Library of Congress

The Library of Congress is the de facto national library of the United States and the research arm of the United States Congress. It is one of the largest and most important libraries in the world. Its collections include more than 29 million catalogued books and other print materials in 470 languages; more than 58 million manuscripts; the largest rare book collection in North America, including a Gutenberg Bible; over 1 million US Government publications; 1 million issues of world newspapers spanning the past three centuries; 33,000 bound newspaper volumes; 500,000 microfilm reels; over 6,000 comic book titles; the world's largest collection of legal materials; films; 4.8 million maps; sheet music; and 2.7 million sound recordings. The head of the Library is the Librarian of Congress. Holdings Library of Congress, Thomas Jefferson Building. The Library developed a system of book classification called Library of Congress Classification (LC) which is used by most US research and university libraries, although most public libraries continue to use the Dewey decimal system. The Library serves as a legal repository for copyright protection and copyright registration, and as the base for the United States Copyright Office. Regardless of whether they are seeking copyright, all publishers are required to submit two copies of their copyrightable works to the Library - this requirement is known as mandatory deposit. Nearly 22,000 new items published in the U.S. arrive every business day at the Library. Contrary to popular belief, however, the Library does not retain all of these works in its permanent collection, although it does add an average of 10,000 items per day. Rejected items are used in trades with other libraries around the world, distributed to federal agencies, or donated to schools, communities, and other organizations within the United States. As is true of many similar libraries, the Library of Congress retains copies of every publication in the English language which is deemed significant. The Guinness Book of World Records currently lists the Library of Congress as the "World's Largest Library". This apparently is based on the shelf space the collection occupies; the Library of Congress states that its collection fills about 530 miles (850 km), while the British Library, reports about 388 miles (625 km) of shelves. The Library of Congress holds about 130 million items with 29 million books against approximately 150 million items with 25 million books for the British Library. It is estimated that the print holdings of the Library of Congress would, if digitized and stored as plain text, constitute 17 to 20 terabytes of information. The Library makes millions of digital objects, comprising tens of terabytes, available at its American Memory site. American Memory is a source for public domain image resources, as well as audio, video, and archived Web content. Nearly all of the lists of holdings, the catalogs of the library, can be consulted directly on its web site. Librarians all over the world consult these catalogs, through the Web or through other media better suited to their needs, when they need to catalog for their collection a book published in the United States. They use the Library of Congress Control Number to make sure of the exact identity of the book. The Library of Congress also provides an on-line archive of the proceedings of the U.S. Congress at THOMAS, including bill text, Congressional Record text, bill summary and status, the Congressional Record Index, and the United States Constitution.

Annual events include:

• The National Book Festival
• Founders Day Celebration
• Archives Fair
• Judith P. Austin Memorial Lecture
• Davidson Fellows Reception

Links

1. The Library of Congress website
2. History of the Library of Congress
3. American Memory
4. Library of Congress catalog
5. thomas.loc.gov, legislative information