LibGuides: Primary Sources: Specific Topics

Specific Topics

African Americans	Civil Rights	Law	Technology
American South	Environment Studies	LGBTQ	U.S Presidents
Business	Indigenous Peoples	Politics	Wars
Children	Latinx Studies		Women and Gender History

African Americans

African America, Communists, and the National Negro Congress, 1933–1947
The National Negro Congress was established in 1936 to "secure the right of the Negro people to be free from Jim Crowism, segregation, discrimination, lynching, and mob violence" and "to promote the spirit of unity and cooperation between Negro and white people." It was conceived as a national coalition of church, labor, and civil rights organizations that would coordinate protest action in the face of deteriorating economic conditions for blacks. This collection comprises the files of John P. Davis, Edward Strong, and Revels Cayton, as well as financial records. Included with the National Negro Congress records are Davis’ files from the Negro Industrial League, 1933, of which he had been executive secretary; Davis’ files from the Joint Committee on National Recovery, 1933-1935, an ad-hoc lobby to protect black interests in the federal government; and his subject/reference files on different aspects of the "Negro question." Also, records of the Negro Labor Victory Committee, 1942-1945, including files of Charles A. Collins, executive secretary, and M. Moran Weston, field secretary, consisting of correspondence, subject/organization files, and printed matter. Source: Schomburg Center, New York Public Library. Extent: 98,600 images
African American Historical Serials Collection
Find primary source material in this archive of periodicals that document the history of African American religious life and culture between 1829 and 1922 with newspapers and magazines, plus reports and annuals from African American religious organizations, including churches and social service agencies.
African American Newspapers: The 19th Century
Find full-text content of six major African-American newspapers published during the 1800s with specific emphasis on New York, and East Coast African American history, as well as Canadian history.

Amistad Research Center Digital Projects
"The Amistad Research Center is committed to collecting, preserving, and providing open access to original materials that reference the social and cultural importance of America's ethnic and racial history, the African Diaspora, human relations, and civil rights."
From Tulane University.

Black Abolitionist Papers
This full-text collection details the extensive work of African Americans to abolish slavery in the United States prior to the Civil War.
Black Studies Center
Black Studies Center is a leading tool that supports research, teaching, and learning in Black Studies and other disciplines that benefit from a more detailed coverage of the black experience such as history, literature, political science, sociology, philosophy, and religion.
Black Thought and Culture

Born in slavery: Slave narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-38
Digital collection that contains more than 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and 500 black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These narratives were collected in the 1930s as part of the Federal Writers' Project (FWP) of the Works Progress Administration, later renamed Work Projects Administration (WPA).

NAACP Papers: Board of Directors, Annual Conferences, Major Speeches, and National Staff Files
Comprehensive view of the NAACP's evolution, policies, and achievements from 1909-1970. Included are thousands of pages of minutes of directors' meetings, monthly reports from officers to the board of directors, proceedings of the annual business meetings, significant records of the association's annual conferences, plus voluminous special reports on a wide range of issues. Available on ProQuest's History Vault platform.

Confederate Slave Payrolls (National Archives)
Digital Harlem. Everyday Life 1915-1930
This site digitally recreates life in Harlem, the center of African American intellectual life between the world wars.
Digital Schomburg
Part of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture at the New York Public Library, this site provides a selection of digitized images and texts, manuscript and archival finding aids.
Documents of the Harlem Renaissance
This book includes primary soruces exploring the transformative energy and excitement that African Americans expressed in aesthetic and civic currents that percolated during the opening of the 20th century and proved a force in the modernization of America.

Freedom on the Move
Database of fugitives from North American slavery. It includes access to runaway ads.Created to control the movement of enslaved people, they ultimately preserved the details of individual lives--their personality, appearance, and life story. Taken collectively, these ads constitute a detailed, concise, and rare source of information about the experiences of enslaved people. After initial curation, the ads become available for crowdsourcing. The crowdsourcing process populates a full-text transcription and additional searchable metadata within the database.
New York Slavery Records Index
Provides access to records of enslaved persons and slave holders in New York state from 1525 though the Civil War.

Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the Enforcement of Federal Law in the South, 1871–1884

Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database
Includes "information on more than 35,000 slave voyages that forcibly embarked over 12 million Africans for transport to the Americas between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries."

