A land survey done by George Washington in Virginia in 1749 is on display at the National Press Club in Washington, DC on July 11, 2013. The item is part of a collection from Washington’s estate at Mount Vernon, which announced that the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington on will open on the grounds on Sept. 27, 2013. The 45,000-square-foot library will house Washington’s original military, civil and personal documents. 
 
 View Photo Gallery » Documents and books belonging to George Washington are on display at the National Press Club in Washington, DC on July 11, 2013. The items are part of a collection from Washington’s estate at Mount Vernon, which announced that the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington on will open on the grounds on Sept. 27, 2013. The 45,000-square-foot library will house Washington’s original military, civil and personal documents. Image Gallery Image Gallery Image Gallery Image Gallery Image Gallery 
 
 “I have not houses to build, except one, which I must erect for the accommodation and security of my military, civil and private papers, which are voluminous and may be interesting.” 
 
 -- Letter from George Washington to his friend James McHenry, April 1797. 
 
 Looks like Washington’s plans are finally being realized, more than 200 years later. 
 
 The Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington will open at his Mount Vernon estate in northern Virginia on Sept. 27, 2013, housing thousands of rare books and historical manuscripts owned or written by the country’s first Commander in Chief, the trust announced Thursday. 
 
 The 45,000-square-foot library will open on the estate grounds, and will serve as an education and outreach center for scholars and historians. The Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, which owns and maintains the estate, raised more than $106 million in private money in three years for the project. 
 
 "No president in American history deserves the honor of an official library more than our first chief executive, nor is there a better story to tell," said Curt Viebranz, Mount Vernon president. "This library will share Washington's leadership lessons for generations to come." 
 
 According to the trust, the library's general collection will include: 
 
 More than 12,000 books, journals, audio-visual items and electronic files 
 
 2,500 rare books, including 54 titles and 105 volumes owned by Washington 
 
 6,000 historical manuscripts 
 
 5,000-plus items such as scrapbooks, photos, postcards and memorabilia from Washington's life as a surveyor, plantation owner, military leader and president. 
 
 Here are photos of some of the items on display at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on Thursday. 
 
 lin.cj@stripes.com 
 
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 (CBS News) MOUNT VERNON, Va. -- If you want to separate fact from fiction about George Washington, just ask Curt Viebranz. 
 
 Curt Viebranz / CBS News 
 
 Viebranz is president of Mount Vernon, Washington's home on the Potomac River, where his presidential library will open this fall. 
 
 Washington, Viebranz says, foresaw the need for a library for his papers and books, even way back then. 
 
 "I think he thought for the public good that they should be available," Viebranz says. 
 
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 The inner sanctum, the library's vault, will be open only to researchers. It will hold Washington's own original books. 
 
 "We're trying to do as much as we can to re-create his original library," Viebranz says. 
 
 Washington's library will be located at Mount Vernon on the Potomac River. / CBS News 
 
 Washington had no formal education. Even still, Viebranz says, he spent every waking moment trying to better himself. He read voraciously. 
 
 The library's collection spans a range of topics, from the principles of taxation to flower gardening. 
 
 "I think it's really an example of the Yin and the Yang of Washington," says Viebranz. 
 
 Thousands of books have been written about Washington, but Viebranz says there's still much to learn. For example: how his early acceptance of slavery changed over time. 
 
 Watch: Library dedication brings 5 living presidents together, below. 
 
 "You couldn't be a signatory of the Declaration of Independence and believe that that goes hand in glove with continuing to have slavery, which is why he ended up actually freeing his slaves in his will," says Viebranz. 
 
 The library, Viebranz predicts, will reveal new surprises about Washington, to go along with those already uncovered. For example: he owned the largest distillery in America. Mount Vernon makes and sells his potent brand of whiskey. 
 
 The George Washington we know, and the one we don't, will soon be open to inspection at the library he's been waiting for -- for more than 200 years. ||||| Plan Your Research Visit 
 
 Learn everything you need to know in order to get the most out of your in-person research at the Archives. ||||| After more than 150 years of work, the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association is preparing to open the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington. 
 
 The Fred W. Smith Library at Mount Vernon is expected to open Sept. 27. (Photo: Courtesy of the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association) Story Highlights The library will preserve the president's books, manuscripts, historical documents 
 
 The founders raised $106.4M for construction and programming 
 
 The library opens Sept. 27 
 
 An earlier version of this story misidentified Fred W. Smith as the founder of FedEx. 
 
