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KF5JRV > TODAY 24.04.19 13:33l 35 Lines 1749 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 35103_KF5JRV
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Subj: Today in History - Apr 24
Path: IW8PGT<IR2UBX<SR1BSZ<OK0NBR<OK2PEN<N3HYM<KF5JRV
Sent: 190424/1131Z 35103@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.18
President John Adams approves legislation to appropriate $5,000 to
purchase “such books as may be necessary for the use of Congress,ö thus
establishing the Library of Congress. The first books, ordered from
London, arrived in 1801 and were stored in the U.S. Capitol, the
library’s first home. The first library catalog, dated April 1802,
listed 964 volumes and nine maps. Twelve years later, the British army
invaded the city of Washington and burned the Capitol, including the
then 3,000-volume Library of Congress.
Former president Thomas Jefferson, who advocated the expansion of the
library during his two terms in office, responded to the loss by selling
his personal library, the largest and finest in the country, to Congress
to “recommenceö the library. The purchase of Jefferson’s 6,487 volumes
was approved in the next year, and a professional librarian, George
Watterston, was hired to replace the House clerks in the administration
of the library. In 1851, a second major fire at the library destroyed
about two-thirds of its 55,000 volumes, including two-thirds of the
Thomas Jefferson library. Congress responded quickly and generously to
the disaster, and within a few years a majority of the lost books were
replaced.
After the Civil War, the collection was greatly expanded, and by the
20th century the Library of Congress had become the de facto national
library of the United States and one of the largest in the world. Today,
the collection, housed in three enormous buildings in Washington,
contains more than 17 million books, as well as millions of maps,
manuscripts, photographs, films, audio and video recordings, prints, and
drawings.
73 de Scott KF5JRV
Pmail: KF5JRV@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA
email: KF5JRV@GMAIL.COM
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