From the Wisconsin Historical Society and National History Day, this collection contains more than 18,000 pages of eyewitness accounts of North American exploration, from the sagas of Vikings in Canada in AD1000 to the diaries of mountain men in the Rockies 800 years later.
Login required (from Proquest/Chadwyck-Healey) Includes thousands of papers concerning English activities in the American, Canadian, and West Indian colonies between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries as found in the British National Archives. Also included is a digitized version of The Calendar of State Papers, Colonial: North America and the West Indies 1574-1739, which contains bibliographic records and extracts for thousands of additional documents.
Also included is a digitized version of The Calendar of State Papers, Colonial: North America and the West Indies 1574-1739, which contains bibliographic records and extracts for thousands of additional documents. Issued by ProQuest Chadwyck-Healey.
Login required (From Archive of Americana/Readex) A resource for information about every aspect of life in 17th- and 18th-century America, this digital collection contains virtually every book, pamphlet and broadside published in America over a 160-year period. Based on Charles Evans’ renowned “American Bibliography” and Roger Bristol’s supplement, including more than 36,000 printed works and 2.3 million pages, Series I also offers new imprints not available in microform editions.
Dates Covered: 1492-1820
Published and supported by the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities (MITH). Intended as a long-term and interdisciplinary project in progress committed to exploring the intersections between traditional humanities research and digital technologies, it invites scholars from all disciplines to submit their editions of early American texts for publication on this site.
Dates covered: 1600-1800 Login required This resource contains 1,482 authors and over 100,000 pages of letters, diaries, memoirs, and accounts of early encounters.
The French image of America: a chronological and subject bibliography of French books printed before 1816 relating to the British North American colonies and the United States by Durand Echeverria and Everett C. Wilkie, Jr. Wagner & Camp's The Plains and the Rockies, a critical bibliography of exploration, adventure and travel in the American West, 1800-1865 Robert Rogers Hubach's Early Midwestern Travel Narratives, An Annotated Bibliography, 1634-1850. Candiana.org, (www.canadiana.org), a full-text online collection that contains documents about Canada's history from the first European contact to the nineteenth century. Bibliography of Native North Americans, Human Relations Area Files, 1976. When complete it will include more than 1,000 published and unpublished items from a variety of sources, including online resources and microform. Subscribers to the collection are encouraged to participate in the maintenance of this bibliography by calling our attention to omissions, suggesting additions, and notifying us of newly discovered materials.
Dates covered: 1473-1700 Login required (From Proquest/Chadwyck Healey) A digital library of English books from 1473-1700
Through EEBO, you can search the bibliographic citations, browse online the digital images of every page,download the digital images in PDF format for more extensive viewing and printing. From the first book published in English through the age of Spenser and Shakespeare, this incomparable collection now contains about 100,000 of over 125,000 titles listed in Pollard & Redgrave's Short-Title Catalogue (1475-1640) and Wing's Short-Title Catalogue (1641-1700) and their revised editions, as well as the Thomason Tracts (1640-1661) collection and the Early English Books Tract Supplement
Dates covered: 1492-1969 Login required (from Adam Matthew) This project includes over 60,000 images of original documents linked to essays by leading scholars in the field. It is divided into five thematic categories:
Section I: Cultural Contacts, 1492-1969;
Section II: Empire Writing and the Literature of Empire;
Section III: The Visible Empire ;
Section IV: Religion and Empire; and
Section V: Race, Class and Colonialism, c1783-1969
Login required (from Ebscohost) Contains over 32,000 citations and is a comprehensive guide to printed records produced in Europe before 1750 that make some mention of the discovery and emerging awareness of the Americas. Subject areas covered range from portrayals of Native American peoples to natural history to disease outbreaks to slavery. The database can be searched by every category of information found within the 6 printed volumes (also available in Doheny Special Collections, Call No. Z1203.E87).
It contains over 32,000 citations and is a comprehensive guide to printed records produced in Europe before 1750 that make some mention of the discovery and emerging awareness of the Americas. Subject areas covered range from portrayals of Native American peoples to natural history to disease outbreaks to slavery.The database can be searched by every category of information found within the 6 printed volumes (available in Doheny Special Collections, Call No. Z1203.E87).Produced in cooperation with the John Carter Brown Library
Dates covered: 1543-1945
Login required (from Proquest/Chadwyck-Healey) (1543-1945) Contains more than 4,700 publications from continental Europe, the U.S., the United Kingdom, Canada, and New Zealand. The anti-feminist case is presented as well as the pro-feminist. Titles are also available in the USC Libraries Catalog.
