Repositories—Washington, DC

Library of Congress
Local History & Genealogy Reference Services
Main Reading Room

Illuminated west façade view at night
Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building
Washington, D.C.

Library of Congress
101 Independence Ave., SE
Washington, DC 20540-4660

202-707-5537
http://www.loc.gov/rr/genealogy/
E-mail: http://www.loc.gov/rr/askalib/ask-genealogy.html (Ask a Librarian)

Open Monday, Wednesday, Thursday: 8:30 a.m.‒9:30 p.m.; Tuesday, Friday, Saturday: 8:30 a.m.‒5:00 p.m.
Closed Sundays & federal holidays

Repository

The Local History & Genealogy Reference Services is located in the Main Reading Room, Thomas Jefferson Building, Room 100. Reference librarians will help you to discover the collections, services, and resources available to you as a family history researcher in over 20 reading rooms at the Library of Congress.  The Library is open to anyone over the age of 16 years of age with a reader registration card http://www.loc.gov/rr/readerregistration.html. All Library materials are non-circulating.

Be Prepared

Before you visit the Library of Congress, please review Information for Researchers http://www.loc.gov/rr/main/inforeas/. Familiarity with this website will answer most of your questions and help you to know what you need to research in the world’s largest library. Cameras may be used in many of the reading rooms to create digital images, and the microfilm scanners allow for images to be saved for free to a USB drive. For photocopies, you will need to get a copy card.  From the Library’s Web site http://www.loc.gov/, you may search the online catalogs, browse digital collections, review special collections in over 20 reading rooms, or correspond electronically with Library reference staff.  Prior to your visit, we invite you to view an online research orientation to genealogical research at Library at: http://www.loc.gov/rr/genealogy/tours.html and to browse the published guides to the genealogy collections of the Library of Congress at http://www.loc.gov/rr/genealogy/bib_guid/bibguide.html, compiled by reference librarians and available in full text.

Main Reading Room
Library of Congress

Collections and Holdings

As one of the leading genealogical collections in the country, the Library has more than 60,000 genealogies and 100,000 U.S. local histories. You will want to consult the Library’s extensive U.S. City Directory Collection http://www.loc.gov/rr/microform/uscity/. While the Library is rich in collections of manuscripts, microfilms, newspapers, photographs, maps, and published material, it is not an archive or repository for unpublished or primary source county, state, or church records. If you are seeking county records, you will need to visit the courthouse or a library in the county of interest, the state archives, or the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, or one of its Family History Centers.

Digital Collections

We invite you to visit the Library of Congress, but if you are not able to come to Washington, please take a look at American Memory at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/, a multimedia website of 9 million digitized historical documents, photographs, sound recordings, moving pictures, books, pamphlets, maps, and other resources from the Library of Congress’s vast holdings.


Photo: Exterior view. Illuminated west façade view at night. Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington, D.C.
Photo: Main Reading Room, Library of Congress

Repositories—Washington, DC