphis, Tennessee. Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. Marion Post Wolcott, photographer. October 1939.

Black man drinking at "colored" water cooler in streetcar terminal, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. Russell Lee, photographer. July 1939.

Photograph showing Duke Ellington swinging a bat in front of his "Duke Ellington: Mr. Hi-Fi of 1955" tour bus; sign for "Astor Motel - Colored" in background. LOOK Magazine Photograph Collection, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. Charlotte Brooks, photographer. 1955.

Legislation creating the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, which later became the Women's Army Corps (WAC), was signed into law on this day in 1942. The WAC's 150,000+ members were the first women other than nurses to serve in the U.S. Army.

According to the Army's Center for Military History, WAC director Oveta Culp Hobby often said, “The gaps our women will fill are in those noncombatant jobs where women’s hands and women’s hearts fit naturally. WAACs will do the same type of work which women do in civilian life. They will bear the same relation to men of the Army that they bear to the men of the civilian organizations in which they work.”

The idea was that each woman who enlisted "would be trained in a noncombatant military job and thus 'free a man for combat.'"

Of the women who joined up, there were widows, mothers and daughters of families with no men "of fighting age," according to the Army. "One out of every five had enlisted because a male member of her family was in the armed forces and she wanted to help him get home sooner."

You can hear the stories straight from the mouths of these trailblazing women on the Veteran's History Project website. Just search "Women's Auxiliary Corps." https://www.loc.gov/collections/veterans-history-project-collection/?loclr=fbloc

Images: Vivian Mildred Corbett Bailey in WAC uniform, from the Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress American Folklife Center.

Gloria M. Poteet in WAC uniform, from the Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress American Folklife Center.

Audrae Marie Gandreau in WAC uniform, from the Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress American Folklife Center.