The Gerritsen Collection has since become the greatest single source for the study of women's history in the world.
Dates Covered: 1650-1838
A collaborative project of the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and Michigan State University's History Department this site provides primary documents concerning Maryland's Jesuit Plantations.
Login required A digital archive of manuscript materials from the holdings of the American Jewish Historical Society (AJHS) in New York. Includes organization and institutional records and papers, as well as autobiographies, letters, notebooks, and scrapbooks dating from the 17th to the mid-20th century. Also includes full-text searchable books and pamphlets from the Soble and Rosenbach collections at the AJHS and supplemental resources including biographies, a chronology, interactive maps, scholarly essays, a selection of American Jewish Year Book articles, links to related websites, and a visual resources gallery that draws from two collections of photographs: the Baron de Hirsch Fund Records collection and the Graduate School for Jewish Social Work (New York) Records.
Includes organization and institutional records and papers, as well as autobiographies, letters,notebooks, and scrapbooks dating from the 17th to the mid-20th century.Also includes full-text searchable books and pamphlets from the Soble and Rosenbach collections at the AJHS as well as supplemental resources including biographies, a chronology, interactive maps, scholarly essays, a selection of American Jewish Year Book articles, links to related websites,and a visual resources gallery that draws from two collections of photographs: the Baron de Hirsch Fund Records collection and the Graduate School for Jewish Social Work (New York) Records.
Login required (from Gale) Comprised of thousands of books, pamphlets, unofficially published trial accounts, and official trial documents—briefs, arguments, administrative proceedings, and arbitrations. It covers adultery, commercial law, conspiracy, constitutional law, crimes against persons, domestic relations, dueling, elections, impeachment, international law, land, libel, military offenses, murder, slavery, theft, torts, treason and wills, among many other subjects. In addition to works pertaining to English-speaking jurisdictions such as the United States, Britain, Ireland and Canada, English-language titles about trials in other jurisdictions such as France are included. Materials in this collection are derived primarily from Harvard, Yale, Columbia, York University in Toronto, and the Library of the Bar of the City of New York.
The two million pages of searchable content is derived from primary source documents located in the law libraries of Yale University, Harvard University, and the Library of the Bar of the City of New York. Included in the collection are unofficially published trial accounts, official trial documents, administrative proceedings, and arbitrations.The collection offers up content describing scandalous courtroom dramas and the daily lives of everyday people around the world, providing a rare historical glimpse into a given era.
Dates covered: colonial era - 1950 Login required (from Alexander Street) This database includes the immediate experiences of 1,325 women and 150,000 pages of diaries and letters.
It covers women in North America from Colonial times to around 1950.
Login required Based on Joseph Sabin's landmark bibliography, this collection contains works about the Americas published throughout the world from 1500 to the early 1900's. Included are books, pamphlets, serials and other documents that provide original accounts of exploration, trade, colonialism, slavery and abolition, the western movement, Native Americans, military actions and much more. All of these titles are accessible through the USC Libraries Catalog.
Included are books, pamphlets, serials and other documents that provide original accounts of exploration, trade, colonialism, slavery and abolition, the western movement, Native Americans, military actions and much more. With over 6 million pages from 29,000 works, this collection is a cornerstone in the study of the western hemisphere.
Login required (From Adam Matthew) A portal for slavery and abolition studies, bringing together documents and collections from libraries and archives across the Atlantic world.
Close attention is being given to the varieties of slavery, the legacy of slavery, the social justice perspective and the continued existence of slavery today.
Dates covered: 1559-1769 Login required (From Adam Matthew) Presents those Ferrar Papers which are in Magdalene College, Cambridge; transcripts of those documents that throw light on the Virginia Company of London; and the four volumes of The Records of the Virginia Company of London (published in 1906 and 1935), edited by Susan Myra Kingsbury.
It documents the founding and economic development of Virginia as seen through the papers of the Virginia Company of London, 1606-1624; the continuing interest of the Ferrar family in the settlement of North America from Jamestown to the Bermudas; trade between Britain and America; the ethnic and gender composition of early Virginia; and tensions among the colonists and of early relations with Native Americans. It is also a crucial source for London's economic history in the Early Modern era, and will be of interest to social and religious historians.
Login required (from Alexander Street) Women and Social Movements in the United States brings together books, images, documents, scholarly essays, commentaries, and bibliographies, documenting the multiplicity of women's activism in public life.
18th Century Primary Sources
For 18th Century Newspapers see Historical Newspapers tab above.
