A Step-by-Step Guide to Doing Historical Research [without getting hysterical!] In addition to being a scholarly investigation, research is a social activity intended to create new knowledge. Historical research is your informed response to the questions that you ask while examining the record of human experience. These questions may concern such elements as looking at an event or topic, examining events that lead to the event in question, social influences, key players, and other contextual information. This step-by-step guide progresses from an introduction to historical resources to information about how to identify a topic, craft a thesis and develop a research paper. Table of contents: The Range and Richness of Historical Sources Secondary Sources Primary Sources Historical Analysis What is it? Who, When, Where, What and Why: The Five "W"s Topic, Thesis, Sources Definition of Terms Choose a Topic Craft a Thesis Evaluate Thesis and Sources A Variety of Information Sources Take Efficient Notes Note Cards Thinking, Organizing, Researching Parenthetical Documentation Prepare a Works Cited Page Drafting, Revising, Rewriting, Rethinking For Further Reading: Works Cited Additional Links So you want to study history?! Tons of help and links Slatta Home Page Use the Writing and other links on the lefhand menu I. The Range and Richness of Historical Sources Back to Top Every period leaves traces, what historians call "sources" or evidence. Some are more credible or carry more weight than others; judging the differences is a vital skill developed by good historians. Sources vary in perspective, so knowing who created the information you are examining is vital. Anonymous doesn't make for a very compelling source. For example, an FBI report on the antiwar movement, prepared for U.S. President Richard Nixon, probably contained secrets that at the time were thought to have affected national security. It would not be usual, however, for a journalist's article about a campus riot, featured in a local newspaper, to leak top secret information. Which source would you read? It depends on your research topic. If you're studying how government officials portrayed student activists, you'll want to read the FBI report and many more documents from other government agencies such as the CIA and the National Security Council. If you're investigating contemporary opinion of pro-war and anti-war activists, local newspaper accounts provide a rich resource. You'd want to read a variety of newspapers to ensure you're covering a wide range of opinions (rural/urban, left/right, North/South, Soldier/Draft-dodger, etc). Historians classify sources into two major categories: primary and secondary sources. Secondary Sources Back to Top Definition: Secondary sources are created by someone who was either not present when the event occurred or removed from it in time. We use secondary sources for overview information, to familiarize ourselves with a topic, and compare that topic with other events in history. In refining a research topic, we often begin with secondary sources. This helps us identify gaps or conflicts in the existing scholarly literature that might prove promsing topics. Types: History books, encyclopedias, historical dictionaries, and academic (scholarly) articles are secondary sources. To help you determine the status of a given secondary source, see How to identify and nagivate scholarly literature . Examples: Historian Marilyn Young's (NYU) book about the Vietnam War is a secondary source. She did not participate in the war. Her study is not based on her personal experience but on the evidence she culled from a variety of sources she found in the United States and Vietnam. Primary Sources Back to Top Definition: Primary sources emanate from individuals or groups who participated in or witnessed an event and recorded that event during or immediately after the event. They include speeches, memoirs, diaries, letters, telegrams, emails, proclamations, government documents, and much more. Examples: A student activist during the war writing about protest activities has created a memoir. This would be a primary source because the information is based on her own involvement in the events she describes. Similarly, an antiwar speech is a primary source. So is the arrest record of student protesters. A newspaper editorial or article, reporting on a student demonstration is also a primary source. II. Historical Analysis What is it? Back to Top No matter what you read, whether it's a primary source or a secondary source, you want to know who authored the source (a trusted scholar? A controversial historian? A propagandist? A famous person? An ordinary individual?). "Author" refers to anyone who created information in any medium (film, sound, or text). You also need to know when it was written and the kind of audience the author intend to reach. You should also consider what you bring to the evidence that you examine. Are you inductively following a path of evidence, developing your interpretation based on the sources? Do you have an ax to grind? Did you begin your research deductively, with your mind made up before even seeing the evidence. Historians need to avoid the latter and emulate the former. To read more about the distinction, examine the difference between Intellectual Inquirers and Partisan Ideologues . In the study of history, perspective is everything. A letter written by a twenty- year old Vietnam War protestor will differ greatly from a letter written by a scholar of protest movements. Although the sentiment might be the same, the perspective and influences of these two authors will be worlds apart. Practicing the " 5 Ws " will avoid the confusion of the authority trap. Who, When, Where, What and Why: The Five "W"s Back to Top Historians accumulate evidence (information, including facts, stories, interpretations, opinions, statements, reports, etc.) from a variety of sources (primary and secondary). They must also verify that certain key pieces of information are corroborated by a number of people and sources ("the predonderance of evidence"). The historian poses the " 5 Ws " to every piece of information he examines: Who is the historical actor? When did the event take place? Where did it occur? What did it entail and why did it happen the way it did? The " 5 Ws " can also be used to evaluate a primary source. Who authored the work? When was it created? Where was it created, published, and disseminated? Why was it written (the intended audience), and what is the document about (what points is the author making)? If you know the answers to these five questions, you can analyze any document, and any primary source. The historian doesn't look for the truth, since this presumes there is only one true story. The historian tries to understand a number of competing viewpoints to form his or her own interpretation-- what constitutes the best explanation of what happened and why. By using as wide a range of primary source documents and secondary sources as possible, you will add depth and richness to your historical analysis. The more exposure you, the researcher, have to a number of different sources and differing view points, the more you have a balanced and complete view about a topic in history. This view will spark more questions and ultimately lead you into the quest to unravel more clues about your topic. You are ready to start assembling information for your research paper. III. Topic, Thesis, Sources Definition of Terms Back to Top Because your purpose is to create new knowledge while recognizing those scholars whose existing work has helped you in this pursuit, you are honor bound never to commit the following academic sins: Plagiarism: Literally "kidnapping," involving the use of someone else's words as if they were your own (Gibaldi 6). To avoid plagiarism you must document direct quotations, paraphrases, and original ideas not your own. Recycling: Rehashing material you already know thoroughly or, without your professor's permission, submitting a paper that you have completed for another course. Premature cognitive commitment: Academic jargon for deciding on a thesis too soon and then seeking information to serve that thesis rather than embarking on a genuine search for new knowledge. Choose a Topic Back to Top "Do not hunt for subjects, let them choose you, not you them." --Samuel Butler Choosing a topic is the first step in the pursuit of a thesis. Below is a logical progression from topic to thesis: Close reading of the primary text, aided by secondary sources Growing awareness of interesting qualities within the primary text Choosing a topic for research Asking productive questions that help explore and evaluate a topic Creating a research hypothesis Revising and refining a hypothesis to form a working thesis First, and most important, identify what qualities in the primary or secondary source pique your imagination and curiosity and send you on a search for answers. Bloom's taxonomy of cognitive levels provides a description of productive questions asked by critical thinkers. While the lower levels (knowledge, comprehension) are necessary to a good history essay, aspire to the upper three levels (analysis, synthesis, evaluation). Skimming reference works such as encyclopedias, books, critical essays and periodical articles can help you choose a topic that evolves into a hypothesis, which in turn may lead to a thesis. One approach to skimming involves reading the first paragraph of a secondary source to locate and evaluate the author's thesis. Then for a general idea of the work's organization and major ideas read the first and last sentence of each paragraph. Read the conclusion carefully, as it usually presents a summary (Barnet and Bedau 19). Craft a Thesis Back to Top Very often a chosen topic is too broad for focused research. You must revise it until you have a working hypothesis, that is, a statement of an idea or an approach with respect to the source that could form the basis for your thesis. Remember to not commit too soon to any one hypothesis. Use it as a divining rod or a first step that will take you to new information that may inspire you to revise your hypothesis. Be flexible. Give yourself time to explore possibilities. The hypothesis you create will mature and shift as you write and rewrite your paper. New questions will send you back to old and on to new material. Remember, this is the nature of research--it is more a spiraling or iterative activity than a linear one. Test your working hypothesis to be sure it is: broad enough to promise a variety of resources. narrow enough for you to research in depth. original enough to interest you and your readers. worthwhile enough to offer information and insights of substance "do-able"--sources are available to complete the research. Now it is time to craft your thesis, your revised and refined hypothesis. A thesis is a declarative sentence that: focuses on one well-defined idea makes an arguable assertion; it is capable of being supported prepares your readers for the body of your paper and foreshadows the conclusion. Evaluate Thesis and Sources Back to Top Like your hypothesis, your thesis is not carved in stone. You are in charge. If necessary, revise it during the research process. As you research, continue to evaluate both your thesis for practicality, originality, and promise as a search tool, and secondary sources for relevance and scholarliness. The following are questions to ask during the research process: Are there many journal articles and entire books devoted to the thesis, suggesting that the subject has been covered so thoroughly that there may be nothing new to say? Does the thesis lead to stimulating, new insights? Are appropriate sources available? Is there a variety of sources available so that the bibliography or works cited page will reflect different kinds of sources? Which sources are too broad for my thesis? Which resources are too narrow? Who is the author of the secondary source? Does the critic's background suggest that he/she is qualified? After crafting a thesis, consider one of the following two approaches to writing a research paper: Excited about your thesis and eager to begin? Return to the primary or secondary source to find support for your thesis. Organize ideas and begin writing your first draft. After writing the first draft, have it reviewed by your peers and your instructor. Ponder their suggestions and return to the sources to answer still-open questions. Document facts and opinions from secondary sources. Remember, secondary sources can never substitute for primary sources. Confused about where to start? Use your thesis to guide you to primary and secondary sources. Secondary sources can help you clarify your position and find a direction for your paper. Keep a working bibliography. You may not use all the sources you record, but you cannot be sure which ones you will eventually discard. Create a working outline as you research. This outline will, of course, change as you delve more deeply into your subject. A Variety of Information Sources Back to Top "A mind that is stretched to a new idea never returns to its original dimension." --Oliver Wendell Holmes Your thesis and your working outline are the primary compasses that will help you navigate the variety of sources available. In "Introduction to the Library" (5-6) the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers suggests you become familiar with the library you will be using by: taking a tour or enrolling for a brief introductory lecture referring to the library's publications describing its resources introducing yourself and your project to the reference librarian The MLA Handbook also lists guides for the use of libraries (5), including: Jean Key Gates, Guide to the Use of Libraries and Information Sources (7th ed., New York: McGraw, 1994). Thomas Mann, A Guide to Library Research Methods (New York: Oxford UP, 1987). Online Central Catalog Most libraries have their holdings listed on a computer. The online catalog may offer Internet sites, Web pages and databases that relate to the university's curriculum. It may also include academic journals and online reference books. Below are three search techniques commonly used online: Index Search: Although online catalogs may differ slightly from library to library, the most common listings are by: Subject Search: Enter the author's name for books and article written about the author. Author Search: Enter an author's name for works written by the author, including collections of essays the author may have written about his/her own works. Title Search: Enter a title for the screen to list all the books the library carries with that title. Key Word Search/Full-text Search: A one-word search, e.g., 'Kennedy,' will produce an overwhelming number of sources, as it will call up any entry that includes the name 'Kennedy.' To focus more narrowly on your subject, add one or more key words, e.g., "John Kennedy, Peace Corps." Use precise key words. Boolean Search: Boolean Search techniques use words such as "and," "or," and "not," which clarify the relationship between key words, thus narrowing the search. Take Efficient Notes Back to Top Keeping complete and accurate bibliography and note cards during the research process is a time (and sanity) saving practice. If you have ever needed a book or pages within a book, only to discover that an earlier researcher has failed to return it or torn pages from your source, you understand the need to take good notes. Every researcher has a favorite method for taking notes. Here are some suggestions-- customize one of them for your own use. Bibliography cards There may be far more books and articles listed than you have time to read, so be selective when choosing a reference. Take information from works that clearly relate to your thesis, remembering that you may not use them all. Use a smaller or a different color card from the one used for taking notes. Write a bibliography card for every source. Number the bibliography cards. On the note cards, use the number rather than the author's name and the title. It's faster. Another method for recording a working bibliography, of course, is to create your own database. Adding, removing, and alphabetizing titles is a simple process. Be sure to save often and to create a back-up file. A bibliography card should include all the information a reader needs to locate that particular source for further study. Most of the information required for a book entry (Gibaldi 112): Author's name Title of a part of the book [preface, chapter titles, etc.] Title of the book Name of the editor, translator, or compiler Edition used Number(s) of the volume(s) used Name of the series Place of publication, name of the publisher, and date of publication Page numbers Supplementary bibliographic information and annotations Most of the information required for an article in a periodical (Gibaldi 141): Author's name Title of the article Name of the periodical Series number or name (if relevant) Volume number (for a scholarly journal) Issue number (if needed) Date of publication Page numbers Supplementary information For information on how to cite other sources refer to your So you want to study history page . Note Cards Back to Top Take notes in ink on either uniform note cards (3x5, 4x6, etc.) or uniform slips of paper. Devote each note card to a single topic identified at the top. Write only on one side. Later, you may want to use the back to add notes or personal observations. Include a topical heading for each card. Include the number of the page(s) where you found the information. You will want the page number(s) later for documentation, and you may also want page number(s)to verify your notes. Most novice researchers write down too much. Condense. Abbreviate. You are striving for substance, not quantity. Quote directly from primary sources--but the "meat," not everything. Suggestions for condensing information: Summary: A summary is intended to provide the gist of an essay. Do not weave in the author's choice phrases. Read the information first and then condense the main points in your own words. This practice will help you avoid the copying that leads to plagiarism. Summarizing also helps you both analyze the text you are reading and evaluate its strengths and weaknesses (Barnet and Bedau 13). Outline: Use to identify a series of points. Paraphrase, except for key primary source quotations. Never quote directly from a secondary source, unless the precise wording is essential to your argument. Simplify the language and list the ideas in the same order. A paraphrase is as long as the original. Paraphrasing is helpful when you are struggling with a particularly difficult passage. Be sure to jot down your own insights or flashes of brilliance. Ralph Waldo Emerson warns you to "Look sharply after your thoughts. They come unlooked for, like a new bird seen on your trees, and, if you turn to your usual task, disappear...." To differentiate these insights from those of the source you are reading, initial them as your own. (When the following examples of note cards include the researcher's insights, they will be followed by the initials N. R.) When you have finished researching your thesis and you are ready to write your paper, organize your cards according to topic. Notecards make it easy to shuffle and organize your source information on a table-- or across the floor. Maintain your working outline that includes the note card headings and explores a logical order for presenting them in your paper. IV. Begin Thinking, Researching, Organizing Back to Top Don't be too sequential. Researching, writing, revising is a complex interactive process. Start writing as soon as possible! "The best antidote to writer's block is--to write." (Klauser 15). However, you still feel overwhelmed and are staring at a blank page, you are not alone. Many students find writing the first sentence to be the most daunting part of the entire research process. Be creative. Cluster (Rico 28-49). Clustering is a form of brainstorming. Sometimes called a web, the cluster forms a design that may suggest a natural organization for a paper. Here's a graphical depiction of brainstorming . Like a sun, the generating idea or topic lies at the center of the web. From it radiate words, phrases, sentences and images that in turn attract other words, phrases, sentences and images. Put another way--stay focused. Start with your outline. If clustering is not a technique that works for you, turn to the working outline you created during the research process. Use the outline view of your word processor. If you have not already done so, group your note cards according to topic headings. Compare them to your outline's major points. If necessary, change the outline to correspond with the headings on the note cards. If any area seems weak because of a scarcity of facts or opinions, return to your primary and/or secondary sources for more information or consider deleting that heading. Use your outline to provide balance in your essay. Each major topic should have approximately the same amount of information. Once you have written a working outline, consider two different methods for organizing it. Deduction: A process of development that moves from the general to the specific. You may use this approach to present your findings. However, as noted above, your research and interpretive process should be inductive. Deduction is the most commonly used form of organization for a research paper. The thesis statement is the generalization that leads to the specific support provided by primary and secondary sources. The thesis is stated early in the paper. The body of the paper then proceeds to provide the facts, examples, and analogies that flow logically from that thesis. The thesis contains key words that are reflected in the outline. These key words become a unifying element throughout the paper, as they reappear in the detailed paragraphs that support and develop the thesis. The conclusion of the paper circles back to the thesis, which is now far more meaningful because of the deductive development that supports it. Chronological order A process that follows a traditional time line or sequence of events. A chronological organization is useful for a paper that explores cause and effect. Parenthetical Documentation Back to Top The Works Cited page, a list of primary and secondary sources, is not sufficient documentation to acknowledge the ideas, facts, and opinions you have included within your text. The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers describes an efficient parenthetical style of documentation to be used within the body of your paper. Guidelines for parenthetical documentation: "References to the text must clearly point to specific sources in the list of works cited" (Gibaldi 184). Try to use parenthetical documentation as little as possible. For example, when you cite an entire work, it is preferable to include the author's name in the text. The author's last name followed by the page number is usually enough for an accurate identification of the source in the works cited list. These examples illustrate the most common kinds of documentation. Documenting a quotation: Ex. "The separation from the personal mother is a particularly intense process for a daughter because she has to separate from the one who is the same as herself" (Murdock 17). She may feel abandoned and angry. Note: The author of The Heroine's Journey is listed under Works Cited by the author's name, reversed--Murdock, Maureen. Quoted material is found on page 17 of that book. Parenthetical documentation is after the quotation mark and before the period. Documenting a paraphrase: Ex. In fairy tales a woman who holds the princess captive or who abandons her often needs to be killed (18). Note: The second paraphrase is also from Murdock's book The Heroine's Journey. It is not, however, necessary to repeat the author's name if no other documentation interrupts the two. If the works cited page lists more than one work by the same author, include within the parentheses an abbreviated form of the appropriate title. You may, of course, include the title in your sentence, making it unnecessary to add an abbreviated title in the citation. > Prepare a Works Cited Page Back to Top There are a variety of titles for the page that lists primary and secondary sources (Gibaldi 106-107). A Works Cited page lists those works you have cited within the body of your paper. The reader need only refer to it for the necessary information required for further independent research. Bibliography means literally a description of books. Because your research may involve the use of periodicals, films, art works, photographs, etc. "Works Cited" is a more precise descriptive term than bibliography. An Annotated Bibliography or Annotated Works Cited page offers brief critiques and descriptions of the works listed. A Works Consulted page lists those works you have used but not cited. Avoid using this format. As with other elements of a research paper there are specific guidelines for the placement and the appearance of the Works Cited page. The following guidelines comply with MLA style: The Work Cited page is placed at the end of your paper and numbered consecutively with the body of your paper. Center the title and place it one inch from the top of your page. Do not quote or underline the title. Double space the entire page, both within and between entries. The entries are arranged alphabetically by the author's last name or by the title of the article or book being cited. If the title begins with an article (a, an, the) alphabetize by the next word. If you cite two or more works by the same author, list the titles in alphabetical order. Begin every entry after the first with three hyphens followed by a period. All entries begin at the left margin but subsequent lines are indented five spaces. Be sure that each entry cited on the Works Cited page corresponds to a specific citation within your paper. Refer to the the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (104- 182) for detailed descriptions of Work Cited entries. Citing sources from online databases is a relatively new phenomenon. Make sure to ask your professor about citing these sources and which style to use. V. Draft, Revise, Rewrite, Rethink Back to Top "There are days when the result is so bad that no fewer than five revisions are required. In contrast, when I'm greatly inspired, only four revisions are needed." --John Kenneth Galbraith Try freewriting your first draft. Freewriting is a discovery process during which the writer freely explores a topic. Let your creative juices flow. In Writing without Teachers , Peter Elbow asserts that "[a]lmost everybody interposes a massive and complicated series of editings between the time words start to be born into consciousness and when they finally come off the end of the pencil or typewriter [or word processor] onto the page" (5). Do not let your internal judge interfere with this first draft. Creating and revising are two very different functions. Don't confuse them! If you stop to check spelling, punctuation, or grammar, you disrupt the flow of creative energy. Create; then fix it later. When material you have researched comes easily to mind, include it. Add a quick citation, one you can come back to later to check for form, and get on with your discovery. In subsequent drafts, focus on creating an essay that flows smoothly, supports fully, and speaks clearly and interestingly. Add style to substance. Create a smooth flow of words, ideas and paragraphs. Rearrange paragraphs for a logical progression of information. Transition is essential if you want your reader to follow you smoothly from introduction to conclusion. Transitional words and phrases stitch your ideas together; they provide coherence within the essay. External transition: Words and phrases that are added to a sentence as overt signs of transition are obvious and effective, but should not be overused, as they may draw attention to themselves and away from ideas. Examples of external transition are "however," "then," "next," "therefore." "first," "moreover," and "on the other hand." Internal transition is more subtle. Key words in the introduction become golden threads when they appear in the paper's body and conclusion. When the writer hears a key word repeated too often, however, she/he replaces it with a synonym or a pronoun. Below are examples of internal transition. Transitional sentences create a logical flow from paragraph to paragraph. Iclude individual words, phrases, or clauses that refer to previous ideas and that point ahead to new ones. They are usually placed at the end or at the beginning of a paragraph. A transitional paragraph conducts your reader from one part of the paper to another. It may be only a few sentences long. Each paragraph of the body of the paper should contain adequate support for its one governing idea. Speak/write clearly, in your own voice. Tone: The paper's tone, whether formal, ironic, or humorous, should be appropriate for the audience and the subject. Voice: Keep you language honest. Your paper should sound like you. Understand, paraphrase, absorb, and express in your own words the information you have researched. Avoid phony language. Sentence formation: When you polish your sentences, read them aloud for word choice and word placement. Be concise. Strunk and White in The Elements of Style advise the writer to "omit needless words" (23). First, however, you must recognize them. Keep yourself and your reader interested. In fact, Strunk's 1918 writing advice is still well worth pondering. First, deliver on your promises. Be sure the body of your paper fulfills the promise of the introduction. Avoid the obvious. Offer new insights. Reveal the unexpected. Have you crafted your conclusion as carefully as you have your introduction? Conclusions are not merely the repetition of your thesis. The conclusion of a research paper is a synthesis of the information presented in the body. Your research has led you to conclusions and opinions that have helped you understand your thesis more deeply and more clearly. Lift your reader to the full level of understanding that you have achieved. Revision means "to look again." Find a peer reader to read your paper with you present. Or, visit your college or university's writing lab. Guide your reader's responses by asking specific questions. Are you unsure of the logical order of your paragraphs? Do you want to know whether you have supported all opinions adequately? Are you concerned about punctuation or grammar? Ask that these issues be addressed. You are in charge. Here are some techniques that may prove helpful when you are revising alone or with a reader. When you edit for spelling errors read the sentences backwards. This procedure will help you look closely at individual words. Always read your paper aloud. Hearing your own words puts them in a new light. Listen to the flow of ideas and of language. Decide whether or not the voice sounds honest and the tone is appropriate to the purpose of the paper and to your audience. Listen for awkward or lumpy wording. Find the one right word, Eliminate needless words. Combine sentences. Kill the passive voice. Eliminate was/were/is/are constructions. They're lame and anti-historical. Be ruthless. If an idea doesn't serve your thesis, banish it, even if it's one of your favorite bits of prose. In the margins, write the major topic of each paragraph. By outlining after you have written the paper, you are once again evaluating your paper's organization. OK, you've got the process down. Now execute! And enjoy! It's not everyday that you get to make history. VI. For Further Reading: Works Cited Back to Top Barnet, Sylvan, and Hugo Bedau. Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing: A Brief Guide to Argument. Boston: Bedford, 1993. Brent, Doug. Reading as Rhetorical Invention: Knowledge,Persuasion and the Teaching of Research-Based Writing. Urbana: NCTE, 1992. Elbow, Peter. Writing without Teachers. New York: Oxford University Press, 1973. Gibladi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 4th ed. New York: Modern Language Association, 1995. Horvitz, Deborah. "Nameless Ghosts: Possession and Dispossession in Beloved." Studies in American Fiction , Vol. 17, No. 2, Autum, 1989, pp. 157-167. Republished in the Literature Research Center. Gale Group. (1 January 1999). Klauser, Henriette Anne. Writing on Both Sides of the Brain: Breakthrough Techniques for People Who Write. Philadelphia: Harper, 1986. Rico, Gabriele Lusser. Writing the Natural Way: Using Right Brain Techniques to Release Your Expressive Powers. Los Angeles: Houghton, 1983. Sorenson, Sharon. The Research Paper: A Contemporary Approach. New York: AMSCO, 1994. Strunk, William, Jr., and E. B. White. The Elements of Style. 3rd ed. New York: MacMillan, 1979. Back to Top This guide adapted from materials published by Thomson Gale, publishers. For free resources, including a generic guide to writing term papers, see the Gale.com website , which also includes product information for schools.

