Research Topics
Using Databases for your Research
See EHS Library Databases link above
Suggested Databases:
Primary Sources:
American Presidency Project **- published collections of presidential documents. Except for recent presidents, these collections omitted many documents such as proclamations, vetoes and orders
Chronicling America **- website providing access to information about historic newspapers. Searchable database of U.S. newspapers with descriptive information and select digitization of historic pages
Civil Rights Digital Library- primary images and documents concerning civil rights
Founders Documents- primary sources from the founding forefathers
National Archives Presidential Libraries- Presidential Libraries are archives and museums, bringing together the documents and artifacts of a President and his administration and presenting them to the public for study and discussion without regard for political considerations or affiliations. Presidential Libraries and Museums, like their holdings, belong to the American people
Miller Center - UVA
Oyes: Supreme court decisions
Source Types for Historical Research
What is different about college level history research?
Historians know about the past because they look at what relics have lasted through the ages which are called primary sources. For some periods and cultures (20th century America, for example), there are tons of primary sources—political documents, newspapers, teenagers’ diaries, high school year books, digitally-recorded phone conversations, etc. For other periods and cultures, however, historians have very few clues to work with; that’s one reason we know so little about the Aztecs.
They also consult other historians’ ideas. These ideas are presented in secondary sources, which include textbooks, monographs, and scholarly articles. Once they’ve studied both primary and secondary sources, historians link together all these bits of information— which answers a question about some past event or phenomenon.