 It took awhile, but the nation's first president finally has a presidential library. 
 
 "No president in American history deserves the honor of a presidential library more than our first chief executive -- nor is there a better story to tell," says Ann Bookout of the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, which owns and operates the Washington estate outside Washington, D.C., in Virginia. 
 
 The association worked to build the library, called the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington. 
 
 The $106.4 million cost was raised in private funds from 7,000 donors, including $38 million from the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation. Under its chairman, former Las Vegas Review-Journal executive Fred W. Smith, the foundation has sponsored several projects related to George Washington. 
 
 The 45,000-square-foot library is scheduled to open Sept. 27 next to the Washington home on the Mount Vernon estate. 
 
 It will have dozens of rare artifacts that belonged to the first president, including his handwritten notes about books like A New System of Husbandry, and thousands of books, manuscripts and electronic materials about Washington. 
 
 The George Washington library is not part of the presidential library system, which is a network of 13 libraries run by the National Archives to house papers and other important materials of every president since Herbert Hoover. 
 
 "There is a national belief among ordinary citizens that having a library for the benefit of George Washington is an important thing," Curt Viebranz, president of the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, said at a news conference Thursday. 
 
 The three-level structure includes a general library with thousands of books, journals, audio-visual materials and other files on Washington and his work. Within the building are three vaults of rare volumes, 105 of which belonged to Washington, a reading room for manuscripts, conference rooms and a broadcast studio. There is a residence for visiting scholars. 
 
 Viebranz says the library is the culmination of a more than 150-year effort to restore Washington's personal library collection and preserve his materials. It is also meant to promote discussion about Washington's leadership and character. 
 
 The Fred W. Smith Library, which opens Sept. 27, will house dozens of rare books owned by Washington. (Photo: Courtesy of Mount Vernon Ladies' Association) 
 
 "While there have been tens of thousands of books published about Washington and lots of research to be done about him, there are still new things to learn," he says. 
 
 Among items in the library will be Washington's notes from the Compend of Husbandry, his copy of The Beauties of Swift: or, the Favorite Offspring of Wit & Genius by 18th-century satirist Jonathan Swift, and a farm report by his nephew, George A. Washington, from August 1790. 
 
 In a letter to his friend James McHenry, Washington wrote on April 3, 1797, that he needed a place to store his documents: "I have not houses to build, except one, which I must erect for the accommodation and security of my military, civil and private papers, which are voluminous and may be interesting." 
 
 Decades later, Washington's vision seemed like a lost cause. In 1848 the Boston Athenaeum, a research library, purchased most of what remained of Washington's books. The Mount Vernon Ladies' Association was established five years later to preserve the president's estate and re-create his personal reading collection. 
 
 Viebranz says the library is a collaboration of scholars, colleges, corporations and individual donors from all walks of life. 
 
 "I have a regular dialogue with ordinary Americans who send me letters, who basically mentioned the importance of the founding era," he says. "Those folks will dig into their pockets and give us $1, $5, $25." 
 
 Mount Vernon plans an exhibit to open with the presidential library. "Take Note! Washington the Reader" will display books, letters and notes. 
 
 Curator Susan Schoelwer says the documents aim to show not just the books but how Washington read and what he thought. 
 
 "The exhibit really is trying to get inside Washington's head," she says. "There's a sort of mythology out there that he wasn't a reader, but when you begin looking at his books they do cover a wide range of topics." 
 
 The exhibits, Viebranz says, will not only preserve Washington's documents and books but will also give people insight into his character. People will have an opportunity to learn "what was his seminal role at the founding of the republic, which is a lesson that every American should know." 
 
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– Pretty cool: George Washington is finally getting what so many other presidents already have—a presidential library. The 45,000-square-foot library, which will be erected at a cost of $106.4 million that was ponied up by 7,000 donors, is slated to open Sept. 27 at Mount Vernon. But the nation's first prez will have to share top billing: The library is to be called the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington, a nod to the man who helped direct millions toward the effort by way of the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation, which he chairs. With its nontraditional name, it's not entirely surprising to learn that this structure won't be part of the 13-library strong system that the National Archives runs (currently encompassing commanders-in-chief from Herbert Hoover to George W). The Washington Library will house thousands of books—105 of which are rare volumes owned by the president himself, reports USA Today. But bookish history fans won't get to touch. CBS News reports that those books will be housed in what it terms the "inner sanctum," a vault that only researchers will have access to. Stars and Stripes has a photo preview here.