How to Write a History Research Paper

  • How do I pick a topic?
  • But I can’t find any material…

Research Guide

Writing guide.

See also: How to Write a Good History Essay

1. How do I pick a topic?

Picking a topic is perhaps the most important step in writing a research paper. To do it well requires several steps of refinement. First you have to determine a general area in which you have an interest (if you aren’t interested, your readers won’t be either). You do not write a paper “about the Civil War,” however, for that is such a large and vague concept that the paper will be too shallow or you will be swamped with information. The next step is to narrow your topic. Are you interested in comparison? battles? social change? politics? causes? biography? Once you reach this stage try to formulate your research topic as a question. For example, suppose that you decide to write a paper on the use of the films of the 1930’s and what they can tell historians about the Great Depression. You might turn that into the following question: “What are the primary values expressed in films of the 1930’s?” Or you might ask a quite different question, “What is the standard of living portrayed in films of the 1930’s?” There are other questions, of course, which you could have asked, but these two clearly illustrate how different two papers on the same general subject might be. By asking yourself a question as a means of starting research on a topic you will help yourself find the answers. You also open the door to loading the evidence one way or another. It will help you decide what kinds of evidence might be pertinent to your question, and it can also twist perceptions of a topic. For example, if you ask a question about economics as motivation, you are not likely to learn much about ideals, and vice versa.

2. But I can’t find any material…

No one should pick a topic without trying to figure out how one could discover pertinent information, nor should anyone settle on a topic before getting some background information about the general area. These two checks should make sure your paper is in the realm of the possible. The trick of good research is detective work and imaginative thinking on how one can find information. First try to figure out what kinds of things you should know about a topic to answer your research question. Are there statistics? Do you need personal letters? What background information should be included? Then if you do not know how to find that particular kind of information, ASK . A reference librarian or professor is much more likely to be able to steer you to the right sources if you can ask a specific question such as “Where can I find statistics on the number of interracial marriages?” than if you say “What can you find on racial attitudes?”

Use the footnotes and bibliographies of general background books as well as reference aids to lead you to special studies. If Carleton does not have the books or sources you need, try ordering through the library minitex. Many sources are also available on-line.

As your research paper takes shape you will find that you need background on people, places, events, etc. Do not just rely on some general survey for all of your background. Check the several good dictionaries of biography for background on people, or see if there is a standard book-length biography. If you are dealing with a legal matter check into the background of the judges who make the court decision and the circumstances surrounding the original incident or law. Try looking for public opinions in newspapers of the time. In other words, each bit of information you find should open the possibility of other research paths.

Learn to use several research techniques. You cannot count on a good research paper coming from browsing on one shelf at the library. A really pertinent book may be hidden in another section of the library due to classification quirks. The Readers’ Guide (Ref. A13 .R4) is not the only source for magazine articles, nor the card catalog for books. There are whole books which are listings of other books on particular topics. There are specialized indexes of magazine articles. Modern History Journals are indexed in the Social Studies and Humanities Index (Ref. A13 .R282) before 1976 After 1976 use the Social Sciences Index (REF A13 .S62) and the Humanities Index (Ref. A13 .H85). See also Historical Abstracts (Ref. D1 .H5). Reference Librarians would love to help you learn to use these research tools. It pays to browse in the reference room at the library and poke into the guides which are on the shelves. It also pays to browse the Internet.

3. Help! How do I put this together?

A. preliminary research:.

If you do not already have a general background on your topic, get the most recent good general source on the topic and read it for general orientation. On the basis of that reading formulate as clearly focused question as you can. You should generally discuss with your professor at that point whether your question is a feasible one.

B. Building a Basic Bibliography:

Use the bibliography/notes in your first general source, MUSE, and especially Historical Abstracts on cd-rom in the Library Reading Room (the computer farthest to the left in the front row as you walk past the Reference Desk — or ask there). If there is a specialized bibliography on your topic, you will certainly want to consult that as well, but these are often a bit dated.

C. Building a Full Bibliography:

Read the recent articles or chapters that seem to focus on your topic best. This will allow you to focus your research question quite a bit. Use the sources cited and/or discussed in this reading to build a full bibliography. Use such tools as Historical Abstracts (or, depending on your topic, the abstracts from a different field) and a large, convenient computer-based national library catalog (e.g. the University of California system from the “Libs” command in your VAX account or the smaller University of Minnesota library through MUSE) to check out your sources fully. For specific article searches “Uncover” (press returns for the “open access”) or possibly (less likely for history) “First Search” through “Connect to Other Resources” in MUSE can also be useful.

D. Major Research:

Now do the bulk of your research. But do not overdo it. Do not fall into the trap of reading and reading to avoid getting started on the writing. After you have the bulk of information you might need, start writing. You can fill in the smaller gaps of your research more effectively later.

A. Outline:

Write a preliminary thesis statement, expressing what you believe your major argument(s) will be. Sketch out a broad outline that indicates the structure — main points and subpoints or your argument as it seems at this time. Do not get too detailed at this point.

B. The First Draft:

On the basis of this thesis statement and outline, start writing, even pieces, as soon as you have enough information to start. Do not wait until you have filled all the research gaps. Keep on writing. If you run into smaller research questions just mark the text with a searchable symbol. It is important that you try to get to the end point of this writing as soon as possible, even if you leave pieces still in outline form at first and then fill the gaps after you get to the end.

Critical advice for larger papers: It is often more effective not to start at the point where the beginning of your paper will be. Especially the introductory paragraph is often best left until later, when you feel ready and inspired.

C. The Second Draft:

The “second draft” is a fully re-thought and rewritten version of your paper. It is at the heart of the writing process.

First, lay your first draft aside for a day or so to gain distance from it. After that break, read it over with a critical eye as you would somebody else’s paper (well, almost!). You will probably find that your first draft is still quite descriptive, rather than argumentative. It is likely to wander; your perspective and usually even the thesis seemed to change/develop as you wrote. Don’t despair. That is perfectly normal even for experienced writers (even after 40 years and a good deal of published work!). You will be frustrated. But keep questioning your paper along the following lines: What precisely are my key questions? What parts of my evidence here are really pertinent to those questions (that is, does it help me answer them)? How or in what order can I structure my paper most effectively to answer those questions most clearly and efficiently for my reader?

At this point you must outline your paper freshly. Mark up your first draft, ask tough questions whether your argument is clear and whether the order in which you present your points is effective! You must write conceptually a new paper at this point, even if you can use paragraphs and especially quotes, factual data in the new draft.

It is critical that in your new draft your paragraphs start with topic sentences that identify the argument you will be making in the particular paragraph (sometimes this can be strings of two or three paragraphs). The individual steps in your argument must be clearly reflected in the topic sentences of your paragraphs (or a couple of them linked).

D. The Third or Final Draft:

You are now ready to check for basic rules of good writing. This is when you need to check the diction, that is, the accuracy and suitability of words. Eliminate unnecessary passive or awkward noun constructions (active-voice, verbal constructions are usually more effective); improve the flow of your transitions; avoid repetitions or split infinitives; correct apostrophes in possessives and such. Make the style clear and smooth. Check that the start of your paper is interesting for the reader. Last but not least, cut out unnecessary verbiage and wordiness. Spell-check and proof-read.

– Diethelm Prowe, 1998

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Research guide

If you are just starting out in HPS, this will be the first time for many years – perhaps ever – that you have done substantial library or museum based research. The number of general studies may seem overwhelming, yet digging out specific material relevant to your topic may seem like finding needles in a haystack. Before turning to the specific entries that make up this guide, there are a few general points that apply more widely.

Planning your research

Because good research and good writing go hand in hand, probably the single most important key to successful research is having a good topic. For that, all you need at the beginning are two things: (a) a problem that you are genuinely interested in and (b) a specific issue, controversy, technique, instrument, person, etc. that is likely to offer a fruitful way forward for exploring your problem. In the early stages, it's often a good idea to be general about (a) and very specific about (b). So you might be interested in why people decide to become doctors, and decide to look at the early career of a single practitioner from the early nineteenth century, when the evidence for this kind of question happens to be unusually good. You can get lots of advice from people in the Department about places to look for topics, especially if you combine this with reading in areas of potential interest. Remember that you're more likely to get good advice if you're able to mesh your interests with something that a potential supervisor knows about. HPS is such a broad field that it's impossible for any department to cover all aspects of it with an equal degree of expertise. It can be reassuring to know that your topic will evolve as your research develops, although it is vital that you establish some basic parameters relatively quickly. Otherwise you will end up doing the research for two, three or even four research papers or dissertations, when all you need is the material for one.

Before beginning detailed work, it's obviously a good idea to read some of the secondary literature surrounding your subject. The more general books are listed on the reading lists for the Part II lecture courses, and some of the specialist literature is listed in these research guides. This doesn't need to involve an exhaustive search, at least not at this stage, but you do need to master the fundamentals of what's been done if you're going to be in a position to judge the relevance of anything you find. If there are lectures being offered in your topic, make sure to attend them; and if they are offered later in the year, try to see if you can obtain a preliminary bibliography from the lecturer.

After that, it's usually a good idea to immerse yourself in your main primary sources as soon as possible. If you are studying a museum object, this is the time to look at it closely; if you're writing about a debate, get together the main papers relevant to it and give them a close read; if you're writing about a specific experiment, look at the published papers, the laboratory notebook, and the relevant letters. Don't spend hours in the early stages of research ferreting out hard-to-find details, unless you're absolutely positive that they are of central importance to the viability of your topic. Start to get a feel for the material you have, and the questions that might be explored further. Make an outline of the main topics that you hope to cover, organized along what you see as the most interesting themes (and remember, 'background' is not usually an interesting theme on its own).

At this stage, research can go in many different directions. At some point, you'll want to read more about the techniques other historians have used for exploring similar questions. Most fields have an established repertoire of ways of approaching problems, and you need to know what these are, especially if you decide to reject them. One of the advantages of an interdisciplinary field like HPS is that you are exposed to different and often conflicting ways of tackling similar questions. Remember that this is true within history itself, and you need to be aware of alternatives. This may well involve looking further afield, at classic books or articles that are not specifically on 'your' subject. For example, it may be that you could find some helpful ideas for a study of modern scientific portraiture in a book on the eighteenth century. The best books dealing with educational maps may not be on the astronomical ones you are studying, but on ones used for teaching classical geography. See where the inspiration for works you admire comes from, and have a look at the sources they have used. This will help you develop the kind of focussed questions that make for a successful piece of work.

As you develop an outline and begin to think through your topic in more detail, you'll be in good position to plan possible lines of research. Don't try to find out everything about your topic: pick those aspects that are likely to prove most fruitful for the direction your essay seems to be heading. For example, it may be worth spending a long time searching for biographical details about a person if their career and life are central to your analysis; but in many other cases, such issues may not be very important. If your interest is in the reception of a work, it is likely to be more fruitful to learn a lot about a few commentaries or reviews (where they appeared, who wrote them, and so forth) than to gather in randomly all the comments you can find.

