World Digital Library

The digital collections of the Library of Congress have expanded into the World Digital Library. The Library of Congress describes this international resource as follows:

The World Digital Library is a cooperative project of the Library of Congress, the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and partner libraries, archives, and educational and cultural institutions from the United States and around the world. The project brings together on a single website rare and unique documents – books, journals, manuscripts, maps, prints and photographs, films, and sound recordings – that tell the story of the world’s cultures. The site is intended for general users, students, teachers, and scholars.

The WDL interface operates in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. The actual documents on the site are presented in their original languages.

Here is a video of one of the resources, "The Arrival of Immigrants at Ellis Island." It depicts scenes at the Immigration Depot and a nearby dock on Ellis Island. It appears to show, first, a group of immigrants lined up to board a vessel leaving the island, then another group arriving at the island and being directed off of the dock and into the depot by a uniformed official. World Digital Library.

I suppose you could spend all of your time just looking at the fabulous wealth of resources becoming available on the Internet every day. But it is interesting to see how many of the items relate to families and family history.