Guide to the Collections

A collection of 15 million photographs, fine and popular prints and drawings, posters, and architectural and engineering drawings. While international in scope, the collections are particularly rich in materials produced in, or documenting the history of, the United States and the lives, interests and achievements of the American people.

The Prints & Photographs Online Catalog describes about 95% of holdings, and includes many digital images.

See the Prints and Photographs: An Illustrated Guide

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division, via Ask A Librarian

A selection of collections have been digitized. See: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

The Library's manuscript collections document all aspects of American history and culture and include some of the nation's greatest manuscript treasures. Foremost among the manuscript collections are the twenty-three groups of presidential papers, ranging in time from George Washington to Calvin Coolidge. But the overwhelming majority of the collections comprise the personal papers of individuals and families. They differ from the holdings of the National Archives and Records Administration, which maintains the official records of the United States government.

Check the specific collections guides and finding aids to help you find what you're looking for. See the Manuscripts: An Illustrated Guide.

For guides to the manuscript collections and finding aids, see http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/f-aids/mssfa.html.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Manuscript Division, via Ask A Librarian.

Some digitized collections exist. See http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/ammem.html.

If digital images are displaying, you can download online images yourself.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

The Library's collections are exceptionally strong in US newspapers, with 9,000 titles covering the past three centuries. Also contains the largest collection of overseas newspapers in the world; as well as collections of current periodicals, comic books, and government publications.

For bibliographies and guides to newspapers see http://www.loc.gov/rr/news/lcnewsp.html.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Serial and Government Publications Division, via Ask A Librarian.

See the National Digital Newspaper program and Chronicling America.

If digital images are displaying, you can download online images yourself.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

Periodical and journals cover all fields and can be found either in the Library's general collections or specialized collections. They include historic collections and current serials.

For bibliographies and guides to periodicals see http://www.loc.gov/rr/news/lcper.html#guides.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Serial and Government Publications Division, via Ask A Librarian.

Not digitized.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

Collections include musical scores, from solo instrumental sonatas to symphonies, and from songs with piano accompaniment to opera full scores and libretti. Particularly rich in material related to American music, including manuscripts, correspondence, and papers of every notable American composer, conductor, and musician; and first editions of the sheet music of "popular" songs, including both original compositions (primarily for voice and piano, or for piano solo), and arrangements of what are now considered "classical" works, used primarily by amateur musicians. Collections also include many music pieces registered for copyright in the United States since the inception of federal copyright legislation in 1790.

Check the specific collections guides and finding aids to help you find what you're looking for. http://www.loc.gov/rr/perform/new.collections.html.

Finding aids: http://www.loc.gov/rr/perform/fabiblgds.html

For information on the background, scope, and content of this collection see: Music, Theater, Dance: An Illustrated Guide.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Performing Arts Division, via Ask A Librarian .

For a selection of digitized items, see the Performing Arts Encyclopedia at: http://www.loc.gov/performingarts/pae-home.html.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

Collections encompass nearly all eras and subjects, and include 800,000 books, broadsides, pamphlets, theater playbills, title pages, prints, posters, photographs, incunabula (fifteenth-century imprints) and medieval and Renaissance manuscripts. Americana dates from a Columbus letter (1493) to the present and includes more than 16,000 imprints from 1640 to 1800, extensive holdings of western Americana, Confederate States publications, and thousands of nineteenth-century pamphlets.

Check the specific collections guides and finding aids to help you find what you're looking for. Finding aids: http://www.loc.gov/rr/rarebook/findaid/findaid.html.

For information on the background, scope, and content of this collection see: Rare Books and Special Collections: An Illustrated Guide.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Rare Book & Special Collections Division, via Ask A Librarian.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

Poster collections include the Work Projects Administration (WPA); World War 1; performance arts, that illustrate the wide range of popular, live entertainment in America from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century; and political, propaganda, and social issue posters and handbills.

