10 interesting facts about the upcoming January 30th birthday of the Library of Congress.

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Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States of America (Free-Press-Release.com) January 25, 2011 -- The Greatest Garage Sale in American History
Interesting facts about the upcoming January 30th birthday of the Library of Congress.

In celebration of the Library of Congress’s 196th birthday on January 30, The Quarter Roll magazine has posted the top 10 things you may not have known about Thomas Jefferson and his personal library of books which helped create the Library of Congress.

1) April 24, 1800: President John Adams approved $5,000 to be spent on creating the Library of Congress. The Library was started with 3 maps and 740 books purchased primarily from London.

2) August 24, 1814: While invading Washington DC British troops burned the Library of Congress which was housed in the Capitol building.

3) Late 1814: Thomas Jefferson was actively looking for ways to pay off his $46,000.00 debt (about $500,000.00 in 2011 dollars), and asked if Congress would be willing to buy his personal library in order to replenish the books lost during the War of 1812.

4) In order to entice Congress into making the purchase, Jefferson also sweetened the deal by organizing the books by categories of History, Philosophy, and Fine Arts.

5) Jefferson did not originally ask for any particular amount of money for his books, but rather promised to accept any price that Congress felt was fair.

6) The final Congressional vote to buy the books was not unanimous, but passed by 10 votes.

7) On January 30, 1815, President James Madison approved this measure decided on by Congress.

8) Jefferson was paid $23,950.00 for all of his books, which was estimated to be about 20% of their original value.

9) The actual number of books shipped to the Library of Congress by Thomas Jefferson was 6,487.

10) Tragically, a second fire on Christmas Eve of 1851, destroyed nearly two thirds of the books Congress had purchased from Jefferson.

More on the history of Thomas Jefferson and the Library of Congress can be found in the upcoming story “The Greatest Garage Sale in American History” in the March / April edition of The Quarter Roll. Find out more at TheQuarterRoll.com.

More information can be found online at http://www.thequarterroll.com

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