Book collections

Magnificent Obsessions: Why We Collect The Smithsonian Libraries has long benefited from the generosity of book collectors who have helped build our world-class museum library system. Our exhibition, Magnificent Obsessions: Why We Collect, tells the captivating stories of the book...	Dibner Library Manuscripts This collection includes correspondence, study and laboratory books, notes, diaries, and hand-lettered texts by notable scientists from the 13^th to the 20^th centuries. Authors like Isaac Newton, Johannes Kepler, Galileo Galilei, Tycho Brahe, Nicola Tesla, Albert Einstein...	Uncle Tom's Cabin: Early and Notable Editions Uncle Tom’s Cabin, one of the most influential books in American history, was written by Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811–1896) to inform readers of the appalling realities of American slavery. First published in March 1852, the novel quickly became an international bestseller, second only...
Japanese Illustrated Books from the Edo and Meiji Periods The National Museum of Asian Art Library's collection of illustrated Japanese rare books includes over 1,000 volumes previously owned by Charles Lang Freer. Often filled with color illustrations, many are by famous artists such as Andō Hiroshige and Katsushika Hokusai. These beautiful woodblock...	The Rare Books of Abecedarium Part history, part coloring book, and part guide to historic books, the Smithsonian Libraries’ Abecedarium: An Adult Coloring Book for Bibliophiles is a contemplative and inspiring way to experience art, science, and culture from the Renaissance through early modern times. Where...	Charles Lang Freer’s Library In 1906, industrialist Charles Lang Freer gave his collection of Asian and American art and related materials in a gift that...
Early Publications in American Indian Languages The Smithsonian Libraries has one of the premier Native North American language and linguistics collections in the world, resulting from the exceptional work of the Smithsonian Institution since its founding. Many of the early printed texts are the works of missionaries in their endeavor to...	James Smithson's Library James Smithson (c.1765-1829), an 18th-century gentleman of science, included his library with his bequest to the United States founding the Smithsonian Institution. The collection consists of...	Arctic Studies Center The Arctic Studies Center (ASC) is a program in the National Museum of Natural History's Department of Anthropology. Established in 1988, it is the only U.S. government program with a...
Beer and Brewing Without undue gravity, we present this active collection of beer, brewing, and brewing industry related material. You can also browse our collection of Trade Literature (catalogs) related to ...	Bella C. Landauer Collection of Aeronautical Sheet Music The Bella C. Landauer Collection of Aeronautical Sheet Music is one of the treasures in the National Air and Space Museum Library. The earliest known aeronautical song was published in 1785. Entitled Chanson sur le Globe Aerostatique,...	Benjamin Moore Catalogs Founded in Brooklyn in 1883, the Benjamin Moore company is best known today for their innovative interior and exterior house paints. Smithsonian Libraries collection of Benjamin Moore trade catalogs reveals a variety of products and color trends throughout the company’s history including coach...
Celebrating African American History and Culture This collection contains material from almost every branch of the Libraries, including our new location in the National Museum of African American History and Culture. We've put this together to celebrate the opening of our newest Smithsonian...	Color in a New Light From chemistry to couture, feathers to physics, color is a topic that links science, history, art and culture. This collection includes books featured in the exhibition "Color in a new Light" as well as rare and interesting titles from across the Libraries collections that reveal the many ways...	Cultivating America's Gardens American garden-making has evolved over time, shaped by history, social attitudes, the environment, and new ideas. The books in this collection illustrate this history and complement the exhibition Cultivating America's Gardens produced by the Libraries and Smithsonian Gardens.
Design Digitized Design Digitized is a collection of rare books from the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum Library collection. Digitization was supported in part by funds from the Metropolitan New York Library Council (METRO) through the New York State Regional Bibliographic Databases Program.	Fantastic Worlds The companion collection to our exhibition Fantastic Worlds: Science and Fiction 1780-1910. Travel back to a time when new frontiers of science were emerging. We took to the air, charted remote corners of the earth, and harnessed the...	George Perkins Marsh In the spring of 1849, the newly founded Smithsonian Institution purchased its first collection, a group of European prints and art books assembled by Vermont Congressman George Perkins Marsh. Although unrelated to the Smithsonian’s then primarily scientific orientation, they were viewed as a...
Heralds of Science In 1955 Bern Dibner, the noted science book collector and founder of the Burndy Library, published Heralds of Science as Represented by Two Hundred Epochal Books and Pamphlets Selected from the Burndy Library. To construct the list, Dibner selected two hundred items he owned that “proclaimed...	Marks on Silver, Pottery, and Porcelain Public Domain works related to hallmarks, factory marks, and other production marks on silverware, pottery, and porcelain.	National Museum of Asian Art Publications Selected publications by the National Museum of Asian Art including their Occasional Papers, Ars Orientalis, and Ars Islamica along with publications about their collections.
Navy and Marine Directories These directories are registers of officers, and sometimes cadets and midshipmen, in the Navy, Marine Corps, and US Naval Reserve for periods including 1776-1887, WW I and WW II. As far as we know, they are not available online elsewhere and are a gold mine of information for genealogical...	Panama Canal Centennial Books from our STRI library, as well as NMAH and NMNH selected to illustrate the history of the Panama Canal and U.S./Panama relations. In commemoration of the Centennial of the Panama Canal in 2014.	Scholarly Editions The Smithsonian Libraries have been digitizing books since 1996. Many of the first books made available online included explanatory essays by prominent scholars, additional details about the books such as collations, or contextual information that had been researched by library staff or visiting...
Scientific Instruments Trade catalogs for scientific instruments. This collection represents a sampling of the overall holdings of scientific instrument trade literature in the Smithsonian Libraries. Digitized catalogs are gradually being migrated from the old site http://www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/Trade-...	Smithsonian Legacy Publications Historical publications from the Smithsonian Institution and it's many divisions including the Bureau of American Ethnology. Many of these titles can be found with additional data in the Biodiversity Heritage Library.	The Great War The Great War profoundly changed not just the geo-political landcape of Europe, and an entire generation, but also the culture, economics, politics, and technology of countries outside the immediate combatants. To commemorate the United States' entry into World War I in April 1917, we present...
The Transcontinental Railroad Completed in 1869 with the driving of the famous "Golden Spike" at Promontory Summit, Utah, the Transcontinental Railroad revolutionized transportation across the United States and fundamentally changed the American West, sparking social, economic, environmental, and political change.	United States Exploring Expedition During the United States Exploring Expedition, thousands of plant and animal species unknown to Western science had been discovered and collected; thousands of miles of coastline had been accurately surveyed and mapped for the first time; the peoples of the innumerable islands of the Pacific and...	World's Fairs Books, catalogs, and ephemera from various World's Fairs and Expositions. Most of the items in this collection were digitized by an outside vendor as part of a special project and are presented as "access copies", that is, they are to be used primarily for informational purposes and do...