The story starts 15 years ago in a Virginia park. The dad, Tom Liljenquist, has two boys in tow, about 5 and 3 years old, and the younger one plucks an object from the sandstone bed of a quiet creek. It's a Civil War bullet—and it becomes the first piece in a collection of artifacts that the brothers will nurture from grade school to college.
Elder son Jason was a busy Stanford freshman in April, when the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., opened a four-month exhibit of his family's trove: photographs of 412 Civil War soldiers, whose portraits illuminate a neglected layer of history. The exhibit, which coincides with the 150th anniversary of the war's start, combines equally rare qualities of dramatic discovery and windfall donation.
The Liljenquists gave all the photos they had searched out and acquired to the Library of Congress as a gift to the nation, handing over a largely unknown and valuable collection out of the blue. The delicate images, all made on glass (ambrotypes) or metal (tintypes), are defined by the haunting sense of personality that emanates from so many of the visages. They're also little treasuries of customs and tastes, providing a tantalizing glimpse into the era just on the basis of the clothes and items pictured.
"You can tell the collection is special because the library reacted so quickly and at such a scale," says Helena Zinkham, chief of prints and photographs.
The free exhibit, The Last Full Measure: Civil War Photographs from the Liljenquist Family Collection, runs through August 13. Some other projects were put on a slower track as the library readied the display for visitors while simultaneously creating a digital archive of the collection. The photos can be viewed online, as well as downloaded and reproduced without restriction.
Not so long ago, the collection was a proud but somewhat aimless accumulation that had overtaken the Liljenquist home and psyche. The photos became the family's dominant interest, but for years there were many that remained stored in scattered drawers and closets throughout rooms strewn with Civil War weapons and memorabilia. Jason remembers wondering "what my friends thought of my home, because it was just a giant collection hole." More tellingly, he recalls being deeply affected by the way 7- and 8-year-old classmates were fascinated with the collection when it was shown at school.
"Without a question," Jason says, "my dad is responsible for this whole thing. But by second grade on, [brother] Brandon and I played a very active role. We went to more estate auctions and Civil War shows than I can remember."
IN MOURNING: A cavalryman's daughter. (Photo: Library of Congress)The essence of the collection came into focus when the Liljenquists were struck by Washington Post photo tributes to U.S. service members who died in Iraq and Afghanistan. That inspired Jason and Brandon to organize all their photos and think in terms of an arrangement that would make both an emotional and educational impact. "Presented together," Brandon wrote in an essay that accompanies the online gallery, "we hoped the photographs would illustrate the magnitude of our nation's loss of 620,000 lives in a way never before shown in the history books."
The family also decided to look for a public institution to which it could donate the collection with the best agreement for its preservation and usefulness. They found the Library of Congress more than enthusiastic and entered into a partnership that allows them to add photos as they keep collecting. The original donation was just under 700 photos; the exhibit concentrates on 360 Union images (one for every 1,000 men who died) and, because they're scarcer, 52 Confederate portraits (one for every 5,000). There also was space left in the exhibit to display some portraits of women from that era.
Among the highlights is the apparently only known extant portrait that includes an African-American Union soldier's family. The Liljenquists didn't discover it, and Tom notes that it has received previous public attention. But the family set a personal single-purchase record to acquire it: $19,200.
RARITY: This is thought to be the only known photo of an African-American Union soldier with his family. (Photo: Library of Congress)
Various photos had prices in the thousands, yet the bidding and buying was not what excited the Liljenquists. The real attraction is exemplified by the brothers' determined research into George Weeks, a Union drummer boy whose photo came with some of his personal letters. The full story of his sacrifice, concluding with his death from malaria at 21, symbolized all the crusading tumult of the war. The family has dedicated the exhibit to him.
WAR DRUM: George Weeks, to whom the exhibition is dedicated. (Photo: Library of Congress) Extraordinarily Ordinary
The most distinctive aspect of the Liljenquist family's Civil War photos may be the prominence of the rank-and-file soldier, including many who exude a startling youthfulness.
"One of the reasons it's such a phenomenal collection is that it filled a historical gap," notes Helena Zinkham of the Library of Congress. "Most pictures we're familiar with are of famous figures, generals and also large group portraits. These are photos of privates and corporals, with the occasional lieutenant and captain."
Zinkham, chief of prints and photographs, says the items soldiers brought to their portrait sessions offer rich clues about what mattered to them and about the history of photography. Details of their clothing, including coats and hats with insignia and buttons, and their poses with weapons and other possessions "will inform many fields of study for years to come."
The collection tended throughout childhood by the Liljenquist brothers—Jason, '14, Brandon, who is entering USC, and 14-year-old Christian—represents a donation of such unusual significance, says Zinkham, that she and colleagues could not document any photographic gift of similar scope in at least the past 50 years.
A Teachable Momentum
The Liljenquist family is coupling its contribution to the nation's archives with a venture benefiting Stanford undergraduates: endowed internships at the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. The Haas Center for Public Service will administer the internships.
Along with making additions to the Civil War photographs they donated to the Library of Congress, the Liljenquists are building a collection of Civil War memorabilia for the African American museum, scheduled to move into its own new building on the mall in Washington, D.C., in 2015.