Follow up hints in other people's footnotes. Works that are otherwise dull or outdated in approach are sometimes based on very solid research. One secondary reference to a crucial letter or newspaper article can save you hours of mindless trawling, and lead you straight to the information you need. Moreover, good historians often signal questions or sources that they think would be worth investigating further.

Remember that the best history almost always depends on developing new approaches and interpretations, not on knowing about a secret archive no one has used before. If you give your work time to develop, and combine research with writing, you will discover new sources, and (better still) a fresh importance for material that has supposedly been known for a long time. As you become familiar with your topic, you are likely to find that evidence you dug out at the beginning of your project is much more significant than you thought it was. In historical research, the most important evidence often isn't sitting there on the surface – it's something you need to dig out through close reading and an understanding of the situation in which the document you are studying was written, or in which the object was produced. This is especially true of instruments, paintings and other non-textual sources.

Some standard reference works

Your research should become more focussed as time goes on. Don't just gather randomly: you should always have at least some idea of why you are looking for something, and what you might hope to find. Make guesses, follow up hunches, see if an idea you have has the possibility to work out. At the beginning, it can be valuable to learn the full range of what is available, but eventually you should be following up specific issues, a bit like a detective tracing the clues to a mystery. It is at this stage of research, which is often best done in conjunction with writing up sections of your project, that knowing where to find answers to specific questions is most useful. There is nothing more disheartening than spending a week to find a crucial fact, only to discover that it's been sitting on the shelf next to you all term. The Whipple has a wide variety of guides, biographical dictionaries and bibliographies, so spend a few minutes early on looking at the reference shelves.

Every major country has a national biographical dictionary (the new version of the British one is the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , available 2004 online). For better-known scientists, a good place to start is Charles C. Gillispie (ed.) Dictionary of Scientific Biography (1970–1980). There are more specialized dictionaries for every scientific field, from entomology to astronomy. The University Library has a huge selection of biographical sources; ask your supervisor about the best ones for your purpose.

Preliminary searching for book titles and other bibliographical information is now often best done online, and every historian should know how to use the British Library's online search facility; COPAC (the UK national library database); and WorldCat (an international database). All of these are accessible through the HPS Whipple Library website (under 'other catalogues'). At the time of writing, the University Library is remains one of the few libraries of its size to have many of its records not available online, so remember that you have to check the green guard-book catalogues (and the supplementary catalogues) for most items published before 1977. It is hoped that this situation will be rectified soon. There are also numerous bibliographies for individual sciences and subjects, together with catalogues of relevant manuscripts. Most of these are listed elsewhere in this guide.

As questions arise, you will want to be able to access books and articles by other historians that touch upon your subject. There are many sources for this listed elsewhere in this guide, but you should definitely know about the Isis Current Bibliography and The Wellcome Bibliography for the History of Medicine . Both are available online, the former through the RLG History of Science, Technology and Medicine database, the latter through the website of the Wellcome Library.

Libraries and museums

Finally, a word in praise of libraries and museums. As the comments above make clear, the internet is invaluable for searching for specific pieces of information. If you need a bibliographical reference or a general reading list from a course at another university, it is an excellent place to begin. If you are looking for the source of an unidentified quotation, typing it into Google (or an appropriate database held by the University Library) will often turn up the source in seconds. Many academic journals are now online, as are the texts of many books, though not always in a paginated or citable form.

For almost all historical topics, however, libraries filled with printed books and journals will remain the principal tools for research, just as museums will continue to be essential to any work dealing with the material culture of past science. The reason for this is simple: what is on the internet is the result of decisions by people in the past decade, while libraries and museums are the product of a continuous history of collecting over several thousand years. Cambridge has some of the best collections for the history of science anywhere. Despite what is often said, this is not because of the famous manuscripts or showpiece books (these are mostly available in other ways), but because of the depth and range of its collections across the whole field. The Whipple Library is small and friendly, and has an unparalleled selection of secondary works selected over many years – don't just go for specific titles you've found in the catalogue, try browsing around, and ask the librarians for help if you can't see what you are looking for. Explore the Whipple Museum and talk to the curator and the staff. There are rich troves of material in these departmental collections, on topics ranging from phrenology and microscopy to the early development of pocket calculators. Become familiar with what the University Library has to offer: it is large and sometimes idiosyncratic, but worth getting to know well if you are at all serious about research. It is a fantastic instrument for studying the human past – the historian's equivalent of CERN or the Hubble Telescope. And all you need to get in is a student ID.

Further reading

Wayne C. Booth, Gregory G. Colomb, and Joseph M. William, The Craft of Research , 2nd ed. (University of Chicago Press, 2003).

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This guide is an introduction to selected resources available for historical research.  It covers both primary sources (such as diaries, letters, newspaper articles, photographs, government documents and first-hand accounts) and secondary materials (such as books and articles written by historians and devoted to the analysis and interpretation of historical events and evidence).

"Research in history involves developing an understanding of the past through the examination and interpretation of evidence. Evidence may exist in the form of texts, physical remains of historic sites, recorded data, pictures, maps, artifacts, and so on. The historian’s job is to find evidence, analyze its content and biases, corroborate it with further evidence, and use that evidence to develop an interpretation of past events that holds some significance for the present.

Historians use libraries to

  • locate primary sources (first-hand information such as diaries, letters, and original documents) for evidence
  • find secondary sources (historians’ interpretations and analyses of historical evidence)
  • verify factual material as inconsistencies arise"

( Research and Documentation in the Electronic Age, Fifth Edition, by Diana Hacker and Barbara Fister, Bedford/St. Martin, 2010)

This guide is meant to help you work through these steps.

Other helpful guides

This is a list of other historical research guides you may find helpful:

  • Learning Historical Research Learning to Do Historical Research: A Primer for Environmental Historians and Others by William Cronon and his students, University of Wisconsin A website designed as a basic introduction to historical research for anyone and everyone who is interested in exploring the past.
  • Reading, Writing, and Researching for History: A Guide for College Students by Patrick Rael, Bowdoin College Guide to all aspects of historical scholarship—from reading a history book to doing primary source research to writing a history paper.
  • Writing Historical Essays: A Guide for Undergraduates Rutgers History Department guide to writing historical essays
  • History Study Guides History study guides created by the Carleton College History Department

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  • Last Updated: Jan 18, 2024 2:14 PM
  • URL: https://researchguides.library.wisc.edu/introhist

Where Research Begins: Choosing a Research Project That Matters to You (and the World)

how to do a history research project

Plenty of books tell you how to do research. This book helps you figure out WHAT to research in the first place, and why it matters.

The hardest part of research isn’t answering a question. It’s knowing what to do  before  you know what your question is . Where Research Begins  tackles the two challenges every researcher faces with every new project: How do I find a compelling problem to investigate—one that truly matters to me, deeply and personally? How do I then design my research project so that the results will matter to anyone else?

This book will help you start your new research project the right way for  you  with a series of simple yet ingenious exercises. Written in a conversational style and packed with real-world examples, this easy-to-follow workbook offers an engaging guide to finding research inspiration within yourself, and in the broader world of ideas.

Read this book if you (or your students):

  • have difficulty choosing a research topic
  • know your topic, but are unsure how to turn it into a research project
  • feel intimidated by or unqualified to do research
  • worry that you’re asking the wrong questions about your research topic
  • have plenty of good ideas, but aren’t sure which one to commit to
  • feel like your research topic was imposed by someone else
  • want to learn new ways to think about how to do research.

Under the expert guidance of award-winning researchers Thomas S. Mullaney and Christopher Rea, you will find yourself on the path to a compelling and meaningful research project, one that matters to you—and the world.

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  • Knowledge Base
  • Starting the research process

A Beginner's Guide to Starting the Research Process

Research process steps

When you have to write a thesis or dissertation , it can be hard to know where to begin, but there are some clear steps you can follow.

The research process often begins with a very broad idea for a topic you’d like to know more about. You do some preliminary research to identify a  problem . After refining your research questions , you can lay out the foundations of your research design , leading to a proposal that outlines your ideas and plans.

This article takes you through the first steps of the research process, helping you narrow down your ideas and build up a strong foundation for your research project.

Table of contents

Step 1: choose your topic, step 2: identify a problem, step 3: formulate research questions, step 4: create a research design, step 5: write a research proposal, other interesting articles.

First you have to come up with some ideas. Your thesis or dissertation topic can start out very broad. Think about the general area or field you’re interested in—maybe you already have specific research interests based on classes you’ve taken, or maybe you had to consider your topic when applying to graduate school and writing a statement of purpose .

Even if you already have a good sense of your topic, you’ll need to read widely to build background knowledge and begin narrowing down your ideas. Conduct an initial literature review to begin gathering relevant sources. As you read, take notes and try to identify problems, questions, debates, contradictions and gaps. Your aim is to narrow down from a broad area of interest to a specific niche.

Make sure to consider the practicalities: the requirements of your programme, the amount of time you have to complete the research, and how difficult it will be to access sources and data on the topic. Before moving onto the next stage, it’s a good idea to discuss the topic with your thesis supervisor.

>>Read more about narrowing down a research topic

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So you’ve settled on a topic and found a niche—but what exactly will your research investigate, and why does it matter? To give your project focus and purpose, you have to define a research problem .

The problem might be a practical issue—for example, a process or practice that isn’t working well, an area of concern in an organization’s performance, or a difficulty faced by a specific group of people in society.

Alternatively, you might choose to investigate a theoretical problem—for example, an underexplored phenomenon or relationship, a contradiction between different models or theories, or an unresolved debate among scholars.

To put the problem in context and set your objectives, you can write a problem statement . This describes who the problem affects, why research is needed, and how your research project will contribute to solving it.

>>Read more about defining a research problem

Next, based on the problem statement, you need to write one or more research questions . These target exactly what you want to find out. They might focus on describing, comparing, evaluating, or explaining the research problem.

A strong research question should be specific enough that you can answer it thoroughly using appropriate qualitative or quantitative research methods. It should also be complex enough to require in-depth investigation, analysis, and argument. Questions that can be answered with “yes/no” or with easily available facts are not complex enough for a thesis or dissertation.

In some types of research, at this stage you might also have to develop a conceptual framework and testable hypotheses .

>>See research question examples

The research design is a practical framework for answering your research questions. It involves making decisions about the type of data you need, the methods you’ll use to collect and analyze it, and the location and timescale of your research.

There are often many possible paths you can take to answering your questions. The decisions you make will partly be based on your priorities. For example, do you want to determine causes and effects, draw generalizable conclusions, or understand the details of a specific context?

You need to decide whether you will use primary or secondary data and qualitative or quantitative methods . You also need to determine the specific tools, procedures, and materials you’ll use to collect and analyze your data, as well as your criteria for selecting participants or sources.

>>Read more about creating a research design

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how to do a history research project

Finally, after completing these steps, you are ready to complete a research proposal . The proposal outlines the context, relevance, purpose, and plan of your research.

As well as outlining the background, problem statement, and research questions, the proposal should also include a literature review that shows how your project will fit into existing work on the topic. The research design section describes your approach and explains exactly what you will do.

You might have to get the proposal approved by your supervisor before you get started, and it will guide the process of writing your thesis or dissertation.

>>Read more about writing a research proposal

If you want to know more about the research process , methodology , research bias , or statistics , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

Methodology

  • Sampling methods
  • Simple random sampling
  • Stratified sampling
  • Cluster sampling
  • Likert scales
  • Reproducibility

 Statistics

  • Null hypothesis
  • Statistical power
  • Probability distribution
  • Effect size
  • Poisson distribution

Research bias

  • Optimism bias
  • Cognitive bias
  • Implicit bias
  • Hawthorne effect
  • Anchoring bias
  • Explicit bias

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how to do a history research project

  • Researching

The historical research process explained

Dublin Trinity College Library

Researching for a History assessment piece can often be the most daunting part of the subject. However, it needn't be. Research is a systematic process that, if followed step-by-step, will become a logical and efficient part of your work. Below are links to the nine stages of good research, providing explanations and examples for each one.

  • Key Inquiry Question
  • Background Research
  • Sub-questions
  • Source Research
  • Organise Quotes
  • Topic Sentences
  • Draft Writing
  • Final Draft

Other potential research stages:

  • Research Rationale
  • Critical Summary of Research

Overview of the research process

Below is a pictorial explanation about how the research process works to create a hypothesis from the results of question-driven research. As you follow the research steps, each section of the diagram is completed. 

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How to do oral history.

Oral history is a technique for generating and preserving original, historically interesting information – primary source material – from personal recollections through planned recorded interviews. Below are suggestions for anyone looking to start recording oral histories based on best practices used in the Smithsonian Oral History Program at the Smithsonian Institution Archives.

Click here for a printout of our How to Do Oral History Guide .

What is oral history.

The Six R’s of Oral History Interviewing

Preparing for Oral History Interviews

How to ask questions in oral history interviews, suggestions for recording oral history interviews.

Suggested Topics/Questions for Oral History Interviews

After the Oral History Interview

Readings and online resources.

Oral history is a technique for generating and preserving original, historically interesting information – primary source material – from personal recollections through planned recorded interviews.  This method of interviewing is used to preserve the voices, memories and perspectives of people in history. It’s a tool we can all use to engage with and learn from family members, friends, and the people we share space with in an interview that captures their unique history and perspective in their own words. Oral history stems from the tradition of passing information of importance to the family or tribe from one generation to the next. In the United States, the Oral History Association connects oral historians and provides a broad range of information on oral history.

Technique :  The methodology of oral history can be adapted to many different types of projects from family history to academic research projects in many different disciplines.  The interviews should usually be conducted in a one-on-one situation, although group interviews can also be effective.

Sharing:   In collaboration with a well-prepared and empathetic interviewer, the narrator may be able to share information that they do not realize they recall and to make associations and draw conclusions about their experience that they would not be able to produce without the interviewer.

Preserving :  Recording preserves the interview, in sound or video and later in transcript for use by others removed in time and/or distance from the interviewee.  Oral history also preserves the ENTIRE interview, in its original form, rather than the interviewer’s interpretation of what was said.

Original historically important information :  The well-prepared interviewer will know what information is already in documents and will use the oral history interview to seek new information, clarification, or new interpretation of a historical event.

Personal recollections :  The interviewer should ask the narrator for first-person information. These are memories that the narrator can provide on a reliable basis, e.g., events in which they participated or witnessed or decisions in which they took part.  Oral history interviews can convey personality, explain motivation, and reveal inner thoughts and perceptions.

Martha Ross: The Six R's of Oral History Interviewing

The oral history interviewer should strive to create a situation in which the interviewee is able to reflect widely, to recall fully, and to associate freely on the subject of the interview, and to maintain an atmosphere in which they are willing to articulate fully those recollections.

The following six considerations are basic to good oral history practice.

1. RESEARCH: Thorough preparation enables the interviewer to know what questions to ask and is essential to establishing rapport with the interviewee.  Research pays off during the interview, when the interviewer’s knowledge of names, dates, and places may jog the interviewee’s memory.

2. RAPPORT: Good rapport is established with the interviewee by approaching them properly, informing them of the purpose of the project, and advising them of their role and their rights.  A pre-interview call or visit to get acquainted and discuss procedures is recommended.

3. RESTRAINT: The experienced interviewer maintains rapport by following good interview techniques: being efficient but unobtrusive with equipment, starting at the beginning and proceeding chronologically, asking open-ended questions, listening closely without interrupting, following up on details or unexpected avenues of information, challenging questionable information in a non-threatening way, and generally maintaining an atmosphere in which the interviewee feels able to respond fully and truthfully.

4. RETREAT: Close each interview session by asking a “deflationary” question, such as an assessment of the experiences just discussed.  All sessions should be planned and scheduled so that they conclude before the interviewee becomes fatigued.

5. REVIEW: Interviewers should listen to their interviews soon afterwards to analyze their interviewing techniques and to pick up details to follow up on in subsequent sessions.

6. RESPECT: Respect underlies every aspect of oral history – respect for the interviewee as an individual, their experience, for the way they remember that experience, and for the way they are able and willing to articulate those recollections.  Maintaining respect toward the individual interviewee and toward the practice of oral history interviewing is essential to success as an interviewer. 

NOTE:  Martha Ross is the “mother” of oral history in the mid-Atlantic region and taught at the University of Maryland in the 1970s and 1980s.

1. Select an interviewee.

2. Ask the interviewee if they are interested.

3. If interviewee is interested, set up a time and place for the interview. Also request any background information the interviewee might want to provide.  Check about the best place – somewhere quiet where you won’t be disturbed.  Request at least two hours for the interview session.

4. Write a follow-up email confirming plans for the interview that discusses the goals, legal rights, and how the interviews will be handled. Provide a very general list of topic areas and ask them to think about topics they would like to cover.

5. Conduct basic biographical research on your interviewee. Conduct internet searches.  Read publications and profiles.  Ask others about topics you should cover, stories they should tell.

6. Develop a chronology of the important events in their life. Develop lists of personal names and terms important in their life, such as geographic names where they traveled, names of important family or community members.  Compile a folder of photographs of the interviewee and their world.  These will prove invaluable in the interview when the interviewee gets confused or forgets names.

7. Rework the question outline, making it relevant to this interviewee, deleting topics that don’t pertain to them, and adding areas, such as organizations they were involved in, etc.

8. With the equipment, PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE until you can use it in your sleep. Practice interviewing family members and friends.  Then delete all the files you’ve created, so the recorder is at full capacity.  Make sure all the settings match the instruction sheet.  Make sure that you have all the necessary pieces of equipment, such as the recorder power cord and an extension cord.

9. The day before the interview, confirm time and place.

10. Bring with you: equipment, extension cord, cell phone (in case of equipment problems), question outline, chronology, terms, photos, etc., legal forms, extra paper for notes and a pen.  Also bring throat lozenges or hard candy, in case throats get dry.  If possible, bring a camera and take photograph of the interviewee at the interview. 

