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Preserving USDA and Agricultural History
The Library houses rare books, manuscript collections, nursery and seed trade catalogs, photographs, posters, and more related to the history of agriculture.
Search the Collections
Featured Collections
Black Agricultural Experience in the United States
A curated collection of historical materials that document how Black people across the United States have contributed to and interacted with agriculture.
Rare Books
Strong in botany, natural history, zoology, and entomology, the collection includes writings of many great herbalists of the sixteenth century as well as works documenting agricultural observations, experiments, and practices.
USDA History Collection
This collection documents the work of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, its staff, and agencies. It is particularly strong concerning the activities of the Secretaries of Agriculture, their assistants, and staffs.
Henry G. Gilbert Nursery and Seed Trade Catalog Collection
This collection consists of over 250,000 American and international catalogs. The earliest catalogs date from the late 1700s, but the collection is strongest from the 1890s to the present. Some have been digitized.
U.S. Forest Service Smokey Bear Collection
This collection includes an assortment of materials dating from 1902 to 1994 with the majority of the items relating to the various advertising activities which began in 1942.
USDA Pomological Watercolor Collection
Over 7,000 fruit and nut watercolors are digitized and available for high-resolution download, documenting varieties from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Additional Information
Plan Your Visit
The Special Collections reading room is open to the public for archival research by appointment or to view rare books or archival materials. Because these materials are unique, rare, or fragile, Special Collections does not lend items to researchers or other libraries.
Reading room appointments: Please email us at least 48 hours in advance of your preferred research date. If you are traveling from out of state, please email us to check schedule availability before booking your travel.
Requesting research materials: Please email us the list of research materials you want to view at least 48 hours before you arrive. This gives us time to locate your materials, pull them, and have them ready for you.
Include this information in your request:
- Collection title
- Box number, folder number, and item description
Your research appointment
What to bring to your research appointment
- Government-issued photo identification, such as a passport or driver’s license
- Laptop or tablet computer
- Digital camera or phone (with the flash turned off); camera tripods will be considered if its use does not harm the collection materials
- Pencil and paper for taking notes
- Personal scanners will be considered on a case-by-case basis
What not to bring to your research appointment
- Food, drink, chewing gum, or mints
- Pens, highlighters, or markers
- Self-stick notes
When you arrive at the library
Please enter through the main door at the front of the building (where the flagpole is located). You must present your photo identification and sign in at the security desk. The security guard will inspect any backpacks, bags, or containers.
Tell the guard that you have an appointment with Special Collections, and a staff member will escort you to the reading room on the third floor.
The library provides free parking in the visitor parking lot.
Registration
You will register for your research visit once you reach the Special Collections reading room. There is no online pre-registration required.
Collection care and handling
Special Collections houses archival materials that are rare, unique, and often fragile. To protect these materials and preserve them for future users, we require researchers to follow our care and handling rules while using our collections. A staff member will review these guidelines with you when you arrive.
Copyright and Citations
Permission to Publish
The USDA National Agricultural Library (NAL) owns the physical objects in its collections, but it does not own the copyrights to these materials, except in rare cases.
Because the Library does not own the rights, we cannot give or deny permission to reproduce or re-publish the materials in our collections. Permission can only be granted by the copyright holders, their heirs, or assignees.
Works created by United States government employees, including employees of USDA, in the course of their jobs are in the public domain and may be copied without permission.
You are responsible for determining the copyright status of a work you wish to reproduce. You must also make sure your use of the work complies with U.S. copyright law.
The unique nature of archival materials sometimes makes it difficult, or even impossible, to determine their copyright status. Special Collections staff will share information whenever possible that might help identify the owner of a copyright.
Citing Materials from Special Collections
Citations help readers or viewers of your work find the sources that you used. Include as much detail as possible in your citations to help someone locate the item in the archive.
Citations
Please include the full collection title, box and folder numbers (if applicable) in your citation. For example:
Kellogg, Charles E. Soil map of Michigan. 1924. Box 31, Folder 625. Charles Edwin Kellogg Papers. Special Collections, USDA National Agricultural Library.
If you need to verify a collection name, or if you have any questions about writing citations for Special Collections materials, please contact us.
Image Credits
Please use the following credit line with images from Special Collections:
Special Collections, USDA National Agricultural Library.
Duplication Services
NOTICE WARNING CONCERNING COPYRIGHT RESTRICTIONS:
The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Under certain conditions specified in the law, libraries and archives are authorized to furnish a photocopy or other reproduction. One of these specific conditions is that the photocopy or reproduction is not to be "used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research." If a user makes a request for, or later uses, a photocopy or reproduction for purposes in excess of "fair use," that user may be liable for copyright infringement.
We provide copies of materials from Special Collections to support research and for use in publications.
NAL's Special Collections staff will copy collection materials to support your research and for use in publications.
We can scan or photocopy up to 50 pages of standard-size documents for you. We will consider requests for copies of other items (such as oversize documents, posters, rare books, etc.) on a case-by-case basis.
Before we fill a duplication order, we consider the material’s format, physical condition, any applicable restrictions, and our staff availability. We reserve the right to refuse a request because of copyright restrictions, privacy of persons named in the documents, donor-imposed restrictions, or potential damage to materials caused by handling them.
How to Request Copies
You can request copies of Special Collections materials either in person or online. Please help us locate the items by including as much of the following information as you can:
- Name of the collection containing the items
- Box and folder numbers
- Item titles or short descriptions
- Dates
- Page numbers
Duplication Fees and Processing Time
Currently, our duplication services are free of charge. This includes photocopies or research-quality scans (pdf or jpeg format) of standard-size documents in quantities of 50 pages or fewer.
We also accept requests for high-resolution, publication-quality scans. Please see Copyright and Citation above for information on using images in publications.
Personal Cameras and Scanners
You may use a camera (with flash turned off) to capture document images when you visit our reading room. Personal scanning equipment and camera tripods will be considered on a case-by-case basis to ensure there is no risk of damaging the collection materials.
Publishing Guidelines
If you plan to publish or publicly display a digital image of an item from NAL’s Special Collections, you are responsible for:
- Determining the item’s copyright status and making sure your use of the work follows U.S. copyright law
- Citing the source of the item
For more information, please see Copyright and Citations above.