Washington, D.C. has a joyful new reason to visit the Thomas Jefferson Building. “Alive in Many Hands: The American Folklife Center at 50,” the newest exhibition at the Library of Congress, opened September 17 and celebrates half a century of preserving the songs, recipes, crafts and stories that Americans create, practice and pass on every day.
The American Folklife Center was established by Congress in 1976 as the national center for folklife documentation and research. To mark its 50th anniversary, the exhibition gathers more than 150 photographs, recordings, films and treasured objects, organized around the themes of food, play, work and place — and around a happy idea: traditions stay alive because countless hands keep sharing them.
The treasures are wonderfully varied. Look for the banjo signed by Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger and more than 260 other folk musicians; a Passamaquoddy song recorded on a wax cylinder back in 1890; go-go legend Chuck Brown performing “Bustin’ Loose” at the Library in 2002; a contemporary Diné (Navajo) rug that mixes traditional imagery with trucks and a city skyline; a small wooden puzzle carved with a pocketknife in Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains; and the moving World War II diary of Delbert Hesler, one of only five prisoner-of-war diaries in the Veterans History Project archive.
The exhibition is free, includes an online version for faraway fans, and remains on view through January 8, 2028 — plenty of time to bring the family and discover how everyday traditions become national treasures.
Photo: Meg Nicholas, Library of Congress
