Primary Resources

What is a primary source?

“Primary sources are original records created at the time historical events occurred or well after events in the form of memoirs and oral histories. Primary sources may include letters, manuscripts, diaries, journals, newspapers, speeches, interviews, memoirs, documents produced by government agencies such as Congress or the Office of the President, photographs, audio recordings, moving pictures or video recordings, research data, and objects or artifacts such as works of art or ancient roads, buildings, tools, and weapons. These sources serve as the raw material to interpret the past, and when they are used along with previous interpretations by historians, they provide the resources necessary for historical research.”

(Finding Primary Sources on the Web, ALA-RUSA, 2008)

Primary Source Databases

American Indian Histories and Cultures

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 1740-1900

American Periodicals Series Online contains over 1,100 periodicals that first began publishing between 1740 and 1900.

American State Papers, 1789-1838

Contains primary material of American historical importance including legislative and executive documents, speeches of U.S. presidents and coverage of historical events from 1789-1838.

American West

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.

China, America, & the Pacific

Rare texts, visual images, personal and business correspondence, newspapers, and maps which document the trading and cultural relationships between China, America, and the Pacific region between the 18th and early 20th centuries.

Confidential Print: Latin America

British Foreign and Colonial Office documents covering the whole of South and Central America, including the non-British islands of the Caribbean, from the 1820s to the height of the Cold War in the 1960s.

Early English Books Online

Includes images of works printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America from 1473-1700.

Medieval Travel Writing

Late medieval manuscript illuminations and maps documenting journeys to Central Asia and the Far East (including Mongolia, Persia, India, China, and South-East Asia), and the Holy Land.

Slavery, Abolition and Social Justice

Primary and secondary documents relating to slavery, abolition and social justice. Includes an interactive map that allows selection of contents by preset regions.

Smithsonian Global Sound for Libraries

The world's music and aural traditions are preserved in this virtual encyclopedic collection of 42,405 tracks from 2,949 albums.

Travel Writing, Spectacle and World History

Women’s world travel writing from the early 19th century to the late 20th century. Collection includes manuscripts, diaries, correspondence, drawings, guidebooks, and photographs.

U.S. Congressional Serial Set

Contains reports, documents and journals of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

U.S. Congressional Serial Set Maps

Contains images and indexing for maps published in reports and documents of the 37th Congress, 1st Session through the 103rd Congress, 2nd session.

Women and Social Movements in the United States

Women and Social Movements is a collection of documents that are organized aroundthe history of women in social movements in the U.S. between 1600 and 2000.