From Annex to Adams

88. Artist Ezra Winter’s rendering of The Canterbury Tales, a mural on the walls of the north reading room in the Adams Building.

Called the Annex Building when it opened to the public in 1939, the Library’s handsome John Adams Building was officially named for the nation’s second president in 1980. John Adams was a book-loving and -collecting president; he also signed the Library’s founding legislation in 1800.

The simple classical structure of the Adams Building was intended, essentially, to function as an efficient bookstack “encircled with work spaces.” The Washington architectural firm of Pierson & Wilson designed the structure, with Alexander Buel Trowbridge as consulting architect. The contract stipulated completion by June 24, 1938, but the building was not ready for occupancy until December 2, 1938. The move of the Card Division began on December 12 and the building opened to the general public on January 3, 1939. The two reading rooms on the top floor, however, were not ready for use by researchers until early April.

The Adams Building’s somewhat understated decorative style contains striking elements of Art Deco inspired by the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs held in Paris in 1925. In recent times it has been recognized as one of the few distinguished Art Deco buildings in Washington, DC. The building’s dignified exterior is faced with white Georgia marble and pink granite from North Carolina. The history of the written word is depicted in bas-relief figures by designer Lee Lawrie on the bronze doors at both the west and east entrances. Reflecting the Library’s increasing international role and collecting interests, emphasized by Librarian Putnam, the figures on the doors represent cultures that, since ancient times, have influenced the art of writing.

When it opened the Annex contained 180 miles of shelving (compared with 104 miles in the Jefferson Building when it opened in 1897) and was designed to hold 10 million volumes. It has entrances and decorative doors at both the west and east entrances. At its heart are 12 tiers of stacks, extending from the cellar to the fourth floor. A sculpted stairway with stylized owls and ornate lamps leads to the southern entrance on Independence Avenue. This entrance, which has never been used, was intended for the US Copyright Office.

Murals by artist Ezra Winter are the “hidden treasures” of the two public reading rooms on the top floor of the Adams Building. In The Canterbury Pilgrims, composed for the walls of the north reading room, Winter presents the Pilgrims in very nearly the order in which Chaucer introduced them in the Prologue to The Canterbury Tales. The mural topic in the south reading room presents less of a surprise but is worthy of attention: inscriptions of Thomas Jefferson’s carefully crafted thoughts on freedom, labor, the living generation, education, and democratic government.

Soon after he became Librarian of Congress on November 12, 1975, Daniel J. Boorstin declared that he “had never met anyone named Mr. Annex,” and announced his intent to change the building’s name. He did so on April 13, 1976, in a ceremony that also marked the birthday of Thomas Jefferson. President Gerald Ford signed into law an act of Congress that changed the name of the Annex Building to the Thomas Jefferson Building. But the change only lasted four years. With the James Madison Memorial Building due to open in 1980, the Architect of the Capitol asked the Library to consider a greater uniformity in the names of the Library’s buildings. Why not name each for a Founding Father who indeed had a strong connection to the Library? Fortunately, John Adams was available. Therefore, on June 10, 1980, the grand 1897 structure known for so many years as “The Library,” rightfully became the Thomas Jefferson Building and the structure called the Annex, but briefly renamed for Jefferson, became, permanently, the John Adams Building.

89. The owl as a symbol of learning is an especially prominent motif in the Library’s Adams Building. This stunning art deco depiction is seen throughout the building.

90. The Library’s John Adams Building, originally known as the Annex.