New Library of Congress exhibit spotlights rare historical artifacts

Washington — Housed contained in the Library of Congress, the nation’s oldest federal cultural establishment, is a treasure trove from previous and current within the new “Collecting Memories” exhibit which opened this week.  

“What we want people to get from looking at just a sample, a small sample of the treasures of the Library of Congress, is these are their memories,” Librarian Carla Hayden informed CBS News. “These are their items. It is the nation’s library.”

The exhibit showcases rare artifacts spanning centuries of historical past — starting with a handwritten draft of President Abraham Lincoln’s historic Gettysburg Address in 1863, and a photograph of Lincoln from that day.

“That’s the only photo we have, or anybody has, of him at Gettysburg,” Hayden stated.

The exhibit additionally has the contents of Lincoln’s pockets from the evening he was assassinated, together with a pocket watch, two pairs of glasses, a handkerchief, and a billfold along with his identify.  

There’s additionally a crystal flute first girl Dolly Madison saved when the White House was burned by the British in 1814, made well-known once more after pop star Lizzo visited the library and performed it at one of her live shows in September 2022.

“After Ms. Lizzo played that flute, we had a teacher contact us and said, ‘I think there’ll be more children who want to play the flute after seeing that,'” Hayden stated. “…It took off, and people said, ‘What else does the Library of Congress have?'”
 
With greater than 178 million objects, the library narrowed down the exhibition to simply over 100 of its most prized possessions, together with Oscar Hammerstein’s “Do-Re-Mi” lyric sheet from “The Sound of Music,” the unique Spiderman drawings, the designs from the Washington Monument and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, and the stitching machine used to assemble the AIDS Memorial quilt.

“These are the things that we want everyone to be able to see,” Hayden stated. “You don’t have to be the president of the United States. You don’t have to be a visiting ambassador…You can see it, it’s free, and you can have that pinch me moment.”

Nikole Killion

Nikole Killion is a CBS News congressional correspondent primarily based in Washington D.C. As a correspondent, Killion performed a key function within the Network’s 2020 political and election protection, reporting from across the nation through the last stretch of the marketing campaign and all through the Biden transition.