11. When you arrive, assess room for sound. Turn off equipment, close doors, and rearrange furniture into a comfortable arrangement facing each other close enough to hand photos but not too close.  Set up equipment so you can monitor it constantly and discretely, without turning away from the interviewee.

12. Go over the list of topic areas again and permissions again.

13. Ask about any scrapbooks, news clippings, awards, etc., that they might want to bring out.

1. Find a quiet place to conduct the interview where you won't be bothered by telephones, family members, pets, traffic noise, etc.  Get two glasses of water.  Take a photograph.  Turn off cell phones, etc.

2. Explain to your interviewee what you are doing.

Explain their legal rights. Explain how interview is likely to be used. Explain that they can choose what questions to answer and that the recorder can be turned off at any time.

3. Ask your interviewee to sign the deed of gift and cosign it yourself if you have one.

4. Use an outline of topics you wish to cover, with follow-up questions, that you have prepared in advance.  Also bring photographs and a personal name and term list, and chronology.

5. Start with easy questions, such as their name, where and when born, names of family members.

6. Allow the interviewee to do the talking.

7. Ask "open-ended" questions, such as, tell me about, describe, etc., what do you remember about?

If the interviewee responds with just a yes or no, ask how, why, when, where, who. What the interviewee chooses to tell you and how they choose to tell it is just as informative/revealing as the actual answers they give.

8. Avoid “closed-ended” questions that can end in a yes or not, or single fact.

Examples, were you there?  What was date of that?  Did you like that? If you get a short answer, follow up with tell me more, who, what, when, where, how and why.

9. Do not ask leading questions – was it this or that? Or I thought that the most important thing was…..These have been demonstrated to affect interviewee’s answer and will taint your interview.

10. Ask one question at a time and try to ask simple questions.

11. Try to ask follow-up questions – tell me more, who, what, where. 

12. To stimulate their memory, use “statement questions” such as, “In 1956, you traveled to Tibet to conduct research.  How did that trip come about?” 

13. Focus on recording their personal experiences, rather than stories about others or that they have heard. If you’re getting general stories, say tell me about your role, describe how you felt that day or dealt with that crisis, etc.

14. Don't worry about silences. Let the interviewee think and take time before they answer.  Look at your outline and check off topics if the interviewee needs time to think.

15. Note what types of questions your interviewee responds best to and try to adapt your style to what works best with them.

16. Let the interviewee suggest topics to you that you might not have thought of.

17. Allow the interviewee to drift off to topics not on your outline. These can be the best part of your interview.

18. After an hour or less, ask interviewee if they would like to take a break. Write down the last words as you turn the recorder off.

19. Provide the interviewee with feedback by nodding, smiling, listening attentively. Try to avoid too many verbal responses that will record over the interviewee, such as “Really!’ or “Uh-huh, uh-huh.”

20. Don’t be afraid to politely question information that might be incorrect – ask for a clarification, or say something to the effect, “Oh, I’m confused, I thought that Mrs. X was involved in that.”

21. Reword questions that the interviewee does not answer – they may not have heard what you thought you asked.  But they have the right to not answer if they don’t want to.

22. Do allow the interviewee to tell “THE STORY.” Most interviews have a favorite story. They will fit it in somehow, so let it happen!  Allow some repetition since additional details may emerge with a second version, but don’t allow your interviewee to keep telling the same story over and over.

23. Bring visuals, if possible, to stimulate memory or ask to bring out photo albums of trips or family events, etc. Invite the interviewee to bring visuals to the interview.

24. Let the interviewee do the talking. Try to avoid telling your own stories, “Yes!  When I was there….”   or offering your own opinions.  If asked for an opinion, explain that the interview is designed to record their point of view, not yours.  

25. An interview usually does not last much longer than 1 1/2 to 2 hours. After that both interviewer and interviewee get tired and lose their concentration.

26. End interview gracefully, asking them to assess their lives and the topics you have discussed.

27. Ask your interviewee to spell any names or places you did not understand.

28. Clean up. Make sure you have all pieces of equipment.

29. As you depart, keep options open to return for an additional interview.

1. There are many recorder options that will record an uncompressed preservation quality audio file. If you do not have access to a recorder, most smartphones have recording software that will record an MP3 audio file.

2. If possible, record an uncompressed WAV audio file at 24 bit.

3. Use external microphones if possible.

4. Check room for extraneous noise such as motors, fans, pets, traffic, etc.

5. Test the recorder to check the volume of the interviewer and interviewee and to see if it is picking up any static or surrounding noise.

6. Begin with an introduction that identifies who is being interviewed, who is conducting the interview, where, when, and the purpose of the interview.

7. Ask if you have permission to record the interview.

8. Avoid speaking while your interviewee is sharing. Instead, try to use physical cues that you’re listening like nodding and taking notes instead of affirming “mhmms.”

9. Upload the files from the recorder to your computer, external hard drive and/or the cloud to ensure you don’t lose the file.

10. Name the file in a way you can identify it later. Ex: LastnameFirstname_Date_Interview#_File#

11. Make copies of your digital file. Save a copy to an external hard drive and/or the cloud.

Suggested Topics/Questions for Oral History Interviews 

1. What is your full name?

2. Do I have permission to record this interview?

3. Where and when were you born?

4. Who else was in your family?

What were your parents’ names? Are there any traditional first names in your family? What type of work did they do?

5. Did other family members live nearby?

Tell me about them. How did they meet? What did they do for a living? When did you get to see them?

6. What did your community look like outside of your family?

How did you meet them? What types of activities would you do together? Tell me about your neighborhood.

7. Where did your ancestors come from?

When did they come to the United States? Where did they first settle? Did your family name change when your family immigrated to the United States? Are any of their traditions still carried on today? What language did your parents and grandparents speak?

8. What games did you play when you were young?

What toys did you have? Who did you play with? Where did you play? Did you have any hobbies? Have your hobbies and interests changed over time? Did you collect anything?  Baseball cards, dolls, etc.

9. Tell me about your grammar and high school education?

Describe your grammar school/high school. What subjects did you study? Tell me about your interests in your school days. Did you have any influential teachers? Any leadership roles in organizations/classes? What were your hobbies and interests as a child? Did you read much, if so, what topics? Did you belong to any influential clubs or organizations? Did you have any goals/dreams for when you grew up? How did gender roles affect you during K-12 education?

10. What holidays did your family celebrate?

How did you celebrate them? What was your favorite part of the holidays?

11. Tell me about the house you grew up in.

How was it furnished? Did you have your own room? Where did you spend most of your time? Did you move to another home while you were growing up? Tell me about the new home. How did your community change?

12. What were mealtimes like in your family?

What foods did you eat? Who cooked the food? Who cleaned up after meals?

13. Did you have any pets? Describe them.

Who took care of them?

14. What type of clothes did you wear?

Where did you get them/who made them? When did you get new clothes?

15. How did your family get around?

Did you have a car? Did you use public transportation? If you had a car, when did you get it?  Who drove it? Did you go on vacations in it? When did you learn to drive?  Describe your first car. What kind of public transportation was available?

16. What sort of entertainment did you like?

What did you listen to growing up? Did you watch TV growing up? What did you watch? What large moments do you remember watching on TV?

17. Who was your family doctor? Describe them.

Do you remember any epidemics or diseases? Did your family have any home remedies?  If so, describe.

18. What was your first job?

Describe a typical work day. How much money did you earn? How long did you have that job?  What lessons did you learn? Additional jobs and details – trace career path, changes Tell me about any influential mentors.  What were the most memorable aspects of that position?

19. Did you attend college?

Tell me about your college years. What school?  How did you decide to go there? What was your major? Any influential mentors? Did you do a semester abroad? Describe your major interests? What were successes/accomplishments and challenges/frustrations? Tell me about any gender challenges you encountered in college.

20. How have historic events, such as 9/11, hurricanes, the Great Depression, world wars, natural disasters, strikes, and now Covid-19 etc., affected you?

Did these events impact your community?

1. Download interview files onto your computer, following the instructions provided.

2. On your computer, rename each file by right clicking on file and selecting rename. Rename it in this format:  LastnameFirstname_Date_Interview#_File#, for example, JonesSandra_04-30-2020_1.

3. Click on file to be sure it plays properly.

4. Do not erase files from your computer until you have made duplicates.

5. Erase files from recorder, so the recorder will be empty for next interview.

6. Write a one paragraph summary of what the interview is about, providing technical details. Also list a dozen or so name and subject terms for indexing.  This will be used to identify the interview for future use.

7. Prepare a longer list of all names, terms, etc. to use for transcription.

8. Prepare an introduction for the transcript that provides an overview of the interview for the reader and helps them understand what they are about to read. The introduction should include an opening paragraph that states why the individual was selected, i.e., the special significance or  accomplishments of the individual; information as to the place and particular conditions of the interviews, e.g., the interviewee’s home or office; research the interviewer did to prepare for the interview, i.e., books read or scrapbooks reviewed, and any prior relationship of special affinity between the interviewer and interviewee, e.g., friends for 25 years, grandchild or child.  The interviewer should also prepare a biography of one or two paragraphs about themselves, including background and experiences of the interviewer related to the conduct of this particular interview.

9. Photocopy or scan the signed legal form, your question outline, chronology, etc.

10. Write a follow-up note to the interviewee, thanking them for their time and reminiscences.

Abrams, Lynn. Oral History Theory, second edition. New York: Routledge, 2016.

Boyd, Douglas A. Oral history and digital humanities: voice, access, and engagement. Springer, 2014.

Frisch, Michael. A Shared Authority: Essays on the Craft and Meaning of Oral and Public History. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1990.

Gluck, Sherna Berger, and Daphne Patai, eds. Women's words: The feminist practice of oral history. Routledge, 2016.

Murphy, Kevin P., Jennifer L. Pierce, and Jason Ruiz. "What Makes Queer Oral History Different." The Oral History Review 43, no. 1 (2016): 1-24.

Neuenschwander, John A. A guide to oral history and the law. Oxford University Press, USA, 2014.

Perks, Robert and Alistair Thomson, The Oral History Reader, third edition. New York: Routledge, 2016.

Ritchie, Donald A. Doing oral history. Oxford University Press, 2014.

Thompson, Paul. The voice of the past: Oral history. Oxford university press, 2017.

Oral History in the Digital Age  https://www.oralhistory.org/oral-history-in-the-digital-age/   Oral History Association website, covering every aspect of oral history, from family and community oral history to academic oral history projects.

Smithsonian Folklife and Oral History Interviewing Guide https://folklife.si.edu/the-smithsonian-folklife-and-oral-history-interviewing-guide/smithsonian   Contains guidelines Smithsonian folklorists have developed over the years for collecting folklife and oral history from family and community members, with a general guide to conducting an interview, as well as a sample list of questions that may be adapted to your own needs and circumstances, an information on preservation and use.

Oral History Association: https://www.oralhistory.org/

Oral History Discussion List: H-Oralhist    http://www.h-net.msu.edu/~oralhist/  is the oral history discussion list.

Library of Congress, Oral History Lesson Plans   http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/lessons/index.html#topic230

Vermont Folklife Center, Oral History Guide https://www.vermontfolklifecenter.org/events/oral-history-an-introduction

10 History Passion Project Ideas for High School Students

Jin Chow with Tree Background

By Jin Chow

Co-founder of Polygence, Forbes 30 Under 30 for Education

how to do a history research project

By Jordan Ellington

Project Support Manager at Polygence

5 minute read

how to do a history research project

If past events fascinate you or if you truly feel as if you were born in the wrong century, you should consider becoming a historian! Knowing when, why, and how decisions have been made over time is a great skill to have. Those who possess a good understanding of the outcomes of past events have the upper hand in helping create a better future.

Explore this topic even further by conducting your own history research project! Here’s a list of 10 history passion project ideas to get you started.

Interesting History Project Ideas to Research and Explore

1) history research paper about your favorite event.

Jump in and get your hands dirty by exploring your favorite historical event! Once you choose your theme, identify your primary questions, find primary sources, and study up on your topic, draft your findings into a history research paper. 

Idea by previous history research mentor Charles

Interested in conducting your own history research project?

Polygence pairs you with an expert mentor in your area of passion. Together, you work to create a high quality research project that is uniquely your own. We also offer options to explore multiple topics, or to showcase your final product!

Student exploring their passions

2) Research Your Family History

Gain a better understanding of your family’s past and the historical events surrounding your ancestors. Start by interviewing your relatives and listening to their stories to collect as much information as possible. Ask questions about your ancestors, and places where they’ve lived, collect documents, record oral histories, etc. By using the information given, you can do a deeper dive into your family's past. Write your own family’s history or create a podcast!

Idea by history research mentor Luther

3) Explore Comparative (Ancient) History Topics

Conduct a research paper focused on an ancient historical event of your choosing. Once your topic is chosen, determine a research gap within your event that you would like to explore further. From there, identify five research questions revolving around your event gap that can help you fill in the blanks. Do your research to find the answers to your questions!

Idea by previous history research mentor Supratik

4) History vs. Hollywood

Choose a few different movies that revolve around real historical events. After watching the movies and taking detailed notes, do your research by reading up on each of these topics. How realistic are the movies? What information was added, left out, or exaggerated?

Idea by previous history research mentor Holly 

5) Propaganda in World War II

If the Second World War fascinates you, this is your project! Pull together as many pieces of propaganda from that period as you can find. This could range from anything relating to a poster, milk carton, comic book, etc. Analyzing your findings will provide you with an understanding of the different reactions portrayed through society at this time. How does this compare to today?

Idea by history research mentor Jonathan  

6) Create a Video or Podcast About History

Choose a recent event that revolves around race and capitalism within the U.S. Pull together articles, news stories, and social media posts to view the different reactions to this event that occurred. Compare this current event to a similar past event and create a podcast or video of your findings. 

Idea by previous history research mentor Samantha

Let History guide your Future!

Register to get paired with one of our expert history mentors and to get started on exploring your passions today! See how far you can go in history to impact the future.

Sitting girl reading a book in the field

7) The Interwar Herald: News of the World

Are you intrigued by the roaring 20s? If so, create your newspaper revolving around historical events from the 1920s! Choose multiple different news stories from that time and get creative. Get creative and design your paper using pictures, articles, ads, interviews, and letters all from that time period.  

Idea by previous history research mentor Erin

8) Finding Global History in China

Learn more about the history of China! Choose a specific time period and topic revolving around Chinese history that you would like to further explore. Conduct a research paper summarizing your findings.

Idea by previous history research mentor John

9) Henry VIII - The Misunderstood Tyrant

If you like to hear about the drama of other people's lives, studying up on Henry VIII might also entertain you! Henry is best remembered for establishing the Church of England and having six wives, but there has to be more to him than that. Dive into this project to uncover the secrets of this notorious British monarch!

Idea by previous history research mentor Rebecca

10) Nature's Past: Let's Do Environmental History!

When you think of “history” you might think of politics and battles but it is so much more than that! Instead of writing a paper on a specific event, try focusing on the environment and the material world. How much better was the environment when everyone rode horses instead of driving cars? What environmental problems did society face in the past and how do those compare or differ from today? 

Idea by previous history research mentor Gustave

Independent High School Research Project About History

Interested in taking part in a dedicated history research program for high school students ? Explore some of our previous students’ history research projects , or learn more about how to get started on your own history research project !

Related Content:

History Summer Research Programs for High School Students: The Top 10

Top 20 Best Writing Contests for High School Students

Passion Project Ideas for High School Students in 2024

Research Opportunities for High School Students in 2024: More Than 50 Options Across Multiple Academic Disciplines and Interests

Get Matched with a Mentor

Interested in doing one of these exciting research projects? Click below to get matched with one of our expert mentors!

how to do a history research project

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American history research guide, american history: smithsonian institution resources, american immigration history, american industrial history.

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The Smithsonian Libraries and Archives' American History Research Guide is a select list of resources for students, teachers, and researchers to learn about various topics of American History. 

  • Anacostia Community Museum
  • Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage
  • From Smithson to Smithsonian: The Birth of an Institution :  Bibliography on the History of the Smithsonian Institution
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  • Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies : The Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies which documents and interprets the ethnic and immigrant experience in the United States. Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies has recently merged into the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
  • Bracero History Archive : The Bracero History Archive collects and makes available the oral histories and artifacts pertaining to the Bracero program, a guest worker initiative that spanned the years 1942-1964. Millions of Mexican agricultural workers crossed the border under the program to work in more than half of the states in America.
  • Ellis Island : The Ellis Island Immigration Museum and their online American Family Immigration History Center (AFIHC) allows visitors to explore the collection of immigrant arrival records stored in the Ellis Island Archives.
  • Immigrant Arrivals: A Guide To Published Sources : Library of Congress bibliography of print and web based resources.
  • Immigration History Research Center : The IHRC develops and maintains a library and archival collection, provides research assistance, produces publications, and sponsors academic and public programs. Its work supports the parent institution, the University of Minnesota.
  • Immigration to the United States, 1789-1930 : Immigration to the United States, 1789-1930, is a web-based collection of selected historical materials from Harvard's libraries, archives, and museums that documents voluntary immigration to the US from the signing of the Constitution to the onset of the Great Depression.
  • I mmigration: The Changing Face of America : A Library of Congress site for teachers and students.
  • National Archives & Records Administration Immigration Records: Immigration Records : NARA has immigration records for arrivals to the United States from foreign ports between approximately 1800 and 1959. The records are arranged by Port of Arrival.
  • Beyond Steel: An Archive of Lehigh Valley Industry and Culture : This Lehigh University Digital Library site highlights the Lehigh Valley's mid nineteenth-century boom, late twentieth-century decline and continuing community readjustment. Through the digitization and presentation of letters, books, photographs, maps, essays, and oral histories the site will aid researchers in understanding not only the lives of railroad barons and steel titans, but also the experiences of average folks who worked and lived in the community.
  • Inside an American Factory: Westinghouse Works Collection : A part of the Library of Congress American Memory Project, this collection of films, images and text. The collection contains 21 films showing various views of Westinghouse companies. Most prominently featured are the Westinghouse Air Brake Company, the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company, and the Westinghouse Machine Company.
  • U.S. Steel Gary Works Photograph Collection : The Indiana University Digital Library Program is produced this series of more than 2,200 photographs of the Gary Works steel mill and the corporate town of Gary, Indiana held by the Calumet Regional Archives at Indiana University Northwest.

