With Educational Materials

Exploring the Early Americas
Features selections from the Jay I. Kislak Collection to examine indigenous cultures, the drama of the encounters between Native Americans and Europeans, and the changes caused by the meeting of the two worlds.

Churchill and the Great Republic
Presents the life of Winston Churchill, his career, and his connection with the United States, a country he called "The Great Republic." A unique interactive presentation is a featured part of the exhibit.

The African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship
February 5-May 5, 1998
Showcases the Library’s incomparable African American collections. The largest black history exhibit held at the Library includes books, documents, maps, musical scores, plays, films, and recordings.

American Treasures of the Library of Congress
May 5, 1997-August 18, 2007
Provides unique insight into various aspects of American history and culture. Objects displayed are organized according to the three categories that Thomas Jefferson used for his library: memory, reason, and imagination.

Bob Hope and American Variety
May 10, 2000-January 9, 2010
Explores variety entertainment through the lens of Bob Hope’s long and rich career, in which he continued to practice the variety traditions he learned on the vaudeville stage.

Churchill and the Great Republic
February 5-July 10, 2004
Presents the life of Winston Churchill, his career, and his connection with the United States, a country he called "The Great Republic." A unique interactive presentation is a featured part of the exhibit.

Creating the United States
April 12, 2008–May 5, 2012
Offers insights into how the nation’s founding documents were forged and the role that imagination and vision played in the unprecedented creative act of forming a self–governing country.

Declaring Independence: Drafting the Documents
June 29-July 4, 1995
Presents previews of unique documents from the collections of the Library of Congress.

The Dream of Flight
October 4, 2003-April 24, 2004
Honors the Wright Brothers’ achievement, using the Library’s rare and significant materials to explore the notion that flight, whether fanciful or actual, has inspired and occupied a central place in most cultures.

Exploring the Early Americas
Ongoing exhibition, opened December 12, 2007.
Features selections from the Jay I. Kislak Collection to examine indigenous cultures, the drama of the encounters between Native Americans and Europeans, and the changes caused by the meeting of the two worlds.

From Haven to Home: 350 Years of Jewish Life in America
September 9-December 30, 2004
Features more than two hundred treasures of American Judaica from the collections of the Library of Congress, augmented by a selection of important loans from other cooperating cultural institutions.

From the Home Front and the Front Lines
May 24, 2004-November 13, 2004
Consists of original materials and oral histories drawn from the Veterans History Project collections at the Library of Congress.

Hope for America: Performers, Politics and Pop Culture
Ongoing exhibition, opened June 11, 2010
Explore the interplay of politics and entertainment, focusing on the careers of Bob Hope and other entertainers who were involved in the political climate of their times.

I Do Solemnly Swear... Inaugural Materials from the Collections of the Library of Congress
January 8, 2005-April 8, 2005
Offers a glimpse into the history of American presidential inaugurations. Eighteen presidents are featured in the display, from George Washington to John F. Kennedy.

John Bull & Uncle Sam: Four Centuries of British-American Relations
November 18, 1999-March 4, 2000
Brings together for the first time treasures from the two greatest libraries in the English-speaking world—The British Library and the Library of Congress—in order to illuminate the relationship between the two countries.

The Last Full Measure: Civil War Photographs from the Liljenquist Family Collection
April 12, 2011–August 13, 2011
Features 379 Civil War-era ambrotypes and tintypes of enlisted Union and Confederate soldiers.

Madison’s Treasures
One day only, March 16, 2001
Examines documents related to two seminal events in which Madison played a major role: the drafting and ratification of the U.S. Constitution and the introduction of the amendments that became the Bill of Rights.

Margaret Mead: Human Nature and the Power of Culture
November 30, 2001-May 31, 2002
Documents Mead’s life, her career as an anthropologist, and the critical reception of her work by drawing upon the 500,000-item Mead Collection, one of the Library’s largest collections for a single individual.

NAACP: A Century in the Fight for Freedom

Presents a retrospective of the major personalities, events, and achievements that shaped the NAACP’s history during its first 100 years.

Politics and the Dancing Body
February 16–July 28, 2012
Explores how American choreographers between World War I through the Cold War realized this vision, using dance to celebrate American culture, to voice social protest, and to raise social consciousness.

Religion and the Founding on the American Republic
June 4-August 29, 1998
Documents the role religion played in the shaping of early American life and in forming the American republic.

Sakura: Cherry Blossoms as Living Symbols of Friendship
March 20–September 15, 2012
Offers an opportunity to deepen understanding of Japanese culture while celebrating the Washington cherry blossoms as symbols of the enduring friendship between the people of Japan and the United States. Coincides with the city-wide centennial celebration of the 1912 gift.

Thomas Jefferson
April 24-October 31, 2000
Draws on the Library’s Thomas Jefferson materials to examine the influence Jefferson’s thoughts and interests had on his own life, the American republic, and the world.

Voices of Civil Rights
February 24-March 26, 2005
Documents events during the Civil Rights Movement in the United States through personal stories, oral histories, and photographs collected by the "Voices of Civil Rights" project, as well as marking the arrival of these materials to the Library.

With Malice Toward None: The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Exhibition
February 12–May 10, 2009
Commemorates the two hundredth anniversary of the birth of the nation’s revered sixteenth president. The exhibition reveals Lincoln the man, whose thoughts, words, and actions were deeply affected by personal experiences and pivotal historic events.

Women Come to the Front: Journalists, Photographers, and Broadcasters During WWII
September 28-November 18, 1995
Features women journalists who were chosen because of the strength and variety of their collections in the Library. Like their male counterparts, the women followed various paths to their wartime assignments.