History 432

Colonial America

Fall '05

Prof. Marsha Hamilton
mhamilton@jaguar1.usouthal.edu
http://www.southalabama.edu/history/faculty/hamilton

Sources of Primary Documents

Search Tips for Limiting to Primary Sources:

Library of American Civilization."It contains more than 6,500,000 pages of material relating to all aspects of American life and literature, from the beginning to the outbreak of World War I. Included are pamphlets, periodicals, documents both public and private, biographies and autobiographies of persons both known and obscure, fiction and non-fiction, poetry, collected works and papers, material of foreign origin relating to America, and many rare books not generally available."
**Ask at the Documents/Serials Desk on Second Floor South for help with the special lens needed to view these documents. Copies may be made at 10¢ a page on the microfiche readers.

Selected Print Sources for Collections of Primary Documents or their Identification

• Annals of America. Ref. E 173 .A793 and online at "Electronic Reference."
• Documents of American History. Ref. E 173 .C66 1973b
• Personal Writings By Women to 1900. Bookstacks Z 1229 .W8 D38 1989
• 100 Key Documents in American Democracy. Ref. E 173 .A15 1994
• Published Diaries and Letters of American Women. Bookstacks Z 5305 .U5 G66 1987
• Debating the Issues in Colonial Newspapers: Primary Documents on Events of the Period. NetLibrary and Bookstacks E 187 .C78 2000
• Black Soldiers in the Colonial Militia. Bookstacks E 184.6 .B49 1994
• Irish Immigrants in the Land of Canaan: Letters and Memoirs From Colonial and Revolutionary America, 1675-1815. Bookstacks E 184 .I6 I683 2003
• English Defenders of American Freedoms, 1774-1778. Gov. Docs. LC 1.2: En 3/774-78
• Making of the American Republic: The Great Documents, 1774-1789. Ref. E 303 .T3
• America’s Naval Heritage: A Catalog of Early Imprints… Gov. Docs. D 221.2: H 42
• Women’s Voices, Women’s Lives: Documents in Early American History. Bookstacks HQ 1416 .W67 1998
• American Maritime Documents, 1776-1860. Bookstacks VK 23 .S73 1992
• Documents of American Constitutional & Legal History. Bookstacks KF 4502 .D635 1989b
• Guide to Records in the National Archives of the United States Relating to American Indians. Gov. Documents GS 4.6/2: AM 3
• American Newspapers, 1821-1936: a Union List of Files Available in the United States and Canada. Library of American Civilization LAC 16878
• Check List of American Eighteenth Century Newspapers in the Library of Congress. Ref. Z 6951 .U47 1968
• American Bibliography: A Chronological Dictionary of All Books, Pamphlets, and Periodical Publications Printed in the United States From the Genesis of Printing in 1639 Down to and Including the Year 1820. Ref. Z 1215 .E92
• National Index of American Imprints Through 1800. Ref. Z 1215 .S495

• American Notes: Travels in America, 1750-1920
• Library of Congress's American Memory Project http://memory.loc.gov
• Documents from the Continental Congress & the Constitutional Convention
• A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation Another Library of Congress collection with Congressional documents and debates http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lawhome.html
• Eyewitness to History http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/
• History Matters A good site for learning how to interpret different kinds of primary sources. http://www.historymatters.gmu.edu/ Search "colonial" for links to many primary document sites.
• George Washington Papers at the Library of Congress including diaries. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/gwhtml/gwhome.html
• Avalon Project: Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy. Documents include pre-18th century - 20th century.
• Historic American Buildings Survey: Library of Congress Special Collections
• Historical Flags of the United States
• National Archives and Records Administration
• United States Historical Census Browser
• Archiving Early America --lots of flashing adverts, but some good primary documents
• History of the United Kingdom: Primary Documents, 1689 - 1815
• UK Official Publications on the Internet

Secondary Sources

Full-Text Journals and Indexes:

Some indexes will also have links to full-text of the articles. Dates of full-text coverage may vary with different databases. One way to check availability is to use "USA’s Full-Text Journal Holdings" under "Fulltext Journals & Indexes" on the University Library homepage (SOUTHcat Plus).

