National Audio-Visual Conservation Center facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Packard Campus |
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| Established | 2007 |
| Location | 19053 Mount Pony Road, Culpeper, VA |
| Coordinates | 38°26′31.052″N 77°58′25.539″W / 38.44195889°N 77.97376083°W |
The National Audiovisual Conservation Center, also known as the Packard Campus, is a special place where the Library of Congress keeps its huge collection of movies, TV shows, and sound recordings. It's located inside a mountain called Mount Pony in Culpeper, Virginia. This center is like a giant vault for America's sights and sounds!
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A Home for History's Sounds and Sights
This amazing center opened in 2007. Before that, from 1969 to 1988, the building was a super-secret storage place for the Federal Reserve Board. In 1997, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation bought it for the Library of Congress. They paid $5.5 million for it.
Later, the Packard Humanities Institute and the U.S. Congress gave more money. This helped turn the old building into the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center. It was finished in mid-2007. By fall 2008, it started showing free movies to the public.
For the first time, all 6.3 million items from the Library of Congress's movie, TV, and sound collections could be stored in one place. This includes old films, TV shows, and music recordings.
The Packard Campus is the main part of the larger National Audio-Visual Conservation Center. The center also includes other Library of Congress offices in Washington, D.C.
The design of the Packard Campus won an award in 2007. It involved updating the old building and adding a new underground entrance. This new area has a large movie theater, offices, and research rooms. The building has the biggest "green roof" in the eastern United States. This means its roof is covered with plants, helping it blend into nature.
The Secret Cold War Bunker
During the Cold War, people worried about a nuclear war. The Federal Reserve built a secret bunker to protect the U.S. economy. This bunker was meant to hold enough U.S. money to restart the cash supply east of the Mississippi River if a disaster happened.
The bunker opened on December 10, 1969. It was about 400 feet (122 meters) long and 140,000 square feet (13,000 square meters). It was built with thick steel-reinforced concrete to protect against radiation. Lead-lined covers could drop over the windows. The building was also covered by 2 to 4 feet (0.6 to 1.2 meters) of dirt. Barbed-wire fences and a guard post surrounded it.
This bunker stored billions of dollars in U.S. money. This included many $2 bills stacked high on pallets. If a nuclear attack happened, this money would be used to supply cash east of the Mississippi River.
The bunker also served as a "continuity of government" site until 1992. This meant it was a safe place for government leaders to continue working during an emergency. It had enough space and supplies for 540 staff members for 30 days. It had dorms for sleeping and a pre-planned menu of freeze-dried foods. Private wells provided clean water. The facility also had an incinerator, an indoor pistol range, and a helicopter landing pad.
The bunker also housed the Culpeper Switch. This was a central station for the Federal Reserve's electronic money transfer system. It helped banks send money electronically.
After the Cold War
In 1988, all the money was moved out of Mount Pony. The Culpeper Switch stopped working in 1992. The bunker was no longer a secret government site. It was not well cared for until 1997, when it was put up for sale.
With approval from the United States Congress, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation bought it. They paid $5.5 million for the Library of Congress. Then, the Packard Humanities Institute and Congress gave more money. This helped turn the old bunker into the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center. It opened in mid-2007. This center became the single place to store all 6.3 million items in the Library's movie, TV, and sound collections.
Cool Campus Design
The Packard Campus was designed to be a "green building". Most of it is underground and has roofs covered with plants. This helps it blend into the Virginia countryside. From one side, you only see a curved entrance that lets natural light into the offices.
The campus also has a huge re-forestation effort. They planted over 9,000 young trees and nearly 200,000 other plants.
The underground storage rooms are very cold, some even below freezing. They have almost 90 miles (145 kilometers) of shelves! This doesn't even include 124 special vaults for old nitrate film. This is the largest storage complex for nitrate film in the Western hemisphere. The campus also has a data center that can save huge amounts of digital information, up to a petabyte (which is like a million gigabytes!).
The campus also has a 206-seat movie theater. It can show both old films and new digital movies. It even has a digital organ that rises from under the stage to play music for silent film screenings. The Packard Campus often shows culturally important films in its beautiful Art Deco style theater. You can find their schedule online.
Special Events
Mostly Lost Film Identification Workshop
Every summer, the Packard Campus hosts a workshop called Mostly Lost. This event helps identify old silent and sound films. Unidentified film clips are shown to people who attend. Together, they try to figure out what the unknown films are.
Films come from the Library of Congress and other film archives. These include the George Eastman Museum, the UCLA Film & Television Archive, and the EYE Film Institute from the Netherlands. Screenings happen in the Packard Campus Theater.
Fall Open House
The Packard Campus has an annual open house on the Columbus Day holiday. This is a chance for the public to tour the facility. Visitors can also learn from staff about their work for the Library of Congress. They explain how they care for the huge audio-visual collections.
