Library of Congress Collections: Rare Book & Special Collections Reading Room

The Americas

Rare Book & Special Collections Reading Room

This view of St. Augustine is the earliest engraving of any locality that is now in the United States.
The English fleet lies at anchor, the infantry troops having disembarked and are attacking the Spanish settlement
on May 28 and 29, 1586. From the online exhibit of The Cultures and History of the Americas; the Jay I. Kislak Collection.
 Image Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

"Today the division's collections amount to nearly 800,000 books, broadsides, pamphlets, theater playbills, title pages, prints, posters, photographs, and medieval and Renaissance manuscripts. Although the division's materials have come into its custody for a variety of reasons--their monetary value, importance in the history of printing, binding, association interest, or fragility, they have one point in common: the collections offer scholarly documentation about the western and American traditions of life and learning."

• The Jay I. Kislak Collection
• "Cultures and history of the Americas. Includes thousands of books and artifacts of native civilizations of the Americas donated by Jay and Jean Kislak."
• American Books
• "Books published in and/or cover the topic of the United States."
• Travels and Voyages
• "Books on travel and voyages. Selected from multiple collections across the Rare Book and Special Collections Division."
• An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Printed Ephemera
• "A rich repository of Americana primary-source items dating from the seventeenth century to the present and encompasses key events and eras in American history."
• Exploring the Early Americas: The Jay I. Kislak Collection Exhibit
• "Selections from the more than 3,000 rare maps, documents, paintings, prints, and artifacts that make up the Jay I. Kislak Collection at the Library of Congress."
• Pre-Contact America
• Explorations and Encounters
• Aftermath of the Encounter

Children's Literature Corner

Illustrated Guide to the Collections

• Introduction
• American History
• American Literature
• Book Arts
• The Illustrated Book
• List of Selected Special Collections
• Concordance of Images
• How to order copies of the images

Finding Aids

Digitized Rare & Special Collections

• Books
• Catalogs
• Exhibits

Collections with Maps

• American Revolution and Its Era: Maps and Charts of North America and the West Indies, 1750-1789
•  "an important historical record of the mapping of North America and the Caribbean. Most of the items presented here are documented in Maps and Charts of North America and the West Indies, 1750-1789: A Guide to the Collections in the Library of Congress compiled by John R. Sellers and Patricia Molen van Ee in 1981. The bibliography contains approximately 2,000 maps and charts. "
• Essay about the interest in mapping North America between 1750-1789
• Collections Items

• Discovery and Exploration
• "documents the discovery and exploration with both manuscripts and published maps. Many of these maps reflect the European Age of Discoveries, dating from the late 15th century to the 17th century when Europeans were concerned primarily with determining the outline of the continents as they explored and mapped the coastal areas and the major waterways. Also included are 18th and 19th century maps documenting the exploration and mapping of the interior parts of the continents, reflecting the work of Lewis and Clark and subsequent government explorers and surveyors."
• Essay about the 1562 Map of America
• Collections Items
• Louisiana: European Explorations and the Louisiana Purchase
• "This presentation focuses on the various documents from maps to newspapers to cultural artifact that help to describe the region of North America that stretched from as far east as Alabama into what is now the state of  Montana.  The 119 items presented here come from the various special and general collections of the Library of Congress."
• Essay on the Exploration and Legacy of the Louisiana Territory
• Collections Items
• Military Battles and Campaigns
• "This category contains maps showing campaigns of major military conflicts including troop movements, defensive structures and groundworks, roads to and from sites of military engagements, campsites, and local buildings, topography and vegetation. Some of the maps are manuscripts drawn on the field of battle, while others are engraved including some that have manuscript annotations reflecting the history of the battle or campaign. A significant number of battle maps provide information about the locality that is not available elsewhere such as the location of plantations, the names of landowners in the area, the configuration of small towns and villages, and indications of prior settlement by native Americans."
• Collections Items
• Rochambeau Map Collection
• "contains cartographic items used by Jean Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau (1725-1807), when he was commander in chief of the French expeditionary army (1780-82) during the American Revolution. The maps were from Rochambeau's personal collection, cover much of eastern North America, and date from 1717 to 1795. The maps show Revolutionary-era military actions, some of which were published in England and France, and early state maps from the 1790s. Many of the items in this extraordinary group of maps show the importance of cartographic materials in the campaigns of the American Revolution as well as Rochambeau's continuing interest in the new United States.The collection consists of 40 manuscript and 26 printed maps, and a manuscript atlas, the originals of which are in the Library of Congress' Geography and Map Division."
• Collections Items

Rare Book Webcasts

• The Origins & Collapse of the Preclassic Maya in the Mirador Basin, Guatemala: Cultural & Natural Dynamics in the Cradle of the Maya Civilization
• Richard Hansen, 2014.