Thomas Jefferson Building

The Thomas Jefferson Building, also known as the Main Library, is the oldest of the Library of Congress buildings in Washington, D.C. Built between 1890 and 1897, it was originally known as the Library of Congress Building and was renamed in 1980 in honor of Thomas Jefferson, a Founding Father, principal author of the Declaration of Independence and third president of the United States. The purchase of Jefferson's own book collection in 1815 had formed a core foundation of the library's holdings, and by the 1880s the library, which had grown to include the United States Copyright Office, needed a building of its own.