A250: America’s pop culture, a worldwide export

This story also appears in the May/June issue of the Library of Congress Magazine, which focuses on America 250.  Baseball, basketball, football, blues, jazz, rock, Hollywood, Broadway, comic books — what would the planet look like without the great spewing fountain of American pop culture? Never mind the economic, dance floor and movie theater impact of America’s entertainment industry. When the Cold War came down to it, the United States had what Soviet kids wanted most: blue jeans and rock ’n’ roll. Who could compete with Levi’s and Elvis? Likewise baseball, first codified in New York in 1845, was America’s much beloved national pastime — but then became a cultural mainstay in nations as diverse as Castro’s Cuba and post-World War II Japan. The Library’s collections preserve much of this history in multiple formats. In the early 20th century, once modern recording and film technologies took hold and broadcast and mass distribution outlets proliferated, American creativity rocketed not just from Key West to Honolulu but around the world. The global impact of American films, television, theater, music (blues, jazz, rock, rap), comic books and even fast food can’t be quantified — but much of it can be catalogued. The Library’s baseball…

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