We Were Prepared for the Possibility of Death: Freedom Riders in the South, 1961

American South

Documenting the American South
From the University Library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, this site provides primary sources related to southern history, literature, and culture, including books, diaries, posters, artifacts, letters, oral history interviews, and songs.

Business

Market Research and American Business, 1935-1965
This database provides an insight into the American consumer boom of the mid-20th century through access to the complete market research reports of Ernest Dichter, the era's foremost consumer analyst and market research pioneer.

Children

National Child Labor Committee Collection
This collection contains over 5,000 photographs taken by Lewis Hine as part of his work to document conditions experienced by children working in factories and mines between 1908 and 1924. The site also contains documents about the decades-long struggle to end child labor.

Civil Rights

Amistad Research Center Digital Projects
"The Amistad Research Center is committed to collecting, preserving, and providing open access to original materials that reference the social and cultural importance of America's ethnic and racial history, the African Diaspora, human relations, and civil rights."
From Tulane University.
Civil Rights and the Black Freedom Struggle Civil Rights and the Black Freedom Struggle
Features records of NAACP, SCLC, SNCC, CORE, and federal records on the black freedom struggle.
Civil Rights Digital Library
Includes unedited film archives of news stations with coverage of the civil rights movement.
Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years 1954-1965
"Eyes on the Prize is a 14-part series which was originally released in two parts: Eyes I in 1985 and Eyes II in 1988. This series, which debuted on PBS stations, is considered to be the definitive documentary on the Civil Rights Movement.“ All of the interviews from Eyes on the Prize I and II are available online with full text search capability. The library offers access to all the complete series via Kanopy.
FBI File: Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
"The 44,000-page case file of the Federal Bureau of Investigation documents the bureau’s role in finding Ray and obtaining his conviction. The file also includes background information amassed by the FBI on Dr. King’s social activism. This archive is of particular interest to students of the civil rights movement and of the continuing controversy surrounding Dr. King’s murder."
Federal Surveillance of African Americans, 1920-1984
"Throughout the twentieth century Black Americans of all political persuasions were subject to federal scrutiny, harassment, and prosecution. The Federal Bureau of Investigation enlisted black "confidential special informants" to infiltrate a variety of organizations. Hundreds of documents in this collection were originated by such operatives. The reports provide a wealth of detail on "Negro" radicals and their organizations. In addition to infiltration, the FBI contributed to the infringement of First Amendment freedoms by making its agents a constant visible presence at radical rallies and meetings. This archive is based on original microfilm."
Kent State Shootings: May 4 collection
Includes primary sources related to the Kent State shootings and their aftermath. Some sources are digitally available.
King Center Archive
"Largest repository of primary source materials on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the American Civil Rights Movement in the world. The collection consists of the papers of Dr. King and those of the organization he co-founded, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, as well as the records of 8 major civil rights organizations and of several individuals active in the Movement. The archives also include more than 200 oral history interviews with Dr. King’s teachers, friends, family and civil rights associates."
Oral History Digital Collection -University of Southern Mississipi
This website offers oral histories relating to the civil rights movement, drawn from the University of Southern Mississippi Center for Oral History Collection. The site features interviews with civil rights leaders such as Charles Cobb, Charles Evers, and Aaron Henry.

Public Housing, Racial Policies, and Civil Rights: The Intergroup Relations Branch of the Federal Public Housing Administration, 1936-1963

Radicalism Collection
It is strongest in publications of the American left beginning in the 1960s.

Ralph J. Bunche Oral Histories Collection on the Civil Rights Movement

We Were Prepared for the Possibility of Death: Freedom Riders in the South, 1961
"Primary source documents related to the Civil Rights activists, the Freedom Riders. The Freedom Riders traveled on interstate buses into the segregated South to test the United States Supreme Court decision, Boynton v. Virginia, which had outlawed racial segregation in the restaurants and waiting rooms in terminals serving buses that crossed state lines."

Environment Studies

DOCUMERICA Project
For the Documerica Project (1971-1977), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hired freelance photographers to capture images relating to environmental problems, EPA activities, and everyday life in the 1970s. The U.S. National Archives digitized more than 15,000 photographs from the series available from this flickr site.
National Agriculture Library Digital Collection
Provides access to full-text historical documents on the agricultural and food sciences. This collection provides insights on how Americans have grown and distributed the food they eat.
Open Parks Network
"The cultural heritage collections are as varied as the national parks and historic sites themselves. They contain a plethora of images and text that feature topics as varied as individuals, families, building plans, maintenance records, Civil War materials, shipwrecks, plant specimens, early town plans, historic workplaces, and much more." From Clemson University and the National Park Service.
Photogrammar - United States Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information (FSA-OWI).
Photogrammar is a web-based platform for organizing, searching, and visualizing the 170,000 photographs from 1935 to 1945 created by the United States Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information (FSA-OWI). This was the largest photography project ever sponsored by the federal government. The collection is housed at the Library of Congress. This digital project is hosted by Yale University.