Dates covered: 1639-1819 Login required (from Readex/Archive of Americana) Provides simultaneous access to multiple primary source collections: American Broadsides and Ephemera, Series 1; Early American Imprints, Series I: Evans, 1639-1800; Early American Imprints, Series I: Supplement from the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1670-1800; Early American Imprints, Series II: Shaw-Shoemaker, 1801-1819; Early American Imprints, Series II: Supplement from the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1801-1819
Available here: Early American Imprints, Series I: Evans, 1639-1800; Early American Imprints, Series II: Supplement from the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1801-1819; Early American Imprints, Series II: Shaw-Shoemaker, 1801-1819; American Broadsides and Ephemera, Series I; Early American Imprints, Series I: Supplement from the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1670-1800.
Dates covered: 1789-1817 Login required (from Readex/Archive of Americana) Contains over 6200 publications from Congress and Executive departments, many originating from the period between 1789 and the beginning of the U.S. Congressional Serial Set in 1817.
Approximately 2/3 of the publications cover the first 14 Congresses (1789-1817), and the remaining 1/3 overlap with the Serial Set from 1817-1838 (Congresses 15-25).
The collection enables students and scholars to easily search and browse every legislative and executive document of the first fourteen U.S. Congresses, and more.
Provides numerous links to historic documents such as the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence (Freedom Documents). Many original scanned images are also available
Part of George Washington University's Documentary History of the First Federal Congress, 1789-1791 project, this searchable online exhibit provides access to primary source materials and other resources.
Login reqired (from Proquest/Chadwyck-Healey) Provides access to thousands of papers concerning English activities in the American, Canadian, and West Indian colonies between the 16th and 18th centuries. Also included is a digitized version of The Calendar of State Papers, Colonial: North America and the West Indies 1574-1739, which contains bibliographic records and extracts for thousands of additional documents.
Also included is a digitized version of The Calendar of State Papers, Colonial: North America and the West Indies 1574-1739, which contains bibliographic records and extracts for thousands of additional documents. Issued by ProQuest Chadwyck-Healey.
From the Massachusetts Historical Society, this site is organized into fifteen topics. Each Topic is introduced with a contextual essay and is supported by six to twelve significant documents (manuscript or printed). For every document there is a high-quality image of all pages, a searchable, printable transcription, and a bibliographic statement. Additional primary materials—e.g., maps, engravings, broadsides, portraits, and images of artifacts—illustrate events as appropriate.
Created by Middle Tennessee State University, this site is a gateway to digital collections of primary sources (photos, letters, diaries, artifacts, etc.) that document the history of women in the United States. Includes 35 collections from the 18th century.
Dates covered: 1804-1806
A "hyperhistory in progress," this collection provides primary source and other materials concerning the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
This collection, presented by American Memory, includes excerpts from Congressional journals, resolutions, proclamations, committee reports, treaties, and early printed versions of the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
Dates covered: 1788-1843 Login required - (from Rotunda/University of Virginia Press)
The complete collection of all of Dolly Madison's known correspondences. It is currently complete through 1843, with a total of 1581 documents, and is searchable by keyword, person or organization, time period, document type, topic, or place. Along with letters, this collection includes summaries and a glossary providing identifications of names, literary references, and places mentioned in the letters.
It is currently complete through 1838, with over 1100 documents, and is searchable by keyword; person or organization; time period; document type; topic; or place. Along with letters, the DMDE includes summaries and a glossary providing identifications of names, literary references, and places mentioned in the letters.
Login required (from Gale) This collection of over 180,000 titles including books, pamphlets, essays, broadsides and more, is an ongoing project based on The English Short Title Catalogue, a union list of the holdings of the British Library, as well as those from more than 1,500 university, private and public libraries around the world.
The collection is an ongoing project based on The English Short Title Catalogue, a union list of the holdings of the British Library, as well as those from more than 1,500 university, private and public libraries worldwide. This collection captures the essence of the Enlightement in Great Britain in multiple academic disciplines, including history, literature, geography, social sciences, fine arts, religion, philosophy, and law.
Dates covered: 1685-1815 Login required (From Adam Matthew) This collection makes available unique or extremely rare eighteenth century periodicals in digitized form. The primary aim of the portal is to promote a truly broad representation of the culture of print journalism in the eighteenth century, illuminating all aspects of eighteenth-century social, political and literary life. Many are ephemeral, lasting only for a handful of issues, others run for several years. Topics covered are extremely wide-ranging and include: colonial life; provincial and rural affairs; the French and American revolutions; reviews of literature and fashion throughout Europe; political debates; and London coffee house gossip and discussion.
