Great Photographs from the Library of Congress

The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., holds the world's greatest collection of historical photographs. Mathew Brady's Civil War classics, the portraits of American Indians by Edward S. Curtis, and the motion studies of Eadweard Muybridge are just a few examples of the more than 700 extraordinary photographs selected from the Library's Prints and Photographs Division for Great Photographs from the Library of Congress.


This unique book contains iconic photographs, like Dorothea Lange's "Migrant Mother" and the Wright Brothers' first successful airplane flight, as well as many historical images of people and places whose names have been lost or forgotten. Readers will be exposed to a variety of themes and time periods, from a turn-of-the-century color view of bustling activity on Constantinople's Galata Bridge to a shot of the Hindenburg passenger airship in flames; from classic portraits of those who have changed the world--Abraham Lincoln, Enrico Caruso as Pagliacci, and Babe Ruth among them--to illustrations of how the world has changed across the seven continents since the dawn of photography.


Along with the high-quality reproductions of the photographs, this interactive book features links to the Library of Congress website, where readers can access complete catalog information about the photographs, as well as download high-resolution copies of the photographs for personal use.


Introductory texts provide a wealth of information about the breadth and depth of the holdings in the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division (P&P), as well as guidelines for navigating the outstanding online archive of more than one million images. The photographs selected for this book are arranged in eight chapters, each a fascinating visual record of historical topics starting with The World and Its Cultures; followed by American Indians; African Americans; Images of America; Accidents and Disasters; Architecture, Design, and Engineering; War; and Famous People. Each chapter's text highlights the significance of the images within the context of the history of photography and provides information about the particular collections in which they are archived.


Published with the approval and under the guidance of the Library of Congress, Great Photographs from The Library of Congress is in itself a valuable archive presented in an innovative electronic format that bears witness to history--the events and people, the fascinating, entertaining, shocking, thrilling, tragic, and poignant--as only photographs can.