If you live in the Washington D.C. Area, the Library of Congress is currently seeking volunteer docents to lead tours of the library. If I lived anywhere nearby, I’d be all over that! I watched the C-Span Library of Congress documentary over the weekend and volunteering there would be the next best thing to working there. It is an amazing place and the story of how it was built and all of the architectural details and symbols, I don’t think we’d be able to create something like it today.
Another really awesome place to spend time or work at is the Harry Ransom Centre at the University of Texas at Austin. They have the papers of David Foster Wallace, Norman Mailer, David Mamet, Don DeLillo and many other writers. They are aggressive collectors and it would be so cool to be able to paw through their stuff, don’t you think?
And that uses up my energy store this evening. It is really humid again and the air is thick enough to cut with a knife. Tomorrow should be better. I hope.
I’m embarrassed to say that I live nearby, and I haven’t even been to the Library of Congress . I do know a couple of people who work there, but still haven’t managed a visit (hanging my head in shame). I should visit and give those docents some work to do!
The University of Cambridge library is pretty awesome too, hint, hint. And we’re in a distinctly cool patch of weather at the moment, hint, hint.
Teresa, I totally understand how you can live nearby and even know people who work at the LOC and never have been there. There are some awesome places in in my town I’ve never been to. I think, I could go there any time, so I go other places instead because of it. It is how we miss the gems in our own backyard in favor of the attractions of far away.
Litlove, LOL! One of these days I’ll have to come and visit your library, or maybe even get a job as a librarian there
Oh wow, I would totally be there. That sounds AMAZING.
Several years ago (decades, really) I was in DC and stopped by the LoC. A tour was already in progress, so I joined it. It was all about the preservation of books. It was so fascinating, I wanted to run off to bookbinding/preservation school right then. But, since I had missed the first half of the tour, I decided to tag along on a second tour that was just starting as my tour was ending. The docent for the second tour discussed all of the facts of the physical building — how large, how many books, how many years to build — and discussed the current exhibits. One case had the contents of Lincoln’s pockets when he was shot : a few coins, a photograph, glasses, a comb, and an unfavorable of his policies from a recent newspaper. I think that if I lived there, I might have to go several times, as obviously the docents have different areas of expertise!
I would really be all over it, too!
Oh, yes, it would be awesome to paw through the papers of those writers! I don’t think being a docent is quite my thing, but it would be fun to take your tour!
I’ve been lucky to see some fantastic artists books at the HRC at UT. The bookbinders group I belong to (though rarely seem to meet up with nowadays due to my crazy job) has a great connection with the HRC so we get private viewings of books. So cool.
You are right, being a volunteer docent at the Library of Congress would be awesome!
I live in the area and work only a few blocks from the LOC.I immediately clicked the link when I read this. The problem for me (and no doubt others) is the training schedule is essentially the better part of two workdays a week for 3 months! I could easily swing part of a workday occasionally to satisfy the requirements for the docents once trained but I can’t manage to give up that much worktime to get trained.
Concerning the weather….I don’t think it’s ever going to get better. Sigh.
Now if an archivist heard you say you wanted to paw through the materials they would probably cringe!
(But I would want to, too). And I have often thought how cool it would be to work at the LoC, too, but it’s too hot and humid in DC as well.
That sounds like so much fun! I’d love to be a LOC docent.
Teresa, there are places in SF I haven’t been to yet – familiarity breeds…….well, not contempt. Just the feeling that one could always do X if one wished and therefore can just as easily spend the day reading a novel rather than trying to figure out if it’s a No Cars day and finally visit the refurbished De Young Museum. Just as an example plucked out of thin air…..
Have you grown gills yet? I’m sure they’d be useful.