Check the specific collections guides and finding aids to help you find what you're looking for. For information on the background, scope, and content of this collection see: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collections/.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division, via Ask A Librarian.

A selection of poster collections have been digitized. See: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

Prints include historical prints (ca. 1700-1900) created to document geographic locations or popular subjects and sometimes used for advertising and educational purposes. Most are by American printmakers (e.g., Baillie, Currier & Ives, Sachse & Co.). Other collections feature baseball cards, political cartoons, fine art, Japanese prints, woodcuts, the early history of aeronautics, periodical illustration in English language periodicals, newspapers and magazines.

The Prints & Photographs Online Catalog (link) describes about 95% of holdings, and includes many digital images. See Prints and Photographs: An Illustrated Guide.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division, via Ask A Librarian.

A selection of poster collections have been digitized. See: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

The Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) and the Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) are collections of documentary measured drawings, photographs, and written historical and architectural information for about 37,000 structures and sites in the United States and its territories. Other collections include the Pictorial Archives of Early American Architecture, the Carnegie Survey of the Architecture of the South, the Archive of Hispanic Culture, and the Seagram County Court House Archive, as well as hundreds of more modest efforts.

This collection has been digitized. For complete information on the background, scope, and content of this collection see: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/hh/.

Go to: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/search/?st=list&co=hh.

If digital images are displaying, you can download online images yourself.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

The Library has vast general collections of books and bound periodicals on all major subjects. The general reference collection emphasizes humanities, especially religion, philosophy, language, literature, art, and history, as well as in biography, bibliography, and library science. The science collections emphasis engineering, mathematics, environmental sciences , physics , chemistry, computer sciences, astronomy, botany, medicine, agriculture , military science , and naval science. The business collections emphasis, accounting, advertising, business history, entrepreneurship, exports and imports, finance, international business, labor management, market research, personnel relations, and stocks and bonds.

Check the specific collections guides and finding aids to help you find what you're looking for. For bibliographies and guides to the Library's general collections of books and periodicals, see: http://www.loc.gov/rr/main/bibguide.html, http://www.loc.gov/rr/business/index1.html, or http://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/subjectguides/subjectguides.html.

For guides to government publications, see http://www.loc.gov/rr/news/lcgovd.html.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Humanities/Social Sciences Division, via Ask A Librarian .

General and technical book collections are not digitized.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

The Law Library is a repository for the complete record of American Law and additions are constantly being made to the collection of U.S. Congress bills, resolutions, hearings and other documents; U.S. federal and state government documents of a legal nature; legal newspapers of major U.S. cities; and records and briefs of the U.S. Supreme Court and Courts of Appeal.

Check the specific collections guides and finding aids to help you find what you're looking for. See: http://www.loc.gov/law/help/ourcollections.php.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff at the Library of Congress Law Library, via Ask A Librarian.

Some digitized collections exist. This collection has been digitized. If digital images are displaying, you can download online images yourself. See http://www.loc.gov/law/find/collections.php.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.

The materials in microform vary widely not only in the nature of the original materials microfilmed--books, pamphlets, periodicals, manuscripts, dissertations, dramatic works, government documents, etc.-- but also in date, place of publication, language, and subject matter. While a number of these items duplicate items in the Library's print collections, most are available only in microform.

The general microform collection includes individual titles as well as distinct collections which may cover one or many subjects.

For guides to the microform collections and finding aids, see http://www.loc.gov/rr/microform/bibguide.html.

If, after reviewing the online resources identified, you need more information about the collections, you can contact the Reference Staff in the Microform Reading Room at the Library of Congress Humanities/Social Sciences Division, via Ask A Librarian.

Microfilm collections are not digitized.

Duplication Services provides high-and low-resolution digital images, digital and paper photocopies, and high-quality prints.

-- If you are ready to order a reproduction, proceed to the Order Form.

-- If you need recommendations on how to select the format and copy options that best suit your needs, go to our Copies and Formats Matrix page.

-- If you need help completing your order, please contact Customer Service.