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Articles by Laura Kells
Unfolding History
Of Note: Supreme Baseball October 6, 2022 Posted by: Laura Kells The notes exchanged between baseball fans Harry A. Blackmun and Potter Stewart during the 1973 American League Championships and the 1975 World Series show how notes exchanged between justices of the Supreme Court provide insight into their informal relationships, allowing us to understand better the individuals who serve on the nation's highest court. Posted in: Of Note, Sports, Supreme Court
Archive: August 2025 (4 Posts)
Behind the Scenes with the Treaty of Ghent: The Library of Congress Acquires Unpublished Correspondence Between Henry Clay and William Harris Crawford August 21, 2025 Posted by: Julie Miller The Library of Congress has just received a group of thirteen letters, mostly from Henry Clay to William Harris Crawford, six of which are unpublished.
Archive: June 2024 (4 Posts)
William Wilgus: Progress, Loss, and a Divided Manuscript Collection June 6, 2024 Posted by: Josh Levy William Wilgus was one of the most accomplished civil engineers of his time. Today two manuscript collections document his sweeping career, one at the New York Public Library and another at the Library of Congress, which opened for research in 2023.
Archive: 2023 (60 Posts)
A Centennial Season’s Greetings from the ERA December 14, 2023 Posted by: Elizabeth Novara This week marks the 100th anniversary of the introduction of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), also known as the Lucretia Mott Amendment, to the U.S. Congress on December 10, 1923. Find materials throughout the Library of Congress on the history of this unratified, but impactful, constitutional amendment. Posted in: Women's & Gender History
Of Note: Stargazing - A Look at Attendance Sheets from the Actors Studio
In 1951 actor, director, and acting teacher Lee Strasberg (1901-1982) became artistic director of the Actors Studio, the influential workshop where professional actors learned his system of method acting and worked together to polish their skills. During the decade that followed, a generation of actors brought this new, more realistic style of acting to the stage and screen.
“Lest You Forget”: Samuel Ponczak (1937-2002)
This guest post is by Manuscript Division historian Meg McAleer. The words “lest you forget” from the book of Deuteronomy are inscribed in the U.S. Memorial Holocaust Museum’s Hall of Remembrance. Samuel Ponczak, who died on December 7, 2022, dedicated himself to ensuring we would not forget. A Holocaust survivor, Ponczak volunteered at the museum, where he shared his compelling personal story of survival.
Of Note: Trust Your Gut: A Civil War Soldier’s Thanksgiving
This guest post is by Andrea J. Briggs, an archivist in the Manuscript Division. Thanksgiving Day 1864, “dawned beautifully upon the civilians and soldiers,” wrote Lieutenant Samuel E. Nichols of the Union Army’s 37th Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers. “Starting wildly from our slumbers at the unearthly sound of ‘Reveille’… we found ourselves with an appetite adequate for the occasion and fully equal to that usually demanded on that auspicious and chicken stuffed day.
Archive: July 2022 (4 Posts)
Chief Judge E. Barrett Prettyman and the Creation of Washington, D.C.’s Public Defender System July 28, 2022 Posted by: Ryan Reft Fifty-one years after his death in August 1971, E. Barrett Prettyman’s papers continue to provide researchers with an inside look into how the late chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit advocated for both federal judicial reform and the rights of city residents. Posted in: Law, Politics
Of Note: Another Use for an Air Sickness Bag
This part of an occasional series in which we share items that have caught our eye. In the course of my work as a processing archivist, I have seen ample evidence that when the need arises, people grab all sorts of things to serve as writing paper – napkins, placemats, envelopes, and even barf bags. When I was organizing the papers of Air Force General Bernard A. Schriever (1910-2005), I discovered not just one, but two air sickness bags covered with his handwriting.
“Great Elocutionary Power and Dramatic Force”: George Kennan’s Lectures on Russia as Reported in American Newspapers, 1889-1893
This is a guest post by E. Thomas Ewing, Professor of History, Virginia Tech, and Virginia Tech political science majors Taylor Wentzel and Justin Noel.