The primary aim of the portal is to promote a truly broad representation of the culture of print journalism in the eighteenth century, illuminating all aspects of eighteenth-century social, political and literary life. Many are ephemeral, lasting only for a handful of issues, others run for several years. Topics covered are extremely wide-ranging and include: colonial life; provincial and rural affairs; the French and American revolutions; reviews of literature and fashion throughout Europe; political debates; and London coffee house gossip and discussion.
Dates covered: 1492-1962 Login required (from Adam Matthew) Includes 70,000 images of original manuscript and printed documents to support study and research in the field of colonial and empire studies. Divided into 5 sections: 1) Cultural Contacts, 1492-1969; 2) Empire Writing and the Literature of Empire; 3) The Visible Empire; 4) Religion and Empire; 5) and Race, Class, Imperialism and Colonialism, c. 1607-1969. In addition to original documents, this database contains scholarly essays and analysis.
Dates covered: 1543-1945
Login required (from Proquest/Chadwyck-Healey) Contains more than 4,700 publications from continental Europe, the U.S., the United Kingdom, Canada, and New Zealand. The anti-feminist case is presented as well as the pro-feminist. Titles are also available in the USC Libraries Catalog.
The Gerritsen Collection has since become the greatest single source for the study of women's history in the world.
Dates Covered: 1650-1838 A collaborative project of the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and Michigan State University's History Department this site provides primary documents concerning Maryland's Jesuit Plantations.
Includes organization and institutional records and papers, as well as autobiographies, letters,notebooks, and scrapbooks dating from the 17th to the mid-20th century.Also includes full-text searchable books and pamphlets from the Soble and Rosenbach collections at the AJHS as well as supplemental resources including biographies, a chronology, interactive maps, scholarly essays, a selection of American Jewish Year Book articles, links to related websites,and a visual resources gallery that draws from two collections of photographs: the Baron de Hirsch Fund Records collection and the Graduate School for Jewish Social Work (New York) Records.
Provides searchable full text of the Nebraska edition of the Lewis and Clark journals (Gary E. Moulton, ed.), as well as images, audio files, Native American perspectives, and other texts.
Login required (from Gale) Comprised of thousands of books, pamphlets, unofficially published trial accounts, and official trial documents—briefs, arguments, administrative proceedings, and arbitrations. It covers adultery, commercial law, conspiracy, constitutional law, crimes against persons, domestic relations, dueling, elections, impeachment, international law, land, libel, military offenses, murder, slavery, theft, torts, treason and wills, among many other subjects. In addition to works pertaining to English-speaking jurisdictions such as the United States, Britain, Ireland and Canada, English-language titles about trials in other jurisdictions such as France are included. Materials in this collection are derived primarily from Harvard, Yale, Columbia, York University in Toronto, and the Library of the Bar of the City of New York.
The two million pages of searchable content is derived from primary source documents located in the law libraries of Yale University, Harvard University, and the Library of the Bar of the City of New York. Included in the collection are unofficially published trial accounts, official trial documents, administrative proceedings, and arbitrations.The collection offers up content describing scandalous courtroom dramas and the daily lives of everyday people around the world, providing a rare historical glimpse into a given era.
Dates covered: colonial era - 1950 Login required (from Alexander Street) This database includes the immediate experiences of 1,325 women and 150,000 pages of diaries and letters.
It covers women in North America from Colonial times to around 1950.
Dates covered: 1748-1799 Login required (from Rotunda/University of Virginia Press) This collection encompasses five separate series and the complete diaries, providing access to the complete Papers released through 2009 in one online publication. You may search on full text and by date, author, or recipient across all volumes and series. The indexing of the individual print volumes is combined here into a single master index, and all internal document cross-references are linked.
Users can search by keyword, date, author, and recipient. The indexing of the print volumes is combined into a single online master index, and all internal document cross-references are linked. The digitized content may be navigated by series, date, or index entry.
Login required (from Gale) This collection contains works about the Americas published throughout the world from 1500 to the early 1900's. Included are books, pamphlets, serials and other documents that provide original accounts of exploration, trade, colonialism, slavery and abolition, the western movement, Native Americans, military actions and much more. All of these titles are accessible through the USC Libraries Catalog.
Included are books, pamphlets, serials and other documents that provide original accounts of exploration, trade, colonialism, slavery and abolition, the western movement, Native Americans, military actions and much more. With over 6 million pages from 29,000 works, this collection is a cornerstone in the study of the western hemisphere.
Donated to the Princeton University Library, this collection includes more than 150 books, pamphlets and prints representing the following themes: the intellectual origins of the American Revolution; the Revolution itself; the early years of the republic; the resulting spread of democratic ideas in the Atlantic world; and the effort to abolish the slave trade in both Great Britain and the United States.
