Press contact: Erin Allen (202) 707-7302
Press contact: Donna Urschel (202) 707-1639
Website: The Civil War in America
Members of the media can find downloadable images from the exhibition in the Library's online pressroom at www.loc.gov/pressroom/

November 8, 2012

Special Programming to Complement Civil War Exhibition Opening Monday

Highlights Include Gallery Talks, Poet Laureate Reading, Lectures, Performance by “The President’s Own” Marine Band

The Library of Congress commemorates the 150th anniversary of the Civil War with an exhibition titled "The Civil War in America," opening Monday, Nov. 12. Special free programming will complement the exhibition throughout its duration through June 1, 2013.

The exhibition will reveal the complexity of the Civil War through those who experienced it firsthand, including through items in the Library’s collections never before on public view that offer a human perspective on the war and shed new light on the many ways that this terrible conflict helped shape the American people and the nation.

"The Civil War in America" will be free and open to the public, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Saturday, in the Southwest Exhibition Gallery of the Thomas Jefferson Building, located at 10 First Street S.E., Washington, D.C. A complete listing of related programming is available at myloc.gov/exhibitions/civil-war-in-america/pages/programs.aspx.

The exhibition is made possible by the generous support of the James Madison Council. Additional funding is provided by Union Pacific Corporation, the Liljenquist family and AARP.

• Highlighting the companion programming will be a reading by U.S. Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey from her Pulitzer Prize-winning book of poetry, "Native Guard," at noon on Wednesday, January 30, 2013, in Room LJ 119, located on the first floor of the Thomas Jefferson Building.
• Library curators and specialists will give a series of noontime gallery talks in the exhibition on Wednesdays (unless otherwise noted). On Dec. 19, Kristi Conkle of the Humanities and Social Sciences Division discusses Frances Clayton, a.k.a. "Jack Williams," and women posing as male soldiers in the Civil War. On Feb. 13, 2013, Mike Buscher of the Geography and Map Division presents Jedediah Hotchkiss’s "Map of the Shenandoah Valley." On March 27, 2013, exhibition curator Michelle Krowl discusses Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. On Tuesday, April 16, 2013, Sibyl Moses of the Humanities and Social Sciences Division explores D.C. Emancipation on the 151st anniversary. On April 17, 2013, Bruce Kirby of the Manuscript Division discusses Civil War veterans and the "Left-handed Penmanship" contests.
• Special music-related events include a panel discussion on "Music in the White House," presented in cooperation with the White House Historical Association, at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 9, 2013, in the Whittall Pavilion, located on the ground floor of the Thomas Jefferson Building. The discussion will be followed by a concert featuring "The President’s Own" United States Marine Band under the direction of Col. Michael J. Colburn at 3 p.m. in the Coolidge Auditorium. Free tickets will be available beginning Dec. 1, 2012. Call or email Nicholas Brown at (202) 707-8437, nbrown@loc.gov, to reserve a seat.
• Lectures include a scholar talk from the John W. Kluge Center and authors in the "Books and Beyond Series," sponsored with the Library’s Center for the Book. On Tuesday, March 12, 2013, at noon, Margaret (Peggy) Wagner discusses "The Library of Congress Illustrated Timeline of the Civil War" in the Montpelier Room, located on the sixth floor of the James Madison Building, 101 Independence Ave., S.E. Kluge Fellow Lindsay Tuggle presents "The Afterlives of Specimens: Science and Mourning in Whitman's America" at noon on Thursday, Jan. 24, 2013, in Room LJ 119.

The Library of Congress, the nation’s oldest federal cultural institution and the largest library in the world, holds more than 151 million items in various languages, disciplines, and formats. The Library seeks to spark imagination and creativity and to further human understanding and wisdom by providing access to knowledge through its magnificent collections, programs, publications and exhibitions. Many of the Library’s rich resources can be accessed through its website at www.loc.gov.

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PR 12-213
11/08/12
ISSN 0731-3527

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