Skip to Main Content

*HISTORY/HUMANITIES RESEARCH*

Find an article, book,/eBook, video, citing example, or get research help from a librarian with an assignment.

Primary Sources on the Web

More Faculty Approved Sites

  • African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship
    This is a chronicle of the African American experience. This exhibition is part of the Library of Congress Web site.
  • American Memory
    The Library of Congress National Digital Library has created this resource offering links to primary and archival materials relating to American culture and history.
  • American Studies at the University of Virginia
    The American Studies department at the University of Virginia has created this comprehensive Web site that includes links related to ethnicity, gender, literature, philosophy, religion, popular culture, regional studies, social sciences and science and technology.
  • Archives of the West
    This PBS site includes "a selection of the memoirs, journals, letters, reports and images that went into the making of THE WEST."
  • Caleb Johnson's Mayflower Web Pages: Primary Source Archive
    These pages provide a wealth of information about Mayflower history and genealogy. It is authored by a scholar specializing in the history of the Mayflower.
  • A Chronology of US Historical Documents
    This site is maintained by the University of Oklahoma College of Law. It includes digitized copies of historical documents from United States history sorted by time period.
  • Digital Public Library: Primary Source Sets
    Filter by subject or time period.
  • Emory Women Writers Resource Project
    "The Emory Women Writers Resource Project is a collection of edited and unedited texts by women writing in English from the seventeenth century through the nineteenth century."
  • The Exhibit Hall
    The Exhibit Hall, at the National Archives and Records Administration, includes links to digital copies of the Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights, Magna Carta, Emancipation Proclamation, Apollo 11 Flight Plan, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and more.
  • EyeWitness to History: history through the eyes of those who lived it
    This site provides text descriptions of historical events and time periods (from the ancient world to present) from the people who experienced them.
  • Guide to Law Online
    "The Guide to Law Online, prepared by the U.S. Law Library of Congress Public Services Division, is an annotated guide to sources of information on government and law available online. It includes selected links to useful and reliable sites for legal information."
  • Hanover Historical Texts Project
    "In 1995, the History Department and Hanover students initiated the Hanover Historical Texts Project. The Project's principal aim is to make primary texts readily available to students and faculty for use in history and humanities courses."
  • Historical & Cultural Atlas
    Interactive maps help students study cultural and historical changes.
  • Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents of the United States
    The full-text of presidential inaugural addresses are available at this site which is a part of the Bartleby.comhistorical texts.
  • Library of Congress Exhibitions
    This site offers online versions of exhibitions at the Library of Congress, past and present.
  • Library of Congress Photostream On Flickr 
    Flickr are the photo-sharing social-networking website. They "help people to make their content available to the people and enable new ways of organizing photos and videos."
  • Library of Congress Prints and Photgraphs Online Catalog
    "The Prints & Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC) provides access through group or item records to more than 50% of the Division's holdings, as well as to some images found in other units of the Library of Congress."
  • Making of America
    "Making of America (MoA) is a digital library of primary sources in American social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction. The collection is particularly strong in the subject areas of education, psychology, American history, sociology, religion, and science and technology.
  • Massachusetts Historical Society 
    "As part of its mission to communicate and share its collections, the MassachusettsHistorical Society makes selected manuscripts and artifacts available foronline viewing. Use this guide to begin exploring ... digital archives, onlinecurriculum, and web exhibitions." This site includes electronic archivesof the Adams and Jefferson papers.
  • Missouri: Images from the Past--Teaching with Documents
    "Created by the legislature in 1965, the State Archives serves as the repository for state records of permanent historical value."
  • National Security Archive
    "An independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University, the Archive collects and publishes declassified documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The Archive also serves as a repository of government records on a wide range of topics pertaining to the national security, foreign, intelligence, and economic policies of the United States."
  • New York Public Library Digital Gallery
    "NYPL Digital Gallery provides access to over 600,000 images digitized from primary sources and printed rarities in the collections of The New York Public Library, including illuminated manuscripts, historical maps, vintage posters, rare prints and photographs, illustrated books, printed ephemera, and more."
  • Non-fiction.Bartleby.com
    Presidential inaugural addresses, autobiographies's, first-hand accounts describing events and society at specific time periods, presidential debates, and pamphlets are available at this site.
  • Office of the Historian: United States Department of State
    "The Office of the Historian is responsible, under law, for the preparation and publication of the official historical documentary record of U.S. foreign policy in the Foreign Relations of the United States series."
  • Papers of George Washington
    This site at the University of Virginia contains links to electronic reproductions of selections from George Washington's papers, online exhibits, and articles about Washington's papers.
  • The Plymouth Colony Archive Project at the University of Virginia
    This site "presents a collection of fully searchable texts, including: court records, colony laws, seventeenth century journals and memoirs, probate inventories, wills, town plans, maps, and fort plans; research and seminar analyses of numerous topics; biographical profiles of selected colonists; and architectural, archaeological and material culture studies."
  • Presidential Libraries
    This list provides links to the ten presidential libraries, as well as to two materials library for former President Nixon and Clinton. Several of the libraries provide links to the full-text of some primary documents.
  • Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History and Culture: Digital Collections 
    "The Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History and Culture in Duke University’s Special Collections Library acquires, preserves and makes available to a large population of researchers published and unpublished materials that reflect the public and private lives of women, past and present."
  • Thomas Jefferson
    This Library of Congress Web site includes information chronicling Thomas Jefferson's life including digitized copies of some primary sources.
  • United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
    This site provides an introduction to the museum in Washington, DC, suggestions for Holocaust educational programs, guidelines for teaching about the subject, links to archives and information on Holocaust organizations and historical sites.
  • Valley of the Shadow
    "The Valley Project details life in two American communities, one Northernand one Southern, from the time of John Brown's raid, through the era ofReconstruction."
  • Victorian Women Writers Project (fiction, non-fiction, poetry, letters, short stories)
    "The goal of the Victorian Women Writers Project is to produce highly accurate transcriptions of works by British women writers of the 19th century."
  • Virtual Jamestown
    This site includes digital copies of primary sources relating to the history of Jamestown and Virginia.
  • Virtual Vietnam Archive
    "The Virtual Vietnam Archive currently contains over 2.7 million pages of scanned materials. Types of material include documents, photographs, slides, negatives, oral histories, artifacts, moving images, sound recordings, maps, and collection finding aids."
  • Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents
    "The Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents is published every Monday and is the official publication of presidential statements, messages, remarks, and other materials released by the White House Press Secretary."

More Faculty Approved Sites

 

[ B. D. Owens Library ] B.D. Owens Library | 800 University Dr. Maryville, MO 64468 | 660.562.1193 [ Twitter ] [ Facebook ] [ Instagram ] [ Spotify ] [ Pinterest ]