An illustrated catalog of the main portions of this collection is available online: http://www.princeton.edu/rbsc/exhibitions/lar/
Login required (from Adam Matthew) This resource is an important portal for slavery and abolition studies, bringing together documents and collections from libraries and archives across the Atlantic world. Close attention is being given to the varieties of slavery, the legacy of slavery, the social justice perspective and the continued existence of slavery today.
Close attention is being given to the varieties of slavery, the legacy of slavery, the social justice perspective and the continued existence of slavery today.
Dates covered: 1590-1790 Login required (from Adam Matthew) -This collection of the Ferrar Papers is from Magdalene College, Cambridge. It documents the founding and economic development of Virginia as seen through the papers of the Virginia Company of London, 1606-1624; the continuing interest of the Ferrar family in the settlement of North America from Jamestown to the Bermudas; trade between Britain and America; the ethnic and gender composition of early Virginia; and tensions among the colonists and of early relations with Native Americans. It is also a crucial source for London's economic history in the Early Modern era.
It documents the founding and economic development of Virginia as seen through the papers of the Virginia Company of London, 1606-1624; the continuing interest of the Ferrar family in the settlement of North America from Jamestown to the Bermudas; trade between Britain and America; the ethnic and gender composition of early Virginia; and tensions among the colonists and of early relations with Native Americans. It is also a crucial source for London's economic history in the Early Modern era, and will be of interest to social and religious historians.
Login required (from Alexander Street) - Includes 4050 publications pertaining to Women and Social Movements in the United States. These materials have been selected by the Editors for their relevance to the focus of the website.
19th Century Primary Sources
For 19th Century Newspapers see Historical Newspapers tab above.
Login required Contains over 6 million citation for books, periodicals and government publications from over 70 print indexes to material published in the 19th Century.
Dates covered: 1818-1907 (majority were published between 1875-1900)
The Daniel A. P. Murray Pamphlet Collection presents a panoramic and eclectic review of African-American history and culture, spanning almost one hundred years from the early nineteenth through the early twentieth centuries, with the bulk of the material published between 1875 and 1900. Among the authors represented are Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Benjamin W. Arnett, Alexander Crummel, and Emanuel Love.
Login required (from Alexander Street) Contains indexed, searchable information on over 4 million soldiers and thousands of battles, as well as regimental rosters, officer profiles and military records. Also includes over 15,000 photographs.
Originally created by Historical Data Systems, Inc., the database contains indexed, searchable information on over 4 million soldiers and thousands of battles, together with over 16,000 photographs. With thousands of regimental rosters and officer profiles, the database will continue to grow as new information is loaded semiannually.
Titles range from Benjamin Franklin's General Magazine and America's first scientific journal, Medical Repository; popular magazines such as Vanity Fair and Ladies' Home Journal;regional and niche publications; and groundbreaking publications like The Dial (publication of the Transcendentalists), Puck (first successful humor magazine), and McClure's (creator of muckraking journalism).
1820-1865
Contrary to the popular belief that the abolitionist crusade was driven by wealthy whites, from the 1820s to the Civil War, some 300 black abolitionists were regularly involved in the antislavery movement. This University of Detroit Mercy collection provides access to over 800 speeches by antebellum blacks and approximately 1,000 editorials from the period.
Login required Draws on indexes such as the Nineteenth Century Short Title Catalogue, The Wellesley Index, Poole's Index and Periodicals Index Online to create integrated bibliographic coverage of over 1.4 million books and official publications, 64,891 archival collections and 15.6 million articles from over 2,500 journals, magazines and newspapers.
The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery is taking part in the commemorations for the 150th anniversary of the Civil War and the presidency of Abraham Lincoln with a series of seven related exhibitions. Accompanying these exhibitions are weekly blog entries, podcasts and videos written and produced by experts on Civil War topics.
Dates covered: 1824-1961 Login required (from Archive Direct/Adam Matthew) This series, issued from the National Archives (London), provides access to confidential papers issued by the British Foreign and Colonial Offices concerning North America, with a focus on Canada, the Caribbean, and the United States.
This site, developed by Tulane University, uses text, images, and sound to reconstruct policy decision-making during from the time of Lincoln's election to the battle of Fort Sumter in April 1861.
Duke University Libraries' site presents over 9,000 images, with database information, relating to the early history of advertising in the United States.