Indigenous Peoples

Accessible Archives
Find full-text primary source material in American history including several 19th-century newspaper collections with images as well as American county histories and other historical collections.
American Indian Movement and Native American Radicalism

Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties
This site provides fully searchable digitzed text of Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties, compiled and edited by Charles J. Kappler, which is "an historically significant, seven volume compilation of U.S. treaties, laws and executive orders pertaining to Native American Indian tribes."
Native American Documents Project
From California State University San Marcos, this collection includes digitized copies of the narrative reports of the commissioner of Indian affairs for 1871, 1872, 1874, 1875, and 1876, and a map of western reservations published with the 1875 report.

Latinx Studies

Arte Público Hispanic Historical Collection
Find publications focused exclusively on U.S. Hispanic history, literature, and culture from colonial times until 1960. Content is written, indexed and searchable in Spanish and English.

LGBTQ

Archives of Sexuality and Gender
Find full-text of approximately 1.5 million pages of primary sources on social, political, health, and legal issues impacting LGBTQ communities around the world. Rare and unique content from newsletters, papers, government documents, manuscripts, pamphlets, and other types of primary sources sheds light on the gay rights movement, activism, the HIV/AIDS crisis, and more.

LGBT Thought and Culture
Online resource hosting books, periodicals, and archival materials documenting LGBT political, social and cultural movements throughout the twentieth century and into the present day.

Law

Politics

Conservatism - Hoover Institution
"Conservative politics, institutions, and thought form a major collecting area, intersecting with materials concerning anticommunism, free market economic policies, and government. Collections concerning the Libertarian Party and its leaders, student organizations, radical groups, and women of the political right are present, alongside sound recordings of Ronald Reagan and broadcasts of William F. Buckley's Firing Line television program."

Political Extremism and Radicalism
This collection includes coverage of far-right and far-left political groups, exploring the development, actions, and ideologies behind extremism and radicalism in the 20th century.

Technology

Alexander Graham Bell Family Papers
Although Bell is best known as the inventor of the telephone, he also did pioneering work in education of the deaf, the phonograph, geography and exploration, and powered flight. This collection at the Library of Congress contains nearly 150,000 documents that detail Bell’s work and life.
Ezra Cornell Papers
Cornell was an early telegraph builder and entrepreneur from Ithaca, NY. After he made his fortune in the telegraph industry, he founded Cornell University. His son Alonzo went on to become Governor of the state.
Engineering and Technology History Wiki (ETHW)
Website with thousands of articles, first hand accounts, oral histories, milestones, archival documents and lesson plans pertaining to the history of technology.
Joseph Henry Papers
Henry, an Albany native, was America’s first internationally renowned scientist. He was also the first head of the Smithsonian, from the 1840s to the 1870s.
Railroads and the Making of Modern America
It "collects and makes available a wide array of materials documenting the social effects of the railroad and the transformation of the United States to modern ideas, institutions, and practices in the nineteenth century."
Samuel F.B. Morse Papers
Morse was the inventor of the telegraph. This collection contains several thousand documents detailing his life, work, and controversial political beliefs. It covers the period 1793 to 1919. Hosted by the Library of Congress.
Thomas Edison Papers
This site contains nearly 200,000 individual records that detail Edison’s laboratory and inventions, his business operations, and his family and personal life. It’s best used alongside the seven (to date) published volumes of Edison’s selected papers.

U.S. Presidents

Abraham Lincoln Online
Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress
American Presidency Project
The core of this digital collection is based on published collections of presidential documents. It includes a great variety of speeches. Its advanced search feature allows you to limit by president, date and type of document.
Corresponde of James K. Polk
John F. Kennedy - Presidential Library and Museum
Papers of Andrew Jackson
Presidential Libraries
Links to presidential libraries, many of which have primary sources online.
Presidents
Selected speeches of all the Presidents, with an emphasis on Inaugural and State of the Union speeches, plus writings and biographies, maintained by George M. Welling, University of Groningen, The Netherlands.
Thomas Jefferson Papers, 1606 to 1827
Held in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division,
Ulysses S. Grant Digital Collections
"The digital collection consists of 32 volumes of The Papers of Ulysses S. Grant, political cartoons, and sheet music from the larger collection. Other materials will be added to the digital collection as processing continues."