American Music History Resources

  • African-American Sheet Music, 1850-1920 : The sheet music in this digital collection has been selected from the Sheet Music Collection at the John Hay Library at Brown University. The full collection consists of approximately 500,000 items, of which perhaps 250,000 are currently available for use. It is one of the largest collections of sheet music in any library in the United States.
  • Azúcar! The Life and Music of Celia Cruz

A bibliography of monographs and lesson plans for teachers from K to 12.

  • Edinburgh University Collection of Historic Musical Instruments : Features descriptions and images of many items in the collection and publication lists.
  • Historic American Sheet Music : The Historic American Sheet Music Project provides access to digital images of 3,042 pieces from the Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library at Duke University, published in America between 1850 and 1920.
  • Historic Sheet Music, 1800-1922 : This sheet music collection from the Library of Congress consists of approximately 9,000 items published from 1800 to 1922, although the majority is from 1850 to 1920. The bulk was published in many different cities in the United States, but some of the items bear European imprints. Most of the music is written for voice and piano; a significant minority is instrumental. Notable in this collection are early pieces by Irving Berlin and Jerome Kern, as well as music by other popular composers such as Victor Herbert, Jean Schwartz, Paul Dresser, Ernest R. Ball, Gussie L. Davis, Charles K. Harris, and George M. Cohan. Numerous arrangements of classical tunes by Bach, Beethoven, Schubert and other famous classical composers are also well-represented.
  • Lester S. Levy Collection of Sheet Music : This collection, at the Milton S. Eisenhower Library of The Johns Hopkins University, contains over 29,000 pieces of music and focuses on popular American music spanning the period 1780 to 1960. All pieces of the collection are indexed on this site and a search will retrieve a catalog description of the pieces and an image of the cover and each page of music.
  • RoJaRo Index : An index to more than 300,000 entries, covering 250 music magazines from 20 countries, covering all types of contemporary popular music: rock, jazz, roots, blues, rap, soul, gospel, country, reggae, etc.

The Sheet Music Consortium : The Archive of Popular American Music is a non-circulating research collection covering the history of popular music in America from 1790 to the present. The collection is one of the largest in the country, numbering almost 450,000 pieces of sheet music, anthologies, and arrangements for band and orchestra, and 62,500 recordings on disc, tape, and cylinder. Subject strengths within twentieth-century holdings include music for theater, motion picture, radio and television, as well as general popular, country, rhythm and blues, and rocksongs.

  • A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation : A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation consists of a linked set of published Congressional records of the United States of America from the Continental Congress through the 43rd Congress, 1774-1875.  A select number of documents and reports from the monumental U.S. Congressional Serial Set are available as well.
  • American Presidency : This online exhibition from the National Museum of American History has a bibliography under the Resources and Teacher Materials which are age and grade specific.
  • American Presidency Project : The American Presidency Project was established in 1999 as a collaboration between John Woolley and Gerhard Peters at the University of California, Santa Barbara. The archives contain 75,117 documents related to the study of the Presidency.
  • American President : This resource is sponsored by the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia. Launched originally in 2000 as the online companion to "The American President" -- the six-part PBS television series -- American President is a resource on the history of the presidency and the nature of contemporary policy making.
  • Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress : Online publication of the Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress, published by the Senate Historical Office and the Legislative Resource Center of the House of Representatives. Includes images from the Senate Historical Office. Database is searchable by name, position, and state.
  • Center for the Study of the Presidency : The Center is a non-profit educational institution devoted to the study of the presidency, government, and politics.
  • Data.gov : The purpose of Data.gov is to increase public access to high value, machine readable datasets generated by the Executive Branch of the Federal Government. Data.gov includes searchable data catalogs providing access to data in three ways: through the "raw" data catalog, the tool catalog and the geodata catalog.
  • Encyclopædia Britannica's profile of the American Presidency : Read about the presidents and explore the electoral process, election results, images, video, and important documents related to the evolution of the nation's highest office.
  • I Do Solemnly Swear... Presidential Inaugurations : This Library of Congress collection offers approximately 400 items or 2,000 digital files from each of the 54 inaugurations from George Washington's in 1789 to George W. Bush's inauguration of 2001. This includes diaries and letters of presidents and of those who witnessed inaugurations, handwritten drafts of inaugural addresses, broadsides, inaugural tickets and programs, prints, photographs, and sheet music.
  • JFK Assassination Records Collection Reference System : Over 170,000 assassination-related documents. Contributing agencies include: the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA); the Department of Justice; and the Department of State.
  • Miller Center of Public Affairs : The Scripps Library and Multimedia Archive serves as a research facility for scholars of U. S. public policy. The Library’s collection is a specialized one focused on American politics and history with special attention paid to the American Presidency.
  • POTUS: Presidents of the United States : This resource you will find background information, election results, cabinet members, notable events, and some points of interest on each of the presidents. Links to biographies, historical documents, audio and video files, and other presidential sites are also included.
  • Presidential Libraries of the National Archives & Records Administration : The Presidential Library system is made up of ten Presidential Libraries. This nationwide network of libraries is administered by the Office of Presidential Libraries, which is part of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), located in College Park, MD. These are not traditional libraries, but rather repositories for preserving and making available the papers, records, and other historical materials of U.S. Presidents since Herbert Hoover.
  • The Role of the Vice President : A brief history of the role of the Vice President as President of the U.S. Senate.
  • THOMAS - The Library of Congress : THOMAS has the Congressional Record and full text of legislation available from 1989 (101st Congress) to the present. In addition, THOMAS has summaries (not full text) of legislation from 1973 (93rd Congress). From the Library of Congress.
  • Voting America: United States Politics, 1840-2008 : This University of Richmond project examines the evolution of presidential politics in the United States across the span of American history. It offers a wide spectrum of cinematic and interactive visualizations of how Americans voted in presidential elections at the county level over the past 164 years. There are expert analysis and commentary videos that discuss some of the most interesting and significant trends in American political history.
  • Voting and Registration (U.S. Census Bureau Data) : Contains information on reported voting and registration by various demographic and socioeconomic characteristics for the United States.
  • White House Historical Association : The White House Historical Association is a charitable nonprofit institution whose purpose is to enhance the understanding, appreciation and enjoyment of the White House.
  • The White House Building : Information on the White House, including historical details.
  • Women in Congress : This web site, based on the book Women in Congress, 1917–2006, contains biographical profiles of former women Members of Congress, links to information about current women Members, essays on the institutional and national events that shaped successive generations of Congresswomen, and images of each woman Member, including rare photos.
  • American Jewish Historical Society : The American Jewish Historical Society is the oldest national ethnic historical organization in the United States. The Society’s library, archives, photograph, and art and artifacts collections document the American Jewish experience.
  • American Religion Data Archive : The ARDA collection includes data on churches and church membership, religious professionals, and religious groups (individuals, congregations and denominations).
  • Divining America: Religion and the National Culture : Divining America: Religion and the National Culture is designed to help teachers of American history bring their students to a greater understanding of the role religion has played in the development of the United States.
  • Journal of Southern Religion : JSR is an online journal targeted toward scholars, students, and others who are engaged in or interested in the study of Southern religion and culture.
  • Material History of American Religion Project : The Material History of American Religion Project studied (1995-2001) the history of American religion in all its complexity by focusing on material objects and economic themes.
  • North Star: A Journal of African-American Religious History : An online journal sponsored by Princeton University.
  • Religion and the Founding of the American Republic (Library of Congress) : Encompassing over 200 objects including early American books, manuscripts, letters, prints, paintings, artifacts, and music from the Library’s collections and complemented by loans from other institutions, Religion and the Founding of the American Republic explores the role religion played in the founding of the American colonies, in the shaping of early American life and politics, and in forming the American Republic.
  • Religious Movements Homepage Project at the University of Virginia : This Web site presents detailed profiles of more than two hundred different religious groups and movements in the United States.
  • Santos: Substance and Soul : There are nine separate reading lists on topics related to the history, culture, preservation, and identification of Santos objects.
  • Brooklyn Daily Eagle Online  (1841-1902) : The Brooklyn Daily Eagle was published from October 26, 1841 to 1955 and was revived for a short time from 1960 to 1963. Currently, the digitized newspaper collection includes the period from October 26, 1841 to December 31, 1902, representing half of the Eagle's years of publication.
  • Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers : This Library of Congress site allows you to search and read newspaper pages from 1900-1910 and find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present.
  • Common-Place: The Interactive Journal of Early American Life : Common-Place is an electronic quarterly journal about early American history and culture before 1900.
  • Documenting the American South - University of North Carolina : Documenting the American South (DocSouth) is a digital publishing initiative that provides Internet access to texts, images, and audio files related to southern history, literature, and culture. Currently DocSouth includes ten thematic collections of books, diaries, posters, artifacts, letters, oral history interviews, and songs.
  • Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History : The Gilder Lehrman Collection is the largest private collection of American history documents in the world. It preserves, exhibits, and disseminates archival resources chronicling the history of the United States from the beginning of European colonization, with emphasis on the period from 1760 through 1876. The collection contains resources on the history of colonial settlement, Indian relations, the American Revolution and its origins, the Constitution, the struggle over slavery, and the Civil War.
  • H-Net Web Site : H-Net Web Site includes archived copies of all history related listserv discussion lists and vacancy announcements for various fields in the humanities.
  • Making of America - Cornell University : Materials accessible here are Cornell University Library's contributions to Making of America (MOA), 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.
  • The G.I. Roundtable Series : The American Historical Association produced the G.I. Roundtable Series to help win World War II. The site is comprised of three main sections. Section I: The pamphlets, reproduced here as primary documents, provide a unique insight into what Americans were thinking about at the end of the war, and how the recent past was seen as a prelude to the future. Section II: A still-evolving selection of Background documents and related readings to provide context on the origins and production of the series and the historiography of the period. Section III: The site provides an extensive analysis of the origins of the series, and how it fit into both the Army's larger program of preparation for postwar changes as well as the larger culture in which they were produced.
  • Within These Walls : An annotated reading list for elementary and middle school students and an extensive bibliography for older students interested in the themes related to the Ipswich House exhibition.
  • Cookery and Foodways Collection : The University of Denver Cookery and Foodways Collection is particularly strong in American regional cookery, and contains a large number of privately published fund-raising cookbooks from churches, service organizations, and other community groups.
  • Heaven Will Protect the Working Girl: Immigrant Women in the Turn-of-the-Century City : This web site is based upon curriculum materials produced by American Social History Project as part of the Who Built America? series.
  • National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) Collection : The complete National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) Collection is a library of 700-800 titles collected between 1890 and 1938 by members of NAWSA and donated to the Rare Books Division of the Library of Congress on November 1, 1938. The bulk of the collection is derived from the library of Carrie Chapman Catt, president of NAWSA from 1900-1904, and again from 1915-1920. Additional materials were donated from the libraries of other members and officers, including Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone, Alice Stone Blackwell, Julia Ward Howe, Elizabeth Smith Miller, and Mary A. Livermore.
  • Online Biographical Dictionary of the Woman Suffrage Movement in the United States : This free crowd-sourced project contains over 3,000 biographical sketches of grassroots women suffragists, including a special section focused on nearly 400 Black Women Suffragists.
  • Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College : The Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College is an internationally recognized repository of manuscripts, photographs, periodicals and other primary sources in women's history.
  • Women & Social Movements in the United States, 1775-2000 : The Women and Social Movements website is a project of the Center for the Historical Study of Women and Gender at the State University of New York at Binghamton and includes roughly 900 documents, 400 images, and 350 links to other websites.
  • Women in America: 1820-1842 : During the first half of the nineteenth century, Tocqueville and Beaumont were joined by scores of other European travelers curious about the new republic, and anxious to fill the European demand for accounts of American life. One of the most striking was the status of women--their domestic roles, their freedom in youth, their responsibilities in marriage, and their importance to the moral and religious life of the republic. Tocqueville and Beaumont observed all manner of social gatherings and recorded the conversations with prominent American citizens on a number of matters, including morality and the status of women.
  • Women Working, 1800 - 1930 : Women Working, 1800 - 1930 focuses on women's role in the United States economy and provides access to digitized historical, manuscript, and image resources selected from Harvard University's library and museum collections. The collection features approximately 500,000 digitized pages and images.

