Pulitzer prize winning poet and playwright Archibald MacLeish was an unusual and controversial appointment to Librarian of Congress. In just four years, however, he was able to modernize the Library's administration and established it as a center for American culture. MacLeish previously supported New Deal programs through his writing for Fortune Magazine and literary works. As the United States became increasingly involved in the European conflict, MacLeish coordinated the services of the Library to provide research resources to the federal government during World War II.

MacLeish appointed Luther Evans Chief Assistant Librarian in 1939. After MacLeish became Assistant Secretary of State, Evans was appointed Librarian in 1945 and fulfilled many of MacLeish's goals for the Library. Evans sought an increasing international influence for the Library of Congress as a leading cultural institution. He also set benchmarks in cooperative library work with the successful Library of Congress European Mission and Cooperative Acquisitions Project, 1942-1947, to acquire World War II-era publications and re-establish book buying arrangements between American libraries and European book dealers.

For more information on the MacLeish-Evans era at the Library of Congress, see the online exhibition Freedom's Fortress: The Library of Congress, 1939-1953.

The Library of Congress sent this copy of the Magna Carta, along with the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution to Fort Knox for safety during World War II.

The Archibald MacLeish Papers include literary and correspondence files that document his career as a poet, a writer and journalist, at the Library of Congress and the U.S. State Department, and in academia. Materials documenting MacLeish's work at the Library of Congress are found in the Correspondence, 1907-1981, and Subject file series, 1937-1971.

The following titles link to fuller bibliographic information in the Library of Congress Online Catalog. Links to additional online content are included when available.

The Luther Evans Papers contain his personal notes and writings as Librarian of Congress, as well as earlier files he maintained as Director of the Historic Records Survey, 1935-1939. The earliest materials in this collection date from his college years at the University of Texas. There are also files from his academic career as Political Science professor at Princeton University, and, following his twelve-year tenure as Librarian of Congress, as Director General of UNESCO.

The following titles link to fuller bibliographic information in the Library of Congress Online Catalog. Links to additional online content are included when available.