The National Archives recently announced the identification of nearly 3,000 Walt Whitman documents written during his service as a Federal government employee.

This trove of information–conclusively identified as Whitman’s papers for the first time by University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) scholar Kenneth Price–sheds light on the legendary poet’s post-war thinking, as well as Whitman’s published reflections on the state of the nation that soon followed. Price discusses the significance of this discovery in the National Archives “Inside the Vaults” video short.