Archive: May 2022 (6 Posts)
Viet Dinh, Anthony Lewis, and the Complexity of being Asian American in the Twentieth Century May 19, 2022 Posted by: Ryan Reft Long subject to discriminatory immigration policies and violence, being Asian American in the United States has always been marked by incongruence and difficulty made clear in the correspondence between Viet D. Dinh and New York Times journalist Anthony Lewis. Posted in: Asian American History, Letters, War and Society
Behind the Scenes: Helping Letters Tell a Story
This is the latest in an occasional series that looks behind the scenes at the work of Manuscript Division staff. As an archivist, one thing that makes me particularly happy when I am processing a newly acquired collection of personal papers is the sight of bunches of handwritten letters in envelopes. These letters may not have been read since their envelopes were originally opened. I don’t know what they say or the stories they tell until I take them out of the envelopes and unfold them.
“My Hamilton”: Philip Schuyler, Alexander Hamilton, and Yellow Fever
This guest post is by Manuscript Division historian and early America specialist Julie Miller. In September 1793, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton and his wife, Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton, contracted yellow fever. The epidemic that struck Philadelphia—then the capital of the United States—in the summer and fall of 1793 stole the lives of ten to fifteen percent of the city’s population.[i] The Hamiltons were lucky – they survived.
Archive: February 2022 (5 Posts)
Of Note: Lessons from a Director’s Chair February 3, 2022 Posted by: Laura Kells This is the first in an occasional series in which we share items that have caught our eye. This unusual item from the papers of stage and film director Rouben Mamoulian (1897-1987) is a memento from the first movie he ever directed, Applause (1929). Mamoulian saved the back of his director’s chair that had been … Posted in: Literature Culture & the Arts, Of Note
Of Note: Lessons from a Director’s Chair
This is the first in an occasional series in which we share items that have caught our eye. This unusual item from the papers of stage and film director Rouben Mamoulian (1897-1987) is a memento from the first movie he ever directed, Applause (1929). Mamoulian saved the back of his director’s chair that had been embellished with artwork and signatures.
Archive: January 2022 (5 Posts)
2022 is the Frederick Law Olmsted Bicentennial Year, with Explorations of the Olmsted Legacy Taking Place across the Country January 25, 2022 Posted by: Ryan Reft The year 2022 marks the bicentennial of the birth of landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted (1822-1903).
Behind the Scenes: Good Things Come in All Kinds of Packages
This is the first in an occasional series that looks behind the scenes at the work of Manuscript Division staff. When researchers visit the Manuscript Reading Room to consult our collections, they are most likely served archival containers filled with neatly organized acid-free folders, identical except for the numbers on their labels, containing precious historical documents.
“Homeward We Our Cycles Turned from Wandering in an Unknown Land”: Wilbur Wright’s account of a bicycle ride by the Wright Brothers
A bicycle rests near the Wright home at 7 Hawthorne Street in Dayton, Ohio, about 1900. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. During the COVID-19 pandemic the demand for bicycles greatly increased as more and more people turned to them as a safe way to get out of the house for recreation and exercise and as an alternative to public transportation.
Archive: October 2021 (3 Posts)
Nixon’s Political Football October 21, 2021 Posted by: Ryan Reft Less than three months after the Watergate break-in, the Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP) attempted to use NFL football as a political tool to further the president’s 1972 reelection campaign encapsulating Nixon’s innovative use of the sport for electoral advantage and underlining his aggressive approach to politics. Posted in: Politics, Sports
Manuscripts at the Library of Congress
This is a guest post by Kathleen O’Neill, Senior Archives Specialist in the Manuscript Division. The Manuscript Division, located in the Library’s James Madison Building in Washington, D.C., is excited to announce the launch of a born-digital access workstation in the Manuscript Reading Room. Born-digital collection materials are files created and maintained in digital form. Unlike digitized content, born-digital files are not surrogates for physical materials; their original format is digital.
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