Login required This collection documents in compelling detail the social and cultural forces that shaped the everyday lives of men and women in America from 1800 to 1920, addressing 19th and early 20th century political, social and gender issues, religion, race, education, employment, marriage, sexuality, home life, health and popular pastimes. Provides access to 75 rare periodicals ranging from Echoes of the South (Florida) the Household Magazine (North Carolina) Lucifer the Lightbearer (Chicago), The Heathen Woman's Friend (Boston) and Women's Work (Georgia); full run of Town Topics from the New York Public Library, 1887-1923, Pamphlets and monographs illuminating all aspects of family life all of which have been screened against Gerritsen, Shaw-Shoemaker, and other relevant projects to avoid needless duplication; contextual essays by scholars.
A collection over 800,000 pages of from 1,500 historical directories, member lists, travel guides, and other name-sources from the New-York Historical Society. These primary sources chronicle the people and organizations as they developed over time and place.
Dates covered: 1543-1945
Login required (from Proquest/Chadwyck-Healey) (1543-1945) Contains more than 4,700 publications from continental Europe, the U.S., the United Kingdom, Canada, and New Zealand. The anti-feminist case is presented as well as the pro-feminist. Titles are also available in the USC Libraries Catalog.
The Gerritsen Collection has since become the greatest single source for the study of women's history in the world.
Dates covered: 1850-1950
This Cornell University site is a core collection of books and journals in Home Economics and related disciplines, published between 1850 and 1950 and selected by scholars for their historical importance.
Login required (from Alexander Street) Contains over 10,000 images (photographs, posters, cartoon, maps, advertisements, ephemera, etc.) from the fields of battle, politics, and general society, enabling researchers to experience the events, both monumental and mundane, of the war that tested and defined the core meaning of America
The images, which are drawn from the fields of battle, politics, and general society, allow students and researchers to experience the events, both monumental and mundane, of this critical war.
Developed by Harvard University's Open Collections Program, this site provides resources on immigration and topics such as the Gold Rush, railroads, immigrant press, and attempts to restrict immigration, such as the Chinese Exclusion Act
Includes organization and institutional records and papers, as well as autobiographies, letters,notebooks, and scrapbooks dating from the 17th to the mid-20th century.Also includes full-text searchable books and pamphlets from the Soble and Rosenbach collections at the AJHS as well as supplemental resources including biographies, a chronology, interactive maps, scholarly essays, a selection of American Jewish Year Book articles, links to related websites,and a visual resources gallery that draws from two collections of photographs: the Baron de Hirsch Fund Records collection and the Graduate School for Jewish Social Work (New York) Records.
Dates covered: 1830-1861
This Northern Illinois University site presents primary source materials from Lincoln's Illinois years (1830-1861) and other resources for study of antebellum Illinois.
Dates covered: 1840-1900
A collaborative effort between Cornell and the University of Michigan makes available primary sources in American social history from each university's library.
Login required Combines 19th- and 20th-century legal collections from America and Britain to form a comprehensive full-text collection of Anglo-American legal treatises. It contains more than 21,000 works from casebooks, local practice manuals, form books, works for lay readers, pamphlets, letters, speeches and more.
The works, derived primarily from the special collections at Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and York University in Toronto, cover every aspect of law and encompass a range of analytical, theoretical, and practical literature, with many being quite rare and generally unavailable at USC or anywhere in the southern California. The types of works included are classic treatises, casebooks, local practice manuals, form books, works for lay readers, pamphlets, letters, speeches, and others.
Login required Based on Joseph Sabin's landmark bibliography, this collection contains works about the Americas published throughout the world from 1500 to the early 1900's. Included are books, pamphlets, serials and other documents that provide original accounts of exploration, trade, colonialism, slavery and abolition, the western movement, Native Americans, military actions and much more. All of these titles are accessible through the USC Libraries Catalog.
Included are books, pamphlets, serials and other documents that provide original accounts of exploration, trade, colonialism, slavery and abolition, the western movement, Native Americans, military actions and much more. With over 6 million pages from 29,000 works, this collection is a cornerstone in the study of the western hemisphere.
A project of the Furman University Department of History, this site provides editorials of the partisan press in antebellum America, currently including those concerning the Nebraska bill debates, Dred Scott, John Brown's Raid on Harper's Ferry, and the attack on Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner by South Carolina representative Preston Brooks.
This site, produced by the University of Michigan Special Collections Library, contains a wealth of primary sources from the 19th and 20th centuries, including railroad company annual reports; the monthly periodical Locomotive World; pamphlets; and more.
Login required This resource brings together hundreds of accounts by women of their travels across the globe from the early 19th century to the late 20th century
Dates covered: 1870-1925
This University of Michigan Library site provides the full text of monographs and government documents concerning the Spanish-American war published in the United States, Spain, and the Philippines between 1870 and 1925.
