About the Library

A premier aviation and aerospace history collection, the National Air and Space Museum Library supports research by the Museum’s curatorial staff and aviation researchers around the world. It’s one of the largest branches in the Smithsonian Libraries’ twenty-branch system, which is analogous to a university library system.

The general collection consists of monographs (books), serials, technical reports, government publications and microforms. With approximately 40,000 volumes, the collection supports the following research:

• aerospace, including aviation history
• air transport and aviation (civil and military)
• astronomy
• astrophysics
• balloons and ballooning
• flight material, including propulsion
• geology: lunar, planetary, and terrestrial
• remote sensing
• rocket engine design
• space history, including spacecraft design and instrumentation

The collection evolved from the Museum’s historical collection, originally located in the Smithsonian’s Arts and Industries (A&I) building. At A&I, the core of the collection came from the Institute of Aeronautical Sciences’ and several other donations. We supplemented the rich historical collection with contemporary materials including a major donation from NASA, e.g. the Bellcomm Library on space sciences and exploration. Another long-term (nearly 25 years) donation comes from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), with materials largely on civil aviation and air transportation (see the FAA Finding Aid).

The National Air and Space Museum Library includes several unusual resources:

• Bella Landauer Collection of Sheet Music, consisting of 1100 pieces of sheet music, and over 870 unique titles
• over 200 sound recordings on aviation, including Pres. Calvin Coolidge, Charles Lindbergh at a ceremony marking his trans-Atlantic flight, and Frank Borman narrating “the Sounds of the Space Age.”
• DeWitt Clinton Ramsey Room, with rare and scarce aeronautic and space treasures including William A.M. Burden’s early works on ballooning, and important autographed first editions by pioneers of flight. The collection also includes titles by Samuel P. Langley, the Wright brothers, and Robert Goddard’s rocketry works.