April 20, 2001 Newly Discovered War Letters to be Featured at Library of Congress Program on May 16

ABC News correspondent Cokie Roberts, Sen. Daniel K. Inouye (D-Hawaii), and writer Christopher Buckley are among the participants in the Center for the Book's "Books & Beyond" program featuring a new book edited by Andrew Carroll, War Letters: Extraordinary Correspondence from American Wars (Scriber, 2001). The event will be held at 7:00 p.m., Wednesday, May 16 at the Library of Congress, Montpelier Room, sixth floor, James Madison Memorial Building, 101 Independence Ave. S.E. It is free and open to the public; no tickets are required.

Also participating in the program is Gary Powers, Jr., son of U2 pilot Francis Gary Powers, who was shot down over the Soviet Union in 1960. He and the other participants will read excerpts from Mr. Carroll's War Letters.

Andrew Carroll is founder of the Legacy Project, a national, all-volunteer campaign that encourages Americans to safeguard wartime correspondence before these letters are lost or damaged. The May 16 program will be the kick-off for Mr. Carroll's trip to 20 American cities to seek out and preserve historically significant war letters.

The program is cosponsored by the American Folklife Center, which was authorized by Congress in 2000 to initiate the Veterans' Oral History Project. The project, which will collect oral histories, letters, diaries, and other written materials that preserve the legacy of American veterans, will be launched this year.

The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress was established in 1977 to stimulate public interest in books, reading, literacy, and libraries. For information about its programs, publications, and the activities of its affiliated centers for the book in 41 states and the District of Columbia, visit its Web site at www.loc.gov/cfbook.