[Historical Research / Community Help] Any DC locals willing to photograph rare Japanese experimental small arms albums at the Library of Congress? 🇯🇵

[_DELAVR]

Hey everyone,

As many of you know, I spend a lot of time digging into primary archival sources on rare WWII Japanese weaponry—both for historical research and to find authentic, obscure prototypes that could make great additions or suggestions for the game.

View of the Library of Congress Asian Reading Room, which is located in Jefferson Building Room 150. Photo: Tien Doan.

Recently, through correspondence with Library of Congress staff, I tracked down two uncataloged wartime Japanese military photo albums physically held in their Asian Division in Washington, D.C.:

• LCCN 2017369615 (Shisei shōjūrui, jidō shōjūrui, kikan tanjūrui — 13 pages covering experimental bolt-action rifles, semi-automatic rifles, and submachine guns).

• LCCN 2017369616 ([Jū, guntō, buki fuzoku yōgu nado] — 39 pages covering various small arms, military swords, mounts, and ordnance accessories).

A huge thank you goes to Jessi from the Library of Congress Asian Division reference staff, who kindly located these folders in the stacks and provided a few sample reference snapshots to confirm their contents. In fact, for those who remember my earlier forum suggestion on the 10-round Type Otsu semi-automatic rifle —this exact album (LCCN 2017369615 ) is where that material came from!

I’ve attached the sample photos below so you can see what the physical album pages look like:

Sample photos from the Asian Division

In the interest of full transparency: since there is no detailed page-by-page index, I don’t know for certain what awaits on all the remaining pages. We might uncover completely unseen prototypes that have never been published online, or in practice, much of the remaining material might turn out to be standard or already-known pieces. Either way, photographing both albums in full will finally solve the mystery and preserve these records for the community.

Unfortunately, due to reproduction policy restrictions, the Library’s Duplication Services cannot provide complete remote scans for these folders. Because I live overseas, hiring a commercial researcher is financially and logistically out of reach.

So, I’m reaching out to our community: Is anyone living in the DMV area (or visiting D.C.) willing to stop by the Library of Congress to take reference smartphone photos of these 52 pages?

What’s involved:

• Where: Asian Reading Room (Room LJ-150 ), Thomas Jefferson Building, Library of Congress (10 First St SE, Washington, DC). Open Monday – Friday, 8:30 AM – 5:00 PM .

• Access: Obtaining a Reader Identification Card is free and takes about 10–15 minutes on-site with any standard government photo ID (driver’s license, passport, etc.).

• Equipment: Just a regular smartphone camera.

• Time: Roughly 1–2 hours total to register, request the two folders at the desk using the LCCNs above, and snap the 52 pages.

If you are in the D.C. area and have some spare time on a weekday to help out, please shoot me a PM or leave a reply below.

Thanks a lot for your time and support!