NEWS from THE LIBRARY OF CONGESS
101 Independence Ave., S.E.
Washington DC 20540-1610
www.loc.gov

January 21, 2009
Public Contact: Beth Davis-Brown, (202) 707-3301 [log in to unmask] Press
Contact: John Sayers, (202) 707-9216 [log in to unmask]

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS RECEIVES GRANT TO CATALOG HIDDEN SPECIAL COLLECTIONS

The Library of Congress has received a Cataloging Hidden Special
Collections
and Archives grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources

(CLIR) to support a project that will catalog 125,000 sheet maps of
Africa.

The catalog records to be produced under the $240,240 grant will include

geographic coordinates for each map that will permit geographic
searching of
the catalog records. The enhanced catalog data will make it possible to
view
the coverage area of individual sheet maps using geographical browsers
such
as Google Earth.

Deanna Marcum, Associate Librarian for Library Services, said, "I am
very
pleased that CLIR is supporting this project that will enable the
Library of
Congress to make detailed geographic information from sheet maps of
Africa
widely available for the first time. This is part of a larger effort by
CLIR
to 'uncover' special collections that have not been well-known outside
of
their own institutions previously, and it is wonderful that the Library
was
a recipient in the first round of grants."

The Library of Congress collected maps since 1800, forming the Geography
and
Map Division in 1897 to concentrate exclusively on the development of
that
collection. At present, the Division holds some 5.5 million maps, 75,000

atlases, 500 globes and globe gores, 3000 raised relief images, and
20,000
digital files.

Work on the CLIR-funded project will be completed by February 2012.

The Cataloging Hidden Special Collections and Archives grant program is
made
possible by funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. For more
information on the program, visit www.clir.org/hiddencollections/.

The Library of Congress is the nation's oldest federal cultural
institution
and serves as the research arm of Congress. It is also the largest
library
in the world, with millions of books, recordings, photographs, maps and
manuscripts in its collections. The Library's mission is to make its
resources available and useful to the Congress and the American people
and
to sustain and preserve a universal collection of knowledge and
creativity
for future generations.