Established in 1800 largely through the efforts of Thomas Jefferson, the Library of Congress is one of the world's great libraries. It's initial mission was to server Congress. Today it is a public reference library with over 70 million items located next to the capital in three buildings. In the mid 1980s B first visited the Library of Congress. One of the things that impressed him was the ceiling of the main lobby. When B accompanied L on her first visit to the nation's capital, one of the areas he wanted her to see was this ceiling. L was impressed.