LibGuides: History 499 (Dr. Mitchell): United States

Tips for Primary Sources by State

University Libraries often hold resources in their archives that are unavailable elsewhere. If your topic focuses on an event that involves a person or event from a particular state, try searching the digital collections of major universities in that state. You can access lists of the universities in every state here.

Most states in the US will have a "State Library" that houses state documents and archival material related to state history. While digital collections may vary, it is a good place to start when looking for major policy or historical events that occurred in a particular state. You view a list of state libraries and archives here.

Curated Collections

Famous Trials Database
Large collection of original essays, trial transcripts and exhibits, maps, images, and other materials relating to significant trials in world history.

Government, Federal, and Presidential Archives

CIA Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Electronic Reading Room
Database of declassified CIA documents that have been released due to many FOIA requests.
National Archives Virtual Library
Page of aggregated links to digitized historical, political, law, diplomatic and other related documents.
Reagan Library Digital Collection
Digitized textual collections that relate to policies, White House staff, speeches, policies, and events from the Reagan era.
US Congressional Record
Digitized proceedings and debates of the US Congress dating back to 1989. Contact your librarian for digitized access to later issues.

African American History

Black Past: List of Digital Archives
A list of major digitized archival holdings in African American history. Click on the name of the archive and you will be taken to the opening page of the collection. The archives are grouped by state. Great resource for topic searching by primary source availability.
Digital Schomburg
Hosted by the New York Public Library, this collection features digital exhibitions, photographs, audio and video streams, historical projects, and external links for research in the history and cultures of the peoples of Africa and the African Diaspora.
Enslaved: Peoples of the Historical Slave Trade (Michigan State University)
"The primary focus of Enslaved.org is people—individuals who were enslaved, owned slaves, were connected to the slave trade, and worked to emancipate slaves. In collaboration with numerous academic institutions, the Center for Digital Humanities & Social Sciences at Michigan State University hosts this robust, open-source architecture to discover, connect, and visualize 600,000 (and growing) people records and 5 million data points. From archival fragments and spreadsheet entries, we see the lives of the enslaved in richer detail."
ProQuest's Black Freedom Struggle in the United States
A selection of primary documents related to critical people and events in African American History. Resource contains approximately 1600 documents covering six areas: Slavery and the Abolitionist Movement (1790-1860); The Civil War and the Reconstruction Era (1861-1877); Jim Crow Era from 1878 to the Great Depression (1878-1932); The New Deal and World War II (1933-1945); The Civil Rights and Black Power Movements (1946-1975); The Contemporary Era (1976-2000) .

California

Calisphere
Calisphere provides free access to unique and historically important artifacts for research, teaching, and curious exploration. Discover over two million photographs, documents, letters, artwork, diaries, oral histories, films, advertisements, musical recordings, and more.
Online Archive of California (OAC)
Provides free public access to detailed descriptions of primary resource collections maintained by more than 200 contributing institutions including libraries, special collections, archives, historical societies, and museums throughout California and collections maintained by the 10 University of California (UC) campuses.
University of California Los Angeles Digital Collections
Digital Collections from the UCLA library featuring a large variety of digitized material focusing on Los Angeles, California and global subjects.
University of California Santa Barbara Digital Collections
Highlights of UCSB's collections are aerial photography, and various personal papers of important Californians. Collection has particular strengths in audio archiving including recording from wax cylinders and the discography of American recordings.
University of Southern California Library's Digital Collections
A robust collection of digitized materials local, state, and global sources. Particular highlights include the Korean American Digital Archive, Los Angeles City Records, and Los Angeles Police Record among many others.
Ventura County Museum Digitized Photographs
Large collection of photographs documenting the history of Ventura County. The museum has a variety of other historical materials relating to the county, though less are digitized.

US - General

Digital Public Library of America
Central repository for millions of digitized archival, library, and museum collections across the United States. Resource has a faceted browsing system for easy exploration of material.
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See DPLA's guide for scholarly research searching here: https://dp.la/guides/the-scholarly-research-guide-to-dpla
Library of Congress Digital Collections
LOC's digital collection consists of over 9 million items that document U.S. history and culture. The collections provides free access to manuscripts, prints, photographs, posters, maps, sound recordings, motion pictures, books, pamphlets, and sheet music.
National Archives List of Digitized State Collections
A state by state list of the online records collections held by repositories in state.

Library Subscription Databases (MyCI Login Required)

American Indian Histories and Cultures This link opens in a new window
Manuscripts, artwork and rare printed books, treaties, speeches, and diaries dating from the earliest contact with European settlers to photographs and newspapers from the mid-twentieth century.
American Periodicals Series 1740-1940 This link opens in a new window
Contains over 1,100 periodicals published between 1740 and 1940.
American State Papers, 1789-1838 This link opens in a new window
Contains primary material of historical importance including legislative and executive documents, speeches of U.S. presidents and coverage of historical events from 1789-1838.
American West This link opens in a new window
Books, journals, diaries and pioneer accounts, maps, broadsides, periodicals, advertisements, photographs, and artwork of the American West from the early eighteenth to the mid-twentieth century.
Slavery, Abolition and Social Justice This link opens in a new window
Bringing together primary source documents from archives and libraries across the Atlantic world, this resource allows students and researchers to explore and compare unique material relating to the complex subjects of slavery, abolition and social justice. In addition to the primary source documents there is a wealth of useful secondary sources for research and teaching; including an interactive map, scholarly essays, tutorials, a visual sources gallery, chronology and bibliography. Register for My Archive and save your favourite documents, search results and images to your personal collection area.
U.S. Congressional Serial Set This link opens in a new window
Contains reports, documents and journals of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. Covering public policy, infrastructure, the land, the people, military and defense, and more.
U.S. Congressional Serial Set Maps This link opens in a new window
Contains images and indexing for maps published in reports and documents of the 37th Congress, 1st Session through the 103rd Congress, 2nd session. The maps published as part of U.S. Congressional Serial Set publications
Women and Social Movements in the United States This link opens in a new window
Contains resources on the history of women in social movements in the U.S. between 1600 and 2000. Includes videos, articles, primary sources, and archives.

History 499 (Dr. Mitchell): United States

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