• JSTOR. A collection of full-text journals in which the latest issues are at least 3 to 5 years old, but the holdings often extend back many years. The journals may be searched separately or as a group.
• America: History and Life. Excellent abstracts. No full-text, but now links to some full-text articles in JSTOR and some H-Net reviews. Includes book reviews.
• Expanded Academic ASAP (Gale/InfoTrac). Some full-text. Includes book reviews.
• Academic Search Premier (EBSCO) Some full-text. Includes book reviews.
• Humanities Index. Ref. AI 3 .H84
• Readers’ Guide Retrospective. Index to general interest periodicals for the period 1890. No full text.

Indexes to Books, Chapters in Books and Dissertations

• WorldCat (FirstSearch) An index to books and other materials in libraries worldwide. Can be searched by keyword, subject heading, author or title. No full text.
• Essay and General Literature Index. Ref. AI 3 .E752 (1900-1998)
• History E-Book Project. Full text to books of major importance in historical studies. (All titles appear in SOUTHcat Catalog but best search results are from History E-Book website)
• NetLibrary. All records appear in the SOUTHcat Catalog and can be searched with keyword or subject searches.
• Dissertation Abstracts/Digital Dissertations. Searchable by author, keyword or institution. USA theses submitted in pdf format are available online at no charge.

• Encyclopedia of Colonial and Revolutionary America. Ref. E 188 .E63 1990
• Blackwell Encyclopedia of the American Revolution. Bookstacks E 208 .B635 1991
• Encyclopedia of American History. Ref. E 174.5 .M847 1970
• Encyclopedia of American Social History. Bookstacks HN 57 .E58 1993
• Encyclopedia of American Intelligence and Espionage. Ref. UB 271 .U5 O85 1988
• Encyclopedia of Women’s History in the United States. Ref. HQ 1410 .C85 1996
• Datapedia of the United States, 1790-2000. Ref. HA 202 .K87 1994
• Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970. Ref. HA 202 .B87 1975
• International Historical Statistics: The Americas 1750-1988. Ref. HA 175 .M52 1993
• Encyclopedia of African American Culture and History. Ref. E 185 .E54 1995
• AHA Guide to Historical Literature. Ref. Z 6201 .A55 1995
• Statistical Abstract of the United States. Gov. Documents C 3.134
• Select Charters and Other Documents Illustrative of American History, 1606-1775. Library of American Civilization

Library Resource Guides

• American Colonial documents http://www.southalabama.edu/univlib/guides/amercolobib.html
• History http://www.southalabama.edu/univlib/guides/history.htm

Sample Searches on SOUTHcat Catalog

Subject

united states-history-colonial period
women - united states-history-18th century
slavery-united states-history-17th century

Keywords

• "united states" and "colonial period" and sources
• women and "colonial period" and sources
• "american newspapers" and colonial
• "indians of north america" and sources
• "indians of north america" and "government relations"
• newspaper? and "united states" and bibliography?

Secondary Sources-Webpages

• Internet Modern History Sourcebook: Colonial North America
• National Center for History in the Schools
• American Women's History
• Distinguished Women of Past and Present
• National First Ladies' Library: includes brief biographies

Style Guides

Bedford/St. Martin Documentation

Chicago Manual of Style. Ready Ref. Z 253 .U69

Citing Internet Sources http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~amrel/cit.html

• Smart "Public" Internet Searching Use well-regarded and recommended Internet sites Use an "advanced" search engine like Google Advanced Search and limit to "more trustworthy" domains (e.g. .edu, .gov). Evaluate what you find through a search engine extremely carefully. Criteria for Evaluating webpages Google Scholar

  Plagiarism & Turnitin plagiarism for students Turnitin