Login required (from Archive of Americana/Readex) The U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 1817-1980 is a full-text database of key publications of the United States Congress. It documents the official activities of the committees of the House and the Senate, including the journals, reports, and documents. In addition, through the nineteenth century the Serial Set also included publications of the executive departments relating to important public issues, including reports on education, public health, and agriculture, as well as maps and color plates
It documents the official activities of the committees of the House and the Senate, including the journals, reports, and documents. In addition, through the nineteenth century the Serial Set also included publications of the executive departments relating to important public issues. It contains, for example, reports on education, public health, and agriculture, as well as maps and color plates. The database consists of approximately 369,000 publications published in 14,500 volumes and over 11 million pages.
Login required (from Gale) Historical records and briefs of the U.S. Supreme Court
Approximately 150,000 Supreme Court cases are featured, the majority consisting of those for which the Court did not give a full opinion. U.S. Supreme Court Records and Briefs comprises over 150,000 cases from the generation before the American Civil War to the decade of the Vietnam War and Watergate. It covers every aspect of law: civil rights law; constitutional law; corporate law; environmental law; gender law; labor law; legal history and legal theory; property law; taxation; trademark and intellectual property law, among other subjects.
This site, developed by Edward L. Ayres at the University of Virginia, provides a wealth of primary sources, including letters, diaries, church and census records, newspapers, and speeches, to document one Northern and one Southern community during the Civil War era.
20th Century Primary Sources
For 20th Century Newspapers see Historical Newspapers tab above.
This Brown University collection presents broadsides, sheet music, pamphlets, and government publications gathered over three centuries to researchers interested in the history of alcoholism and how the media and arts spread ideas and information.
1893-1933
This site, developed by the Westerville, Ohio Public Library, presents primary materials donated to the library by the League, which played a key role in American politics from 1893-1933.
Login required hese two Proquest History Vault modules include primary source materials from the late the 19th century to the late 20th century:
Black Freedom Struggle in the 20th Century: Federal Government Records Contains records of federal government agencies, covering some of the major events of the civil rights movement including: Brown v. Board of Education in 1954; the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955; the Little Rock School Desegregation Crisis in 1957; the March on Washington in 1963; the Civil Rights Act of 1964; Bloody Sunday and the Selma to Montgomery March; and much more.
Black Freedom Struggle in the 20th Century: Organizational Records and Personal Papers, Part One includes personal papers and records of civil rights organizations. This module covers many of the same events that are covered in the Federal Government Records module as well as other aspects of African American life in the 20th century, including religion, sports, and education.
Dates covered: 1824-1961 Login required (from Archive Direct/Adam Matthew) This series, issued from the National Archives (London), provides access to confidential papers issued by the British Foreign and Colonial Offices concerning North America, with a focus on Canada, the Caribbean, and the United States.
Dates covered: 1972-2010 Login required Published annually since 1972, this collection contains 39 volumes of primary sources. Each volume includes approximately one hundred documents covering the most significant events of the year. These documents range from presidential speeches, international agreements, and Supreme Court decisions to U.S. governmental reports, scientific findings, and cultural discussions.
This database searches the full-text of CQ Weekly, CQ Researcher, CQ Historic Documents, contact directories, a variety of reference books, and selected datasets focused on issues in U.S. politics and areas of public policy, such as, health care, education, economics, bioethics, environment, and society. Contents are created by more than 125 Capitol Hill reporters, editors, and researchers to provide non-partisan coverage and detailed analysis of issues facing Congress on a daily basis. Coverage is from 1972 to the present.
Compiled by Douglas O. Linder of the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law, this resource provides primary source and other materials concerning some of the 20th Century's key trials.
Login required Contains digital images of a wide range of original documents, including diaries, letters, personal narratives, trench journals, scrapbooks, objects, and a wealth of visual sources, this resource provides a rich seam of information on personal experiences of war. Supplementing the primary sources is a wealth of secondary resources including interactive maps, 360° panoramas and walk-throughs of the Sanctuary Wood Trench System, the Memory Wall, In Their Own Words feature, scholarly essays, a slideshow gallery, chronology and glossaries.
This resource showcases a wealth of primary source material for the study of the First World War, from personal narratives and printed books to military files, propaganda pamphlets and strong visual documents. The material is complemented by a range of contextual secondary material, including scholarly essays, case studies and interactive maps.
