The President of the United States, in the name of the United States Congress, has awarded 3,471 Medals of Honor to the nation's soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, and coast guardsmen since the decoration's creation in 1861. The citations highlighting these acts resided in archives, some for more than 100 years and were only sporadically printed. In 1973, the U.S. Senate ordered the citations compiled and printed as Committee on Veterans' Affairs, U.S. Senate, Medal of Honor recipients: 1863–1973 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1973). This book was later updated and reprinted in 1979.