Wars

For World War I and II, check out this section

Conflict-War Categories
Provides access to publications by the Air Force Historical Support Division under the following conflict-war categories: World War I, World War II, Cold War, Vietnam War, and Gulf War.
Densho: the Japanese American Legacy Project
The Archive of this site contains primary sources such as videos, oral histories, photographs and documents related to the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II. The site is free, but registration is required to access the Archive.
Frontline: the Gulf War
Includes oral histories and personal narratives from those involved.
Oral History: Veterans Remember
From the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, this site is a collection of oral histories from veterans of World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. Includes audio, written oral history abstracts, and photos for dozens of interviews.
Ad*Access
"Presents images and database information for over 7,000 advertisements printed in U.S. and Canadian newspapers and magazines between 1911 and 1955. Ad*Access concentrates on five main subject areas: Radio, Television, Transp
Rutgers Oral History Archives
Includes transcripts of oral histories of World War II, Korean, and Vietnam War.
Veterans History Project. Library of Congress
This site both collects oral histories and provides the tools and skills for volunteers to conduct oral history interviews.
Vietnam Veterans Archive
The Vietnam Veterans Archive is a collection of oral histories, documents, photographs, memorabilia, and letters from veterans or family members. Created by Brown University.
Virtual Vietnam Archive
"Strives to collect and provide free and open access to a full history of the Vietnam War. In order to achieve this goal, we collect materials that represent all aspects, all viewpoints, and all sides of the war." Contains millions of digitized documents.Types of material include documents, photographs, slides, negatives, oral histories, artifacts, moving images, sound recordings, maps, and collection finding aids. Hosted at Texas Tech University.
Wilson Center Digital Archive - Cold War
This is the world’s preeminent resource on the Cold War. Documents translated into English

Women and Gender History

Archives of Sexuality and Gender
Find full-text of approximately 1.5 million pages of primary sources on social, political, health, and legal issues impacting LGBTQ communities around the world. Rare and unique content from newsletters, papers, government documents, manuscripts, pamphlets, and other types of primary sources sheds light on the gay rights movement, activism, the HIV/AIDS crisis, and more.

Discovering American Women's History Online
Database to identify digitized primary sources relating to American women's history.
Eleanor Roosevelt Papers
Roosevelt was not only FDR’s wife, but a noted and respected public figure in her own right. She fought for justice for African Americans and the working class. She helped to write the UN Declaration of Human Rights, and she publicized her views on leading political issues through her daily newspaper column, “My Day.”
Emma Goldman Papers
Digitized materials from the Emma Goldman Papers Project at the University of California, Berkeley. Includes selections from Emma Goldman's writings, letters, telegrams, handbills, pamphlets, speeches, and photographs.

Sisters in the Brotherhoods: Working Women Organizing for Equality in New York City
Features audio and transcripts of the Sisters interviews as well as material from LaTour's book Sisters in the Brotherhoods: Working Women Organizing for Equality in New York City (2008). Website produced by Talking History. Gerald Zahavi is its director and executive producer.

Women's Studies Archive

Women's Suffrage .gov
This guide collates materials found on federal and some New York State agency websites relating to women's suffrage in the United States. While these materials are not official public documents, they are primary sources, both text and image, that chronicle our nation's history. The bulk of these historical records are maintained by two federal agencies, the Library of Congress and the National Archives and Records Administration (National Archives).

Women and Social Movements in Modern Empires Since 1820
Provides access to documents focused on women's perspectives in world history, with a particular emphasis on colonized and Indigenous voices.
Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000
Find digitized documentary sources on women and social movements in the United States including published histories and records of women's reform organizations throughout the United States across the 19th and 20th centuries.

Women Working, 1800-1930: An Exploration of Women's Impact on the Economic Life of the United States between 1800 and the Great Depression
This collection is an exploration of women's impact on the economic life of the United States between 1800 and the Great Depression. Working conditions, workplace regulations, home life, costs of living, commerce, recreation, health and hygiene, and social issues are among the issues documented. Created by Harvard University.