Login required (FBIS) (from Readex) Created by Presidential directive during World War II, the Foreign Broadcast Information Service’s mission was to monitor, record, transcribe and translate intercepted radio broadcasts from foreign governments, official news services, and clandestine broadcasts from occupied territories. Millions of translations, or transcriptions in the case of English language materials, make up the daily reports collected in this database
Content will be released to this digital product on a monthly basis over a time span of about two years. When completed, the product will consist of approximately two million pages.
Includes organization and institutional records and papers, as well as autobiographies, letters,notebooks, and scrapbooks dating from the 17th to the mid-20th century.Also includes full-text searchable books and pamphlets from the Soble and Rosenbach collections at the AJHS as well as supplemental resources including biographies, a chronology, interactive maps, scholarly essays, a selection of American Jewish Year Book articles, links to related websites,and a visual resources gallery that draws from two collections of photographs: the Baron de Hirsch Fund Records collection and the Graduate School for Jewish Social Work (New York) Records.
Dates covered: 1935-1967 Login required American theater goers and television watchers were witness to Time Inc.'s newsreel series. This series is now available online in streaming video format which includes over 400 titles. The newsreels have been restored by HBO Archives, allowing viewers to experience these historic newsreels as audiences did in earlier decades.
Now, for the first time, this groundbreaking series is available in online streaming video in a single, cross-searchable collection designed specifically to meet the needs of researchers, teaching faculty, and students. The newsreels have been restored to their original luster by HBO Archives, allowing viewers to experience these historic newsreels as audiences did in earlier decades.
Login required These papers from the National Archives, Kew (London) allow scholars and researchers the opportunity to assess the Nixon administration from a British, European and Commonwealth perspective.
These 12 projects bring together nearly one hundred video oral history interviews and several thousand photographs, documents, and digitized newspaper articles. Included are films, slide shows, and lesson plans for teachers. The projects also feature dozens of historical essays about important issues, events, and people.
• Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project
• Great Depression in Washington State Project
• Strikes! Labor History Encyclopedia for the Pacific Northwest
• Seattle General Strike Project
• Communism in Washington State - History and Memory Project
• Waterfront Workers History Project
• Antiwar and Radical History Project--Pacific Northwest
• Seattle Black Panther Party - History and Memory Project
• Chicano/a Movement in Washington State Project
• Labor Press Project
• Workers and Unions of UW Project
• Farm Workers in Washington State History Project
This collection of primary source materials covers such topics as the Vietnam war, student protests, consumerism, music, fashion, etc. It includes the Social Protest Collection from UC Berkeley, a wide range of zines and alternative press publications, posters, and multimedia. The resource is provided by Adam Matthew.
Dates covered: 1960- Login required Underground and Independent Comics, Comix, and Graphic Novels is the first ever scholarly, primary source database focusing on adult comic books and graphic novels. Beginning with the first underground comix from the 1960’s to the works of modern sequential artists, this collection will contain more than 75,000 pages of comics and graphic novels, along with 25,000 pages of interviews, criticism, and journal articles that document the continual growth and evolution of this art form
Login required (Archive of Americana/Readex) The U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 1817-1980 is a full-text database of key publications of the United States Congress. It documents the official activities of the committees of the House and the Senate, including the journals, reports, and documents. In addition, through the nineteenth century the Serial Set also included publications of the executive departments relating to important public issues, including reports on education, public health, and agriculture, as well as maps and color plates
It documents the official activities of the committees of the House and the Senate, including the journals, reports, and documents. In addition, through the nineteenth century the Serial Set also included publications of the executive departments relating to important public issues. It contains, for example, reports on education, public health, and agriculture, as well as maps and color plates. The database consists of approximately 369,000 publications published in 14,500 volumes and over 11 million pages.
Login required (from Gale) Historical records and briefs of the U.S. Supreme Court
Approximately 150,000 Supreme Court cases are featured, the majority consisting of those for which the Court did not give a full opinion. U.S. Supreme Court Records and Briefs comprises over 150,000 cases from the generation before the American Civil War to the decade of the Vietnam War and Watergate. It covers every aspect of law: civil rights law; constitutional law; corporate law; environmental law; gender law; labor law; legal history and legal theory; property law; taxation; trademark and intellectual property law, among other subjects.
This collection includes the following primary source materials: Associated Press, Saigon Bureau Records; records of the Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV); records of the U.S. Marine Corps in the Vietnam War,detailing the monthly activities of the U.S. Marine Corps; Vietnam Documents and Research Notes Series: Translation and Analysis of Significant Viet Cong/North Vietnamese Documents contains material captured from North Vietnamese and Viet Cong soldiers and the North Vietnamese domestic wire service, Viet-Nam News Agency.