Carol M. Highsmith Archive photos from the 1980s

Banquet hall of the Biltmore Estate, George W. Vanderbilt's mansion that became the nation's largest home, Asheville, North Carolina

Bally's Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada

Bar at the Gibson Inn, a favorite Florida Panhandle watering hole at the hotel in Apalachicola, Florida

Balder figure, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C

Bar at the historic St. James Hotel, built in the 1870s in Red Wing, Minnesota

Bank of Canton office in a building that once housed a telephone exchange, San Francisco, California

Baltimore's Inner Harbor, including a view of the Chesapeake Lightship, a floating lighthouse that used to guide vessels into the Chesapeake Bay in Baltimore, Maryland

Barn and storage shed near Sherman Dale, Pennsylvania

Barn along US Highway 101 near Salinas, California

Barn in rural Maryland

Barn in the American countryside in springtime

Barn in rural America

Barn with a painted silo near Sycamore, Illinois

Barn reflected in a pond near Eagle's Nest Airport, Waynesboro, Virginia

Barn welded together with various pieces of colorful sheet metal in North Carolina

Barn that looks new but apparently has more than a century of years on it

Barn whose owner has civic pride in Wright, Texas

Barn in Caledonia, Illinois

Barn with an oversized cupola, which helps with ventilation

Barn, and more so, a silo, in trouble

Barn with an oversized cupola, excellent for ventilation in rural America

Barn with a patriotic touch

Barn in rural Virginia

Barn, Kleffner Ranch, East Helena, Montana

Barns in northern Illinois, between Chicago and Rockford

Barns in rural Illinois

Baroque pipe organ in the Indonesian Embassy in the lush former home of Tom Walsh, which has been described as his "monument to overnight prosperity." Washington, D.C

Barnyard at historic Rugby, an aristocrats' community near Nashville, Tennessee

Barrels brimming with shellfish on a New England pier

Bartlett Memorial Historical Museum

Barry Faulkner's 1936 Declaration of Independence mural in the rotunda of the National Archives, Washington, D.C

Barry Faulkner's 1936 "Constitution" mural in the rotunda of the National Archives, Washington, D.C

Barren desert near Las Vegas, Nevada

Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception

Battle of New Orleans site, Chalmette, Louisiana

Basilica of Saint Mary, Loring Park, Minneapolis, Minnesota

Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington, D.C

Battleship Cove, showing the USS Massachusetts and the USS John F. Kennedy. Fall River, Massachusetts

Basement at Arlington House, Robert E. Lee's former mansion, Arlington, Virginia

Basilica of the Immaculate Conception on the grounds of the Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C

Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception on the campus of the Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C

Bass Harbor Head lighthouse built in 1858, Bass Harbor, Maine

Bashful Bob posing in front of the sign at Bashful Bob's Motel in Page, Arizona

Bay Bridge lights at dusk, San Francisco, California

Bay Bridge, San Francisco, California

Beacon Hill, Boston, Massachusetts

Beach at the Outer Banks in North Carolina

Battleship Texas, commissioned in 1912 and now moored in Houston, Texas

Beautiful artifacts from Ecuador are displayed in the residence of the Ambassador of Ecuador located in Washington, D.C

Beautiful day below Diamond Head at Waikiki Beach in Honolulu, Hawaii

Confederate White House, Richmond, Virginia

Bedroom at Robert E. Lee's Arlington House mansion, Arlington, Virginia

Beautiful sky over Transamerica Tower, San Francisco, California

Bedroom of Frederick Douglass at his home on a hill in the Anacostia neighborhood in Washington, D.C

Bedroom at Arlington House, Robert E. Lee's house at Arlington Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia

Bedroom at Arlington House, the former Robert E. Lee mansion, Arlington, Virginia

Bedroom in Theodore Roosevelt's birth home on East Twentieth Street, New York, New York

Bedroom in Arlington House, Robert E. Lee's former mansion, Arlington, Virginia

Bedroom of architect Mies van der Rohe's classic modernist Farnsworth House, now a property of the National Trust for Historic Preservation in Plano, Illinois

Bedroom at Shakertown, a Shaker settlement in Kentucky