Automobile and Transportation History

  • America on the Move : Teachers and parents can use the resource guides, lessons, and activity plans to teach children (K- Middle School) about transportation in American history.
  • Antique Automobile Club of America : The Antique Automobile Club of America, founded in 1935, is dedicated to perpetuating the memories of early automobiles by encouraging their history, collection and use.
  • Automobile in American Life and Society : This site was created and developed by the University of Michigan-Dearborn and the Henry Ford Museum. Each of the site’s five sections (design, environment, gender, labor, race) contains two essays—an overview of the topic and a more focused case study—plus a select annotated bibliography or bibliographic essay to guide further reading.
  • Carriage Association of America : The Carriage Association of America is an organization devoted to the preservation and restoration of horse drawn carriages and sleighs. The site features information about the organization and links to related sites.
  • Hemmings Motor News : This is the online resource of the advertising monthly that is devoted to antique, classic, vintage, muscle, street rod, and special interest automobiles, catering to car collectors and restorers. HMN also features the hobby's most complete calendar of upcoming events, hobbyists' legislative alerts, and a monthly listing of stolen collector cars.
  • Henry Ford Museum : The Henry Ford Museum began as Henry Ford's personal collection of historic objects. Today, the 12 acre site is primarily a collection of antique machinery, pop culture items, automobiles, locomotives, aircraft, and other items. 
  • Rural Heritage : The online version of the print journal in support of small farmers and loggers who use draft horse, mule and ox power. It features articles and dialogues on animals, equipment, health information, and other resources.
  • Society for Commercial Archeology : Established in 1977, the SCA is the oldest national organization devoted to the buildings, artifacts, structures, signs, and symbols of the 20th-century commercial landscape.
  • Best of History Web Sites
  • Documents in Law, History, and Diplomacy
  • Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History  
  • History Matters: The U. S. Survey Course on the Web
  • National Archives Research Room
  • National History Day
  • Smithsonian History Explorer
  • Using Primary Sources on the Web
  • Architecture and Urbanism of the Southwest : Architecture and Urbanism of the Southwest, is an illustrated essay by John Messina (AIA, Research Architect) and the University of Arizona Southwest Studies Center and the School of Architecture. The site also provides a recommended readings list of books and articles.
  • Bata Shoe Museum : Located in Toronto, the Bata Shoe Museum holds over 10,000 shoes in the collection.
  • Built in America: Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) and the Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) 1933 to present : The Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) and the Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) collections are among the largest and most heavily used in the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress. This online presentation of the HABS/HAER collections includes digitized images of measured drawings, black-and-white photographs, color transparencies, photo captions, data pages including written histories, and supplemental materials.
  • City Beautiful: The 1901 Plan for Washington, DC : A University of Virginia American Studies project, this site documents the first explicit attempt to utilize the vaguely classical Beaux-Arts architectural style, which emerged from the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, for the explicit intent of beautification and social amelioration was the Senate Park Commission's redesign of the monumental core of Washington D.C. to commemorate the city's centennial. The McMillan Plan of 1901-02, named for Senator James McMillan, the commission's liaison and principal backer in Congress, was the United States' first attempt at city planning.
  • Corning Museum of Glass : The Corning Museum of Glass's home page begins with its local address and phone numbers and provides a menu of places to visit within the museum site, including, "A Resource for Glass," a collection of information developed to answer questions about glass, and "Glossary of Glassmaking Terms," an alphabetical list of terms with in-depth definitions.
  • Digital Library for the Decorative Arts and Material Culture : The Digital Library for the Decorative Arts and Material Culture collects electronic resources for study and research of the decorative arts, with a particular focus on Early America. Included are electronic texts and journals, image databases, and information on organizations, museums and research facilities. The site was created and is maintained at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries.
  • Digital Library for the Decorative Arts and Material Culture: Image and Text Collections : The Digital Library for the Decorative Arts and Material Culture collects and creates electronic resources for study and research of the decorative arts, with a particular focus on Early America. Included are electronic texts and facsimiles, image databases, and Web resources. Made possible by the Chipstone Foundation, the project is produced at the University of Wisconsin Madison General Library System.
  • Furniture Glossary : A compilation of terms and acronyms on furniture styles, design and construction.
  • Harper's Bazaar Magazine : A browse-able collection of issues from the 19th Century magazine, Harper's Bazaar (1867-1900). 
  • MAD: Maine Antique Digest : MAD's bulletin board, with table of contents from current issues, and over 90 book reviews of books dealing with antiques and collectibles.
  • Museum of Glass: International Center for Contemporary Art : The Museum of Glass: International Center for Contemporary Art in Tacoma Washington presents contemporary art with a sustained concentration on the medium of glass. The Museum exhibition schedule includes works by internationally known artists and trends in contemporary art. The exhibition program offers artists and audiences the opportunity to experiment with and experience a full range of media in the visual arts.
  • National Building Museum : Created by an act of Congress in 1980, the National Building Museum is America’s premier cultural institution dedicated to exploring and celebrating architecture, design, engineering, construction, and urban planning.
  • National Register of Historic Places : The National Register of Historic Places is the Nation's official list of cultural resources worthy of preservation.  Authorized under the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Register is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect our historic and archeological resources. Properties listed in the Register include districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects that are significant in American history, architecture, archeology, engineering, and culture. The National Register is administered by the National Park Service, which is part of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
  • The Noble Craftsman We Promote: The Arts and Crafts Movement in the American Midwest : An online version of the Toledo University exhibition, looks at four particular areas of Arts and Crafts in the Midwest: the book arts, architecture, interior and exterior design, and the decorative arts and attempts to explain how the movement in the heartland differed from its purer British counterpart.
  • Paint by Number: Accounting for Taste in the 1950s : A brief resource list for a unique subject.
  • Quilt Index : The Quilt Index aims to be a central resource that incorporates a wide variety of sources and information on quilts, quiltmakers and quiltmaking. The Quilt Index was conceived and developed by The Alliance for American Quilts and implemented in collaboration with Michigan State University's MATRIX: The Center for Humane Arts, Letters and Social Sciences Online and the Michigan State University Museum.
  • Sears Modern Homes : This site features a history of the Sears Modern Homes program, photos, catalog advertisements, references and a registry of owners. More than 100,000 Sears ready-made houses were sold from 1908 to 1940.
  • Skyscraper Museum : Founded in 1996, THE SKYSCRAPER MUSEUM is a private, not-for-profit, educational corporation devoted to the study of high-rise building, past, present, and future. Located in New York City, the world's first and foremost vertical metropolis, the museum celebrates the city's rich architectural heritage and examines the historical forces and individuals that have shaped its successive skylines. Through exhibitions, programs and publications, the museum explores tall buildings as objects of design, products of technology, sites of construction, investments in real estate, and places of work and residence.
  • Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) : Founded in 1940, the Society encourages scholarly research in the field and promotes the preservation of significant architectural monuments that are an integral part of the worldwide historical and cultural heritage.  They publish the quarterly Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians and bimonthly Newsletter.  There are several bibliographies and links to related organizations.
  • Stained Glass Magazine : Stained Glass Magazine on the World Wide Web, featuring the Stained Glass Association of America's conference schedule, professional announcements, calls for papers, and lists of useful catalogues and resources of interest to collectors and historians of stained glass.
  • Strong Museum (Rochester, NewYork) : The Strong Museum's more than 500,000 objects include the world's largest and most historically significant collection of dolls and toys, America's most comprehensive collections of homecrafts and souvenirs, and nationally important collections of home furnishings and advertising materials.
  • Textile Society of America : The Textile Society of America provides a forum for the exchange and dissemination of information about all aspects of textiles: historic, artistic, cultural, social, political, economic, and technical.
  • Urban Planning, 1794-1918: An International Anthology of Articles, Conference Papers, and Reports : These documents are primary source material for the study of how urban planning developed up to the end of World War I. They include statements about techniques, principles, theories, and practice by those who helped to create a new professional specialization. This new field of city planning grew out of the land-based professions of architecture, engineering, surveying, and landscape architecture, as well as from the work of economists, social workers, lawyers, public health specialists, and municipal administrators.
  • Vernacular Architecture Forum : The term "vernacular architecture" applies to traditional domestic and agricultural buildings, industrial and commercial structures, twentieth-century suburban houses, settlement patterns and cultural landscapes.  The Vernacular Architecture Forum was formed in 1980 to encourage the study and preservation of these informative and valuable material resources.
  • Victoria & Albert Museum (London) : The Museum's ceramics, glass, textiles, dress, silver, ironwork, jewellery, furniture, sculpture, paintings, prints and photographs span the cultures of Europe, North America, Asia and North Africa, and date from ancient times to the present day. There are 2000 images of the collection available for online viewing.
  • Winterthur Museum & Library (Delaware) : The Winterthur Library contains approximately half a million imprints, manuscripts, visual materials, and printed ephemera for research from the 17th century to the early 20th century. The museum collections include 85,000 domestic artifacts and works of art made or used in America to 1860.
  • Work of Charles and Ray Eames: A Legacy of Invention : This site is in association with the Eames exhibition tour
  • American Environmental Photographs, 1891-1936: Images from the University of Chicago Library : This collection consists of approximately 4,500 photographs documenting natural environments, ecologies, and plant communities in the United States at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century. The photographs were taken by Henry Chandler Cowles (1869-1939), George Damon Fuller (1869-1961), and other Chicago ecologists on field trips across the North American continent.
  • Bureau of Reclamation History : The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation History site is a collection of oral histories, photographs, and papers on the agency and it's work.
  • Conservation and Environment - Library of Congress : The historic and more recent maps contained in this category show early exploration and subsequent land use in various areas of the United States. These maps show the changes in the landscape, including natural and man-made features, recreational and wilderness areas, geology, topography, wetland area, vegetation, and wildlife. Specific conservation projects such as the growth and development of U.S. National Parks are included in this category.
  • Evolution of the Conservation Movement, 1850-1920 : The Evolution of the Conservation Movement, 1850-1920 documents the historical formation and cultural foundations of the movement to conserve and protect America's natural heritage, through books, pamphlets, government documents, manuscripts, prints, photographs, and motion picture footage drawn from the collections of the Library of Congress. The collection consists of 62 books and pamphlets, 140 Federal statutes and Congressional resolutions, 34 additional legislative documents, excerpts from the Congressional Globe and the Congressional Record, 360 Presidential proclamations, 170 prints and photographs, 2 historic manuscripts, and 2 motion pictures.
  • Forest History Society Databases : The Forest History Society has six databases that are searchable on the website via InMagic's Web Publisher software. All of the databases provide useful, detailed information about primary or secondary resource materials that aid research in the broad fields of forest, conservation, and environmental history.
  • H-Environment - H-NET, the Humanities & Social Sciences Online initiative : This website is intended as a general resource for people interested in environmental history. Much of its content is compiled from the discussion list H-Environment and includes book reviews, conference announcements, a course syllabus library, and a survey of films. There are also links to other organizations and websites where you can find materials of interest.
  • History of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service : Official website of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, with links to their archival collections, oral histories, and other information sources.
  • Love Canal Collection : The University Of Buffalo Library holds the records of the Ecumenical Task Force, 1979-1991 which contain extensive documentation of the toxic waste controversies associated with the Love Canal and related toxic waste sites in Niagara County, New York. The ETF assembled a resource file of government and other reports concerning the Love Canal and related environmental issues. The reports in the resource file and elsewhere in the records include draft documents, photocopied statements prepared by Love Canal residents, scientists and ETF members for hearings on the Love Canal, speeches, consultant reports, articles, as well as printed and online reports.
  • Bon Appétit! Julia Child's Kitchen at the Smithsonian : The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History website of their Julia Child's Kitchen exhibition.
  • Doubtless as Good: Thomas Jefferson's Dreams of American Wines Fulfilled : This short bibliography, prepared by staff at the National Museum of American History, includes books on the material culture of viniculture, some historic works on American winemaking not included in the Gabler bibliography, and some relevant works on American culture and taste.
  • Feeding America: The Historic American Cookbook Project : The Michigan State University Library and the MSU Museum have created an online collection of some of the most influential and important American cookbooks from the late 18th to early 20th century.
  • Food Reference Website : A fairly comprehensive private website that provides links to articles, information, food history dates, and a wide range of useful information on food.
  • Food Timeline : A resource about food history, social history, manners and menus covering Prehistory through modern day.
  • Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive : The Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive at the William L. Clements Library on the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor contains thousands of items from the 16th to 20th centuries - books, ephemera, menus, magazines, graphics, maps, manuscripts, diaries, letters, catalogues, advertisements, and reference works. It is a work in progress, and material is being added and catalogued daily.
  • New York Food Museum : A new and developing web-based resource on New York City foodways and food history.
  • Peacock Harper Culinary Collection - Virginia Tech University : The Peacock Harper Culinary Collection is a collection of cookbooks and related items housed in the Virginia Tech Library. The VT Image Base contains over 700 images pertaining to culinary history and the collection. They publish an online newsletter called the Virginia Culinary Thymes
  • Southern Foodways Alliance : The Southern Foodways Alliance website contains links to ongoing research projects, symposiums and their oral history texts. It is a subsidiary of the University of Mississippi's, Center for the Study of Southern Culture.
  • Taking America to Lunch : This Smithsonian exhibition in the National Museum of American History features samples from the museum's collection of lunch boxes from the 19th century plain metal buckets to 20th century popular culture images on boxes made of synthetic materials.

Graphic Art

  • American Printing History Association : The American Printing History Association was founded to encourage the study of printing history and its related arts and skills, including calligraphy, typefounding, typography, papermaking, bookbinding, illustration, and publishing. APHA is especially, but by no means exclusively, interested in American printing history.
  • Fine Press Book Association : The Fine Press Book Association is an organization formed by individuals interested in the art of fine printing to promote printing skills and the appreciation of beautiful books.
  • Graphic Artists Guild
  • Robert C. Williams Paper Museum : This Web site traces the history, art, and science of paper making.
  • Society for the History of Authorship, Reading & Publishing : The Society (SHARP) provides a global network for book historians, 1000 members in over 20 countries, including professors of literature, historians, librarians, publishing professionals, sociologists, bibliophiles, classicists, booksellers, art historians, reading instructors, and independent scholars.
  • Separate Is Not Equal: Brown vs. Board of Education : The annotated bibliography includes information about related Web resources and teacher materials, as well as fiction and non-fiction books for children, young adults, and adults.
  • Slates, Slide Rules, and Software: Teaching Math in America : A collection of reference resources on the tools used in teaching mathematics in the United States from the 1800s onward.

History of Technology - Invention and Inventors

  • Canada Science and Technology Museum : This site links you to the various collections within the Canada Science and Technology Museum.
  • Edison After Forty : This listing includes Edison's Papers, book-length studies, children's books, and museums.
  • Edison Papers Web Site : The Edison Papers Web Site is a searchable database, based on the University Press of America's editions of Thomas Edison's papers, which detail the first 31 years of his life.
  • Hagley American Patent Models : The largest privately-owned collection of United States patent models in the world. Containing nearly 4,000 patent models and related documents, the collection spans America's Industrial Revolution.
  • Lighting a Revolution: A Bibliography of Lighting : A collection of books, articles, and web sites on the history and technology of electrical lighting.
  • National Inventors Hall of Fame : Web site for the National Inventors Hall of Fame, in Akron, Ohio. Features a collection of biographies of members of the National Inventors Hall of Fame.
  • Powering a Generation of Change : This bibliography lists books, journal articles, and reports documenting the story of electrical power restructuring in North America.
  • Society for the History of Technology (SHOT) : The Society for the History of Technology (SHOT) is dedicated to the historical study of technology and its relations with politics, economics, labor, business, the environment, public policy, science, and the arts.
  • The Office Museum : This commercial website engages in research on the history and evolution of offices, antique office machines and equipment, and business technology based on original documents and artifacts.
  • U.S. Patent & Trademark Office : The official web site of the USPTO has a searchable database. Patents issued between 1790 and 1976 are searchable only by patent number and current US classifications.
  • Yesterday's Office : This site contains articles on antique or redundant office technology and links to related sites.
  • Charles Babbage Institute, University of Minnesota : CBI is dedicated to promoting study of the history of information technology and information processing and their impact on society.
  • Chronology of Events in the History of Microcomputers : A timetable of significant events in the history of computing, with product announcements and delivery dates from a variety of sources.
  • Computer Museum History Center (Silicon Valley) : The Computer Museum History Center is a non-profit entity dedicated to the preservation and celebration of computing history. It holds one of the largest collections of computing artifacts in the world.
  • Intel Museum (Santa Clara) : This museum documents the development and construction of computer chips by one of the leading manufacturers of chip technology.
  • Internet Archive : The Internet Archive is a non-profit that was founded to build an Internet library, with the purpose of offering permanent access for researchers, historians, and scholars to historical collections that exist in digital format. Founded in 1996 and located in the Presidio of San Francisco, the Archive has been receiving data donations from Alexa Internet and others. In late 1999, the organization started to grow to include more well-rounded collections. Now the Internet Archive includes texts, audio, moving images, and software as well as archived web pages in the collections.
  • Internet Histories : A collection of links about the history of the Internet, from the ISOC , the Internet Society, a non-governmental international organization, committed to global cooperation and coordination for the Internet.
  • Making the Macintosh: Technology and Culture in Silicon Valley : "Making the Macintosh" is an online project documenting the history of the Macintosh computer. This project collects and publishes primary material on the Macintosh's development and early reception. It draws on the extensive holdings of the Stanford University Library's Department of Special Collections, the personal papers of engineers and technical writers involved in the Macintosh project, and interviews conducted for the project.
  • Discovering Lewis and Clark : This comprehensive website contains more than 1,400 pages, and is updated monthly with additional material. This website includes a nineteen-part synopsis of the expedition's story by historian Harry W. Fritz, illustrated with selections from the journals of the expedition, photographs, maps, animated graphics, moving pictures, and sound files.
  • Kansas State Historical Society: Lewis and Clark : This website provides the user with information about the history of the expedition in Kansas.
  • Lewis and Clark Expedition: Selected Resources : The Smithsonian Institution has created this directory of sites on the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
  • Lewis and Clark Across Missouri : The Geographic Resources Center at the Department of Geography, University of Missouri partnered with the Missouri State Archives to create this website offering campsite maps, photo-realistic images of important river landmarks, and animated virtual Missouri River travel to trace Lewis and Clark's expedition. 
  • Lewis and Clark in North Dakota : Lewis and Clark in North Dakota is one of most informative websites available about the expedition. A highlight is the In North Dakota Link that includes personal profiles of the individuals involved in the expedition, background information about the sites that Lewis and Clark visited, an expedition chronology, a facts and trivia section, maps, and a bibliography.
  • Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation Inc. : The mission of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation is to stimulate public appreciation of the Lewis and Clark Expedition's contributions to America's heritage, and to support education, research, development, and preservation of the Lewis and Clark experience. Their website includes a detailed history of the expedition with a bibliography. The site also includes a link to the The Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation Library. The Library  has about 800 book titles and 300 articles relating to the Lewis & Clark Expedition. The library also has maps, genealogical information, sound, and video recordings. Users can search the library's catalog online.
  • Lewis and Clark: Indiana Bicentennial Commission : This site outlines Indiana's important role in the expedition and lists events to commemorate the expedition.
  • Lewis and Clark: Mapping the West : This Smithsonian site reviews the cartographic work of the Corps of Discovery.
  • Monticello, The Home of Thomas Jefferson: Jefferson's West : This website has a special section on Lewis and Clark that includes an expedition timeline, bibliography, website links, and online study resources for teachers and students. This site is particularly recommended for users who are interested in researching the role that President Thomas Jefferson played in the expedition.
  • PBS Online: Lewis and Clark : This website is a companion resource to the Ken Burns film: The Journey of the Corps of Discovery and contains several special features that will appeal to users. It provides users with a search engine enables users to search the expedition journals by author, date, or year. It contains transcripts of unedited interviews with various experts and historians about their perspectives on the expedition. It also includes expedition timelines, maps, a bibliography, and related links.
  • Rivers, Edens, Empires: Lewis & Clark and the Revealing of America : This site provides a small sampling of primary materials (maps and journal entries) related to the Lewis and Clark expedition that are housed in the Library of Congress.
  • The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition : The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition website makes available for users the text of the celebrated Nebraska edition of the journals, edited by by Gary M. Moulton. Moulton's edition is considered to be the most accurate and inclusive version published. Currently, the site offers almost two hundred pages from volume 4. In the future, the site will provide access to the full set of journals, almost 5000 pages of primary source material. This site also includes a full text search engine.
  • Artificial Anatomy: Papier-Mâché Anatomical Models : Resources on Anatomy, Papier- Mâché, Preservation, and Trade Catalogs.
  • DeWitt Stetten, Jr., Museum of Medical Research (NIH) : Established in 1986 as a part of the NIH centennial observance, the Stetten Museum collects and exhibits biomedical research instruments and NIH memorabilia.
  • Human Radiation Experiments (DOE) : A website from the US Department of Energy offering a "roadmap" to the stories and records of the cold-war story of radiation research on human subjects.
  • Medical Antiques & Pre-1900 Antique Surgical Sets : From the Arbittier Museum of Medical History, examples of medical antiques, amputation, and surgical sets by some of the most famous makers of the 1800's. Of particular interest are those surgical antiques used in the Civil War. There is a section on pricing and valuation of early surgical sets and kits as well as extensive topics on antique medical collecting.
  • Medical Heritage Library : The Medical Heritage Library is a digital curation collaborative among some of the world’s leading medical libraries. The collection resides at the Internet Archive.
  • Medicine in the Americas, 1619-1914 : The Medicine in the Americas website provides access to a number of key primary historical documents that deal with a number of areas, such as women’s health, public health, and clinical works of enduring historical value. Currently, there are a total of eight works in the archive, and they include Clara Barton’s “The Red Cross of the Geneva Convention” from 1878 and L. Emmett Holt’s 1894 work “The Care and Feeding of Children: A Catechism for the Use of Mothers and Children’s Nurses”.
  • National Library of Medicine : National Library of Medicine home page, with links to a variety of sites on the Internet.
  • Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM) : This database is a catalog of human genes and genetic disorders authored and edited by Dr. Victor A. McKusick and his colleagues at Johns Hopkins and elsewhere, and developed for the World Wide Web by NCBI, the National Center for Biotechnology Information.
  • The Medical Heritage Library : The Medical Heritage Library (MHL) is a digital curation collaborative among some of the world’s leading medical libraries. The collection resides at the Internet Archive.
  • Access to Military Service and Pension Records : The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is the official repository for records of military personnel who have been discharged from the U.S. Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, Navy and Coast Guard.
  • Air University Library's Index to Military Periodicals : The Air University Library's Index to Military Periodicals is a subject index to significant articles, news items, and editorials from English language military and aeronautical periodicals. The Index contains citations since 1988 and is updated continuously. A comprehensive list of all journals covered by AULIMP since 1949 is available as the Historical Index of AULIMP titles.
  • Company of Military Historians : The web site for the journal with several useful links and color plates of uniforms.
  • Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms : Sets forth standard US military and associated terminology to encompass the joint activity of the Armed Forces of the United States in both US joint and allied joint operations, as well as to encompass the Department of Defense as a whole.
  • Historic U.S. Government Publications from World War II : This Southern Methodist University Libraries site allows users to search or browse a collection of over 300 United States government documents produced during World War II.
  • Index to the Uniforms of the American Revolution : This site is provided by the Sons of the Revolution in the State of California and contains several images of American Revolutionary War uniforms.
  • Military Review - English Edition Archives : Archival collection of the professional journal of the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center (CAC) and the Command and General Staff College (CGSC).
  • Military Women Veterans : This site documents the contributions of American women to the Armed Forces of the United States.
  • Papers of the War Department, 1784-1800 : Papers of the War Department is a project of the Center for History and New Media, George Mason University and the National Historical Publications and Records Commission. This collection of more than 55,000 documents is in an online format with extensive and searchable metadata linked to digitized images of each document.
  • Price of Freedom: Americans at War : This online exhibition from the National Museum of American History presents a timeline of American military conflicts from the War of Independence through the War in Iraq, 2003. It also includes information on hundreds of artifacts related to America’s military history, along with learning resources for educators.
  • Redstone Hyper-media Historical Information : Designed by the MICOM Historical Office, this home page features the Redstone Arsenal Complex Chronological Highlights such as; The Pre-Missile Era (1941-1949) and Women at War: Redstone's WWII Female
  • United States Army Center of Military History : CMH Online is an information and education service provided by the U.S. Army Center of Military History.
  • Valley of the Shadow : The Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities (IATH) at the University of Virginia's Web page featuring Edward Ayers's material on the Great Valley in the Civil War.
  • Veterans History Project - Library of Congress : The Veterans History Project covers World War I, World War II, and the Korean, Vietnam, and Persian Gulf wars. It includes all participants in those wars--men and women, civilian and military. It documents the contributions of civilian volunteers, support staff, and war industry workers as well as the experiences of military personnel from all ranks and all branches of service--the Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, and Navy, as well as the U.S. Coast Guard and Merchant Marine.
  • War Times Journal : The War Times Journal is a free online magazine which covers all periods of military history and military science.
  • West Point in the Making of America : There are eight subject categories from this exhibition reading list on West Point graduates and their contributions to the nation in peace and war.
  • World War I Edition of Stars and Stripes - Library of Congress : From February 8, 1918, to June 13, 1919, by order of General John J. Pershing, the United States Army published a newspaper for its forces in France, The Stars and Stripes. This online collection, presented by the Serial and Government Publications Division of the Library of Congress, includes the complete seventy-one-week run of the newspaper's World War I edition.

Naval and Maritime History

  • Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology : The Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology has been at the forefront of underwater archaeology for over 35 years. The ACUA serves as an international advisory body on issues relating to underwater archaeology, conservation, and submerged cultural resources management.It is working to educate scholars, governments, sport divers, and the general public about underwater archaeology and the preservation of underwater resources.
  • All Hands Magazine Archives : Each issue of this U. S. Navy bulletin and magazine (1922-2011) has been scanned and digitized in Adobe Acrobat format.  Free access.
  • American Merchant Marine at War : The U.S. Maritime Service Veterans complied this collection of war service related topical links.
  • Council of American Maritime Museum : The Council of American Maritime Museums (CAMM) is an organization dedicated to preserving North America's maritime history. The Members include museums, museum professionals, and scholars from United States, Mexico, Bermuda, Australia and Canada. CAMM works to promote high professional standards in the preservation and interpretation of maritime history. Our Members seek to convey and preserve this history through collections, sites, vessels, projects, exhibitions, and research.
  • Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships : The Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, commonly known as DANFS, is the foremost reference regarding U.S. naval vessels. Published in nine volumes (from 1959 to 1991), it gives histories for virtually every U.S. naval vessel.
  • Fast Attacks & Boomers: Submarines in the Cold War : Selections for further reading on the growth and development of the U.S. Nuclear Navy.
  • Historic Naval Ships Association : The purpose of the Historic Naval Ships Association is to facilitate the exchange of information and provide mutual support among those who are working hard to maintain their aging vessels physically and financially. The ships of HNSA are located in the United States, Canada, Western Europe, and Australia. The ships are organized into three categories on the site: name of ship, type of ship, and location.
  • Index to Ships in Books -- Search Page : This index allows researchers to search the names of commercial and naval vessels that were published in a variety of books and serials. A bibliography of those printed resources is included.
  • International Congress of Maritime Museums : The International Congress of Maritime Museums is a professional guild of associations, organizations, and individuals in the maritime preservation field. Their website includes a news section that provides information about recently discovered wrecks, upcoming museum exhibits, and other developments in the field.
  • Maritime History Links on the Net : This comprehensive list covers a variety of subjects related to Maritime History.
  • Nautical Research Guild, Inc. : The Nautical Research Guild links researchers, collectors, and builders of the highest quality ship models. The Guild emphasizes learning about ships and maritime history through academic research, as applied and expressed in the process of ship model building and other artistic and academic endeavors.
  • Steamship Historical Society of America : The Steamship Historical Society (SSHSA) is an organization dedicated to preserving artifacts and memories from the steamship days of the past.
  • U.S. Naval Historical Center : The Naval Historical Center is the official history program of the Department of the Navy. The Center now includes a museum, art gallery, research library, archives, and curator as well as research and writing programs.
  • U.S. Naval Vessel Register : The Naval Vessel Register contains information on ships and service craft that comprise the official inventory of the U.S. Navy from the time of vessel authorization through its life cycle and disposal. It also includes ships that have been stricken but not disposed.
  • American Numismatic Society : Official website of the American Numismatic Society offers a list of online resources , including MANTIS , a searchable database of over 600,000 objects from the Society's collections of international coins, paper money, tokens, ‘primitive’ money, medals and decorations.
  • American Numismatics Association : Features information about ANA, a membership form, a link to ANA's ftp site, and links to an educational and museum directory. The FTP site includes press releases; ANA's library catalog; ANA's classification system; video list; and slide lists. The educational and museum directory features ANA's exhibits online; scholarship information; and convention updates.
  • Coins of Colonial and Early America : This University of Notre Dame site features discussions, descriptions and images of the coins and tokens used in Colonial and Confederation America based on examples in the Department of Special Collections. A companion project features Colonial and Confederation era paper currency.
  • Money - Past, Present & Future : Sources of information on monetary history, contemporary developments, and the prospects for electronic money.
  • National Numismatic Collection, Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of American History : The Smithsonian's National Numismatic Collection (NNC) is America's collection of monetary and transactional objects. This diverse and expansive global collection contains objects that represent every inhabited continent and span more than three thousand years of human history.
  • U.S. Department of the Treasury : U.S. Department of Treasury's Home Page includes press releases and updates on new programs and seminars being offered by the Department.
  • Freeze Frame: Eadweard Muybridge’s Photography of Motion : Information on the collection, links, and readings on Muybridge and his work on locomotion.
  • George Eastman Museum: International Museum of Photography and Film : The George Eastman Museum collects and interprets images, films, literature, and equipment in the disciplines of photography and motion pictures and cares for the George Eastman legacy collections.
  • International Center of Photography : The International Center of Photography is a museum, a school and a center for photographers and photography, whose mission is to present photography's vital and central place in contemporary culture and to lead in interpretation issues central to its development.
  • Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Collection : Link to the "Collection Finder" page of the Library of Congress American Memory site.
  • LIFE Magazine photo archive hosted by Google : Search millions of photographs from the LIFE photo archive, stretching from the 1750s to today. Most were never published and are now available for the first time through the joint work of LIFE and Google.
  • Museum of Photographic Arts : The Museum of Photographic Arts (MoPA) is one of the first museum facilities in the United States designed exclusively to collect and present the world's finest examples photographic art.
  • National Stereoscopic Association : The association promotes the study, collection and use of stereographs, stereo cameras and related materials for collectors and students of stereoscopic history. There is a link to the Oliver Wendell Holmes Stereoscopic Research Library.
  • NYPL Digital : The New York Public Digital Library is a continually expanding collection of digitized images and text selected from throughout the Research Libraries' collections.
  • Stereoscopy : Stereoscopy.com provides information about stereoscopic imaging (3-D) for both amateurs and professionals.
  • The Daguerreian Society : The Daguerreian Society is an organization of individuals and institutions sharing a common interest in the art, history and practice of the daguerreotype.
  • UCR Arts : This museum features contemporary exhibitions, digital and web art online, and a vast historical photograph collection.
  • Building the Washington Metro : This site tells the story of the Washington Metro, a 103-mile rapid transit system serving Washington, D.C., and the surrounding areas of Maryland and Virginia.
  • Center For Railroad Photography & Art : The center's focus is on the preservation and presentation of railroad-related photography and art.
  • Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum : This expansive website has an online library of 19th century pictures (more than 2,300), maps and descriptions of railroad construction and travel.
  • Great Northern Railway Historical Society : The Society works to preserve and promote the history of the Great Northern Railway, which was created in September 1889 from several predecessor railroads in Minnesota and eventually stretched from Lake Superior at Duluth and Minneapolis/St.Paul west through North Dakota, Montana and Northern Idaho to Washington State at Everett and Seattle.
  • National Railway Historical Society : Founded in 1935, the National Railway Historical Society has nearly 18,000 members and over 177 Chapters spread throughout the United States, Canada and Great Britain. It is now the United States' largest rail enthusiast organization.
  • Railroad Maps, 1828-1900 : The maps presented here are a selection from the Library of Congress Geography and Map Division holdings, based on the cartobibliography, Railroad Maps of the United States: A Selective Annotated Bibliography of Original 19th-century Maps in the Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress. This annotated list reveals the scope of the railroad map collection and highlights the development of railroad mapping in 19th-century America. Described are 623 maps chosen from more than 3,000 railroad maps and about 2,000 regional, state, and county maps, and other maps which show "internal improvements" of the past century.
  • Railroads and the Making of Modern America : This University of Nebraska project seeks to document and represent the rapid and far-reaching social effects of railroads and to explore the transformation of the United States to modern ideas, institutions, and practices in the nineteenth century. Railroads and the Making of Modern America seeks to use the digital medium to investigate, represent, and analyze this social change and document episodes of the railroad's social consequence.
  • Academic Info: The American West : Academic Info, an educational organization, created this directory of Internet resources on the history of the American West. This list covers a variety of subjects including Native Americans, women, religious history, the Gold Rush, Asian Americans, and railroads.
  • History of the American West, 1860-1920 : This site contains over 30,000 photographs, drawn from the holdings of the Western History and Genealogy Department at Denver Public Library. These photos illuminate many aspects of the history of the American West. Most of the photographs were taken between 1860 and 1920. They illustrate Colorado towns and landscape, document the place of mining in the history of Colorado and the West, and show the lives of Native Americans from more than forty tribes living west of the Mississippi River.
  • New Perspectives on the West : This is the companion website to the Ken Burns documentary series, the West. This site contains selected documentary materials, archival images and commentary, as well as links to background information and other resources.
  • The First American West: The Ohio River Valley, 1750-1820 : This Library of Congress site consists of 15,000 pages of original historical material documenting the land, peoples, exploration, and transformation of the trans-Appalachian West from the mid-eighteenth to the early nineteenth century. The collection is drawn from the holdings of the University of Chicago Library and the Filson Historical Society of Louisville, Kentucky
  • The Oregon Territory and its Pioneers : This website focuses on the pioneers of the Oregon Territory up to and including 1855...The first section is called THE SETTLING OF OREGON and is a compilation of information [including pioneer lists by year of emigration] extracted from a variety of sources. The second section lists the UPDATES that are in progress. The third section is devoted to RESEARCHING THE PIONEERS and provides links to research and historic sites that may be of interest."
  • The Oregon Trail : This website is a comprehensive source of information about the historic Oregon Trail. It includes primary source documents such as Trail diaries and memoirs. The site was created by Prof. Mike Trinklein and Steve Boettcher, creators of The Oregon Trail, the award-winning documentary film which aired nationally on PBS.
  • Canadian Centre for Architecture  CCA Library: Special Collections Trade Catalogues : Approximately 5,600 trade catalogues documenting building technology and construction methods from the late eighteenth century to the present. Core of the collection formed through acquisition of the relevant portions of the Franklin Institute trade catalogue collection. Coverage is broad and includes such categories as concrete and lumber, metalwork and woodwork, flooring, heating and insulation, plumbing and electricity, windows and roofing.
  • Columbia University. Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library : The American collection is one of the most extensive in existence. It begins with the first pertinent book to be published in the colonies, Abraham Swan's British Architect (Philadelphia, 1775), and includes a large number of titles listed in H.R. Hitchcock's basic bibliography, American Architectural Books. In the seventies and eighties the scope of the American collection was expanded to include printed source materials not previously collected. These include early trade catalogs from the manufacturers of building products (1840-1950).
  • Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum Library Reference Collection : There are over 4,500 trade catalogs in the Cooper-Hewitt Library collection, some dating from the 17th century.
  • Corning Museum of Glass. Rakow Research Library : The Juliette K. and Leonard S. Rakow Research Library of The Corning Museum of Glass has a wide-ranging collection including books, magazines, trade and auction catalogues, personal and corporate archives, videotapes, microforms, sound recordings, drawings, prints, photographs, and slides. Its mission is to acquire and preserve all informational resources on the art, history and early science and technology of glass, in all languages and all formats.
  • D'Arcy Collection : The D'Arcy Collection of the Communications Library of the University of Illinois is a collection of almost two million original advertisements published between 1890 and 1970. The collection, which was donated by the D'Arcy, MacManus & Masius advertising agency (now D'Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles) in 1983, is a rich source of research information on products advertised by many agencies. While the vast majority of these advertisements appeared in newspapers, magazines and trade journals, there are a few in other forms such as brochures, signs, and programs. Most of the clippings advertise standard consumer products, but there are a number of obsolete categories such as spats, bathing shoes, and Prohibition.
  • Digital Collections & Trade Catalogs from the Indiana Historical Society : This collection concentrates on catalogs from businesses that were either headquartered in Indiana or had a substantial presence in the state. Items in this collection date from the 1840s through the 1990s. The catalogs document the wide range of commodities that have come out of Indiana.
  • Hagley Museum and Library : The library houses an important collection of books, pamphlets, trade catalogs, manuscripts, photographs, ephemera, and audiovisual materials documenting the history of American business and technology. Hagley's main strength is in the Middle Atlantic region, but the scope of collecting includes business organizations and companies with national and international impact.
  • Instruments for Science, 1800-1914: Scientific Trade Catalogs in Smithsonian Collections : Digital collection of scientific instrument trade catalogs
  • John W. Hartman Center for Sales, Advertising, and Marketing History : The Ad*Access Project 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, Transportation, Beauty and Hygiene, and World War II. The advertisements are from the J. Walter Thompson Company Competitive Advertisements Collection of the John W. Hartman Center for Sales, Advertising & Marketing History in Duke University's David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
  • Marketing in the Modern Era : Marketing in the Modern Era: Trade Catalogs and the Rise of 19th-Century American Advertising: an online exhibit at the Baker Library at Harvard University.
  • National Museum of American History Library Trade Literature Collection : This collection contains more than 460,000 catalogs, technical manuals, advertising brochures, price lists, company histories and related materials representing over 36,000 companies.
  • National Museum of American History -- Archives Center, Warshaw Collection of Business Americana : The National Museum of American History purchased the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, ca. 1724-1977 in 1967. The collection was assembled by Isadore Warshaw and represents the largest advertising ephemera collection in the United States, occupying more than 1,020 cubic feet of storage space.  Organization, re-housing, and description of the Warshaw Collection are a long-term project. Most portions of the collection are open to researchers in the Archives Center.
  • New Jersey Trade and Manufacturers' Catalogs : Housed in Special Collections and University Archives, the Rutgers University Libraries collection of New Jersey trade and manufacturers catalogs represents part of the University's effort "to collect, preserve and make available for research, primary and secondary materials in various formats, documenting all aspects of New Jersey's history, from its founding to the present."
  • Otis Historical Archives, National Museum of Health and Medicine, Armed Forces Institute of Pathology : Particularly strong collections within the OHA include the areas of medical illustration, including anatomical drawings and paintings, photographs, and photomicrographs; reconstructive surgery and prosthetics; tropical and infectious disease research; trade literature and advertisements; medical technology and battlefield surgery from the Civil War through to the present conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. 
  • Seed Catalogs from the Smithsonian Libraries Trade Literature Collection : The Smithsonian Libraries has a unique trade catalog collection that includes about 10,000 seed and nursery catalogs dating from 1830 to the present, documenting the history of the seed and agricultural implement business in the United States, as well as providing a history of botany and plant research such as the introduction of plant varieties into the US. Additionally, the seed trade catalogs are a window into the history of graphic arts in advertising, and a social history, through the text and illustrations, showing changing fashions in flowers and vegetables.
  • Sewing Machine Galleries : Created by David and Lin Best, this site comprises photographs of over 130 sewing machines from their collection, together with information about the manufacturers that produced them.
  • Sewing Machines: Historical Trade Literature in Smithsonian Institution Collections : This guide illustrates the range of materials published by and about sewing machine companies in the United States, starting in the 1840s. Sewing machine catalogs and other industry materials are just one portion of the remarkable collections of manufacturers' trade literature held in the libraries, archives and curatorial units of the Smithsonian Institution. 
  • Shedding Light on New York: Edward F. Caldwell & Co. : The E. F. Caldwell & Co. Collection at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum Library, Smithsonian Institution Libraries, contains more than 50,000 images consisting of approximately 37,000 black & white photographs and 13,000 original design drawings of lighting fixtures and other fine metal objects that they produced from the late 19th to the mid-20th centuries.
  • The Virtual Laboratory (Max Planck Institute for the History of Science) : The digital library of the Virtual Library contains scans of historical books, journals, laboratory notebooks and instrument catalogues. Furthermore, it provides bibliographical information based on tables of contents (overview) and on existing personal bibliographies which have been checked for consistency. Every item can be acessed by author, title, year or word contained in the title.
  • University of California, Santa Barbara. Library. Special Collections. Romaine Trade Catalog Collection : Lawrence B. Romaine (1900-1967) was an antiquarian book dealer, who bought and sold rare books, manuscripts, trade catalogs, and other Americana. Romaine was recognized as the leading expert in the U.S. on trade catalogs, and was the author of A Guide to American Trade Catalogs, 1774-1900 (New York: R. R. Bowker Company, 1960), the standard reference work in this field.  Romaine spent approximately 30 years collecting over 41,000 trade catalogs from the 19th and early 20th centuries, on every imaginable product from agricultural implements, clothes, medical and surgical instruments to weathervanes and windmills. The bulk of his collection focused on machines, tools, engines and other hardware used in agriculture and manufacturing industries.
  • University of Delaware Trade Catalogs: An online exhibition : The University of Delaware Library Special Collections Department houses an extensive collection of trade catalogs and advertising ephemera produced in the United States from the middle of the eighteenth century until the present day. The trade catalog collection also complements the Special Collections Department's traditional strengths in the history of horticulture, science and technology, printing and publishing, and the book arts. Companies selling printing supplies, agricultural implements and nursery stock, type founders, publishing companies, and booksellers are particularly well-represented as are the catalogs of Delaware businesses.
  • Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library : The National Art Library holds numerous examples of trade catalogues within its collections. Some items entered the NAL during the 19th century, and both current and retrospective examples of trade catalogues have been added to the collections throughout the 20th century. Since 1983 the policy has been to actively collect both current and retrospective examples of trade literature in areas broadly in line with the research interests of the Victoria and Albert Museum.
  • Winterthur Museum Library : WinterCat is the Winterthur Library's online catalogue and includes nearly 60,000 bibliographic records, representing the holdings of the four collections that constitute the Winterthur Library. Records for imprints, periodicals, rare printed materials, manuscript and ephemera holdings, photographs, and archival resources are all in one database, which researchers can use to determine the library's holdings on any given topic, person, or organization through one search. WinterCat features hyperlinks to manuscript finding aids and selected images.
  • Women Working, 1800-1930: trade catalogs : To illustrate the world of women working, the Open Collections Program of Harvard University Library has digitized a group of trade catalogs. These colorful works illustrate the dramatic changes that were taking place between 1870 and 1930 in the home, in the workplace, and in the minds of retailers and manufacturers. 
  • Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) : This site contains approximately two million physical and cultural geographic features in the United States and its territories. The Federally recognized name of each feature described in the data base is identified, and references are made to a feature's location by State, county, and geographic coordinates.
  • Library of Congress Map Collection 1500-2004 : The Library of Congress' map collection contains the topical areas of cities and towns, conservation and environment, discovery and exploration, cultural landscapes, military battles and campaigns, as well as transportation and communication.
  • Mapping History: American History : The maps cover a variety of historical topics from pre-1500 Native American culture, to the Civil War and Reconstruction, to 20th century health. Some of these maps are interactive.
  • National Map Small-Scale Collection : The site from the U.S. Geological Survey offers a collection of small-scale datasets available for free download, along with hundreds of printable reference maps developed as part of the 1997-2014 edition of the National Atlas. 
  • University of Georgia Libraries Hargrett Rare Books and Manuscripts : The collection encompasses 500 years including maps on Georgia, the New World, the Colonial America, the revolutionary America, the revolutionary Georgia, the Union and expansion, the American Civil War, the frontier to the new South, Savannah and the coast, and transportation.
  • University of Illinois Historical Maps Online : These maps mainly focus from 1650 to 1994 on North America and the Northwest Territory, Maps of the Midwest, Illinois and Champaign County, and the Warner & Beers Atlas of 1876.
  • University of Texas at Austin's Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection : This collection contains maps arranged by state, city, and topical. Many of the maps are from the late 1700s through the early 1900s.
  • US History by Online Highways : The topical maps include the areas of early America, Colonial Period, Revolutionary America, young republic, and election maps of the early 1900s.

World's Fairs and Expositions

  • A Century of Progress: The 1933-34 Chicago World's Fair : The John Crerar Library (which is now part of the University of Chicago Libraries) collected various official publications, press releases, guidebooks, and other related materials pertaining to this world exposition. Approximately 350 of those collected items are now available on this website. The collection may be browsed by publication author, publication title, and the general subject of each publication.
  • Alaska Yukon Pacific Exposition Centennial : This University of Washington Libraries digital collection contains more than 1200 photographs of the 1909 fair held on the grounds of the University of Washington, depicting buildings, grounds, entertainment and exotic attractions.
  • Donald G. Larson Collection on International Expositions and Fairs, 1851-1940 : The Donald G. Larson Collection at Cal-State Fresno, consists of approximately 1,600 books and more than 6,500 pamphlets, postcard, sheet music, and other materials.
  • ExpoMuseum : ExpoMuseum was first created as a web site in 1998 by Urso S. A. Chappell, and is maintained by him.The site pays tribute to the past, present, and future of these immensely popular expositions, and also includes a number of fun features, such as a discussion area and a special section dedicated to the architecture of these places.
  • Hyper-text Thesis on the World's Columbian Exposition : A Masters thesis, by Julie K. Rose, M.A. English, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA on the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, in Chicago, Illinois, which features a virtual tour of the Fair and offers analysis of social and cultural importance of the World's Columbian Exposition.
  • Paris 1900 - The Exhibit of American Negroes : The Exhibit of American Negroes is a reconstruction of highlights from an exhibit of the same name put together by W. E. B. DuBois, Thomas Calloway and the Historic Black Colleges for the Paris 1900 International Exposition.
  • Progress Made Visible: American World's Fairs and Expositions : The Special Collections Department of the University of Delaware Library holds a wide variety of primary source materials relating to the World's Fairs and Expositions held in the United States between 1876 and 1939.
  • Revisiting World's Fairs and International Expositions: A Selected Bibliography, 1992 - 1999 : This Smithsonian Institution Library bibliography supplements Bridget Burke's bibliography, "World's Fairs and International Expositions: Selected References 1987-1993," which was published as part of Fair Representations: World's Fairs and the Modern World, edited by Robert Rydell and Nancy Gwinn. It focuses on secondary materials that were published between 1992 and mid-summer 1999, but also includes some entries for materials prior to 1992 that were not included in the Burke's bibliography.
  • The 1904 World's Fair: Looking Back at Looking Forward : An online exhibition in association with the Missouri Historical Society's 2004 centennial celebration of the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair.
  • The History of World Expositions : An EXPO 2000 resource on twenty previous World's Fairs and Expositions from 1851 to 2000.
  • The Iconography of Hope: The 1939-40 New York World's Fair : Created by John C. Barans, this site features historical information and digitized photographs chronicling the 1939-40 New York World's Fair.

how to do a history research project

Mrs. Nelson Teaches

Engaging ela education.

how to do a history research project

Black History Month Research Project: A Step-by-Step Guide

Black-History-Month-Research-Project

Hello Teacher Friends! How is your 2022 going? For me, this year is just zipping by! I cannot believe it is nearly Black History Month already! Since February is so close, I wanted to take a quick minute and highlight one of my most popular resources in my TpT Store . My Black History Month Research Project is incredibly popular this time of year. This resource has helped literally hundreds of teachers and thousands of students learn the research process and commemorate important Black individuals! I’ve recently updated the entire product and wanted to break it down and show you how I use this resource in my classroom!

Black History Month Research Project

With this resource, each student will research an influential Black individual, write a biographical essay about their individual and create a visual representation of their person! While this sounds like a lot of work, I promise I have broken it down into manageable chunks for YOU and your students! Even students who struggle with reading and writing have succeeded with this project!

Phase 1: Building Research Skills

Before beginning, students need a research subject! Included in this resource is a list of over 140 Black individuals who have made significant contributions to society— including many influential women! Personally, I like to randomly assign names to students. (Actually, I usually have them pick a name out of a bowl.) I do this for a few reasons. First, I think there is value in learning about someone new that students maybe haven’t even heard of before. If given the choice, students often default to the Black figures they already know! I don’t want them to do that! Second, I like to have all my students in all my classes have different names. This way, when we display them in the hallway or classroom, we don’t have any duplicates!

Black-History-Month-Research-Project

After students have their research subject, it is time to learn how to research. Instead of setting my students loose on Google right away, I like to teach them the research process. This direct teaching does take a little bit of class time. However, it is totally worth it! Not only will your students’ end results be infinitely better, but they are learning foundational research skills. Research skills that they will use again and again throughout their educational careers!

In these lessons, students will learn about different types of sources, how to determine if a source is credible, and how to recognize an author’s bias.

Black-History-Month-Activities

I’ve included a “Source Credibility Checklist” for students to keep as a reference that will help them determine whether a source is a “good” source or not. I’ve also outlined a fun activity intentionally using a completely biased website! It’s a real eye-opening activity for students that shows them the need to use multiple sources and check for credibility.

Black-History-Month-Writing-Assignment

Phase 2: Research & Note-taking

Black-History-Month-Writing-Assignment

The next step in the Black History Month Research Project is to research! I have two Slides Presentations giving students tips for conducting thorough research and taking notes to keep track of the information they have gathered! Students can take notes on their KWL Chart. I’ve also included a Note-taking Graphic Organizer that helps students keep track of what information came from what source. Keeping track of their information will come in handy later when they create their bibliographies!

Black-History-Month-Middle-School

Phase 3: Writing Black History Month Research Project Essays

Following the research and note-taking process, it’s time for students to outline and draft their essays. I’ve included a suggested outline that students can use to organize their information. In the Slides, I show how to take the information from their outline and notes and turn it into paragraphs in their essays! In my class, we talk a lot about writing excellent paragraphs . Here is another resource that can help if your students are struggling with this basic building block of writing!

Also in this phase, students will work together to edit and revise one another’s essays. This collaborative process is a great way to teach students how to give and accept feedback. It is also helpful in learning how to improve one’s writing from the first draft to the published final copy!

Black-History-Month-Research-Project

Additionally, students will also practice citing their sources by creating a bibliography. At the middle school level, I don’t require my students to stick with MLA or Chicago styles or anything in particular. I’m most interested in them understanding that they should be giving credit to the original authors. I don’t worry too much about formatting it in a specific style. I’ve included a Simple Bibliography Guide for students to use!

Phase 4: Visual Display & Class Presentations

Black-History-Month-Activity-Middle-School

Finally, students will create a visual display of information for their person. There are endless options for this portion of the assignment. You could ask students to simply use a large sheet of paper, a poster board, etc. to create a visual by hand. Alternatively, I heard from one tech-savvy teacher who asked his students to create a Slide for their visual component. He compiled the Slides, set up a projector in the front of the school, and looped the Slides all throughout February to allow others in the school to learn from their research!

I generally stick with a low-tech option and use large sheets of paper (my school has 12×18 sheets of paper that seem to work well). Students include the the most important facts and information about their individual. I also ask them to include pictures and a quotation on their poster. When students have finished their essays and their posters, students present their Black History Month Research Projects to the class. Afterwards, I like to display the posters in the hallway outside my classroom to allow others to learn as well!

Black-History-Month-Research-Project

Phew! If that sounds overwhelming, don’t worry! I’ve got you covered! This resource includes over 120 Instructional Slide s that literally walk you through the entire process! Also, if you need any help along the way, I’m just an email away!

How do you like to commemorate Black History Month with your students? I’d love to hear your ideas!

Brenna (Mrs. Nelson)

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The Australian National University

ANU College of Science

Australian landscape with gum trees

Can more ethical histories be written about early colonial expeditions? A new project seeks to do just that

By  Peter Taylor ,  Associate Professor - Fenner School, Australian National University, Australian National University ;  Cameo Dalley , Senior Lecturer, The University of Melbourne ; and  Nicole Huxley , Gudjala and Girramay leader, Indigenous Knowledge

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names and images of deceased people. The name of the Aboriginal man in this article was how he was referred to, and his relative has requested we honour this name.

Truth-telling is at the heart of a new research project we are currently leading that re-examines the legacy of the Hann Expedition, which travelled Queensland’s Cape York Peninsula in 1872.

Our project seeks to rewrite this period of history – and others – to honour the voices and experiences of Aboriginal people whose contributions to colonial-era expeditions have long been overlooked.

The Hann Expedition began in Mt Surprise, Queensland, in April 1872, and made a loop across the peninsula before finishing at the Junction Creek Telegraph Station seven months later. The team consisted of six white men and an Aboriginal guide. The purpose was to map and record “unknown” parts of Queensland and determine whether the lands would be feasible for mining and pastoral development.

Apart from geological descriptions and mapping, the expedition is credited with recording and collecting specimens of at least 149 plants previously unknown to Western science. However, using records from the expedition, we found these species were likely only located with the help of the young Girramay man, Jerry, who was their guide.

Jerry was derogatorily referred to as “the blackboy”, and his important role in the expedition has never been fully acknowledged.

The importance of Aboriginal knowledge to the expedition compelled us to further examine the encounters the men had with other Aboriginal people along the route. This likely included Olkala, Kuku Yalanji, Lama Lama and Guugu Yimithirr people.

In one of these encounters, botanist Thomas Tate and Jerry found a young Aboriginal boy near a lagoon and took him back to their camp. The boy’s family immediately retrieved him and returned the next day, threatening the team with weapons.

In other encounters, the team unsuccessfully tried to communicate with Aboriginal people, seeking information that would be useful to their expedition.

Our research team also found a detailed map created by Norman Taylor, the expedition’s geologist, which includes observations about encounters with Aboriginal people, as well as environmental details not recorded elsewhere.

The original map had been held in the Queensland State Archives since at least the 1980s, but had not been connected to other materials from the expedition. Although a detailed analysis of the map has only just begun, it suggests local Aboriginal people helped the expedition navigate difficult terrain along their route, particularly along the coast.

Descendants leading research

Our work takes its lead from Indigenous scholars and practitioners, such as Rose Barrowcliffe, Fiona Foley, Julie Gough, Natalie Harkin, Shino Konishi, Jeanine Leane and Djon Mundine, and others . Their work has been instrumental in critiquing the silencing of Aboriginal voices in colonial history. Wiradjuri scholar Jeanine Leane calls this a form of “cardboard incarceration”.

Our research team includes descendants of the 1872 expedition, such as the project lead and co-author, Peter Taylor (a descendant of Norman Taylor’s), and co-researcher and co-author Cameo Dalley (a great-granddaughter of Tate’s).

In addition, Nicole Huxley, a Gudjala leader, is a descendant of Jerry. Ms Huxley and her family wanted Jerry’s story to be told, in particular his role in keeping the expedition team alive at dangerous points in their travels.

As descendants, each of us has inherited different family narratives about what took place on the expedition, and whose contributions were central.

The Balkanu Cape York Development Corporation, which supports the land and development interests of Aboriginal people on Cape York, has also partnered with the project. Further funding will support our research and the involvement of Traditional Owners along the expedition route, including Olkala, Kuku Yalanji, Lama Lama and Guugu Yimithirr people.

As Gerhardt Pearson, the executive director of Balkanu, says:

…following the Hann Expedition, the violence and dispersal of Indigenous people was so devastating, the memories and stories of this period still haunt many people. The united commitment of the descendants and their detailed knowledge of this expedition will be incredibly valuable in working with Elders across the cape who still grieve about their own history.

Part of this process involves what is referred to as “rematriation”, or the reunification of Indigenous people and their knowledges with Country. This can include Indigenous people taking over the management of collections of artefacts and other specimens from the colonial era.

In our project, this includes botanical collections now held in the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew (London), the National Herbarium of Victoria at the Royal Botanic Gardens (Melbourne), and the Queensland Herbarium. These institutions are keen to develop protocols for involving Indigenous communities in the interpretation and management of collections.

Why truth-telling is needed in Australia

Truth-telling was a vital component of the Uluru Statement from the Heart signed by over 200 Indigenous delegates from around Australia. However, the failed referendum on a Voice to Parliament last year arguably demonstrated an apathy towards such processes at a national level.

This project shifts focus to local and regional approaches to truth-telling and the importance of individuals and families in taking responsibility for their role in shaping history. This is even more important for those of us with ancestors responsible for the intergenerational trauma experienced by Aboriginal people.

For the white descendants involved in our project, this will require us to sit uncomfortably in the privilege we have inherited because of this violence and think meaningfully about what can be done in the present.

Selective memory can be a tool of colonisation, and this project goes directly to the responsibilities of the descendants of colonisers to challenge this.

Cover image: Cape York to York Peninsular. By Nomadic Pics/Flickr CC2.0

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article .

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Space and Science

Researchers reveal first full passages decoded from famously inscrutable Herculaneum scrolls

After surviving a volcanic eruption in AD 79, the Herculaneum scrolls are extremely fragile and crumble if taken apart. Using AI, researchers were able to decipher several passages of text from an unrolled scroll.

Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter.  Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more .

After using artificial intelligence to uncover the first word to be read from an unopened Herculaneum scroll, a team of researchers has revealed several nearly complete passages from the ancient text, giving insight into philosophy from almost 2,000 years ago.

The Herculaneum scrolls are hundreds of papyri that survived the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. In their charred state, the ancient documents would crumble if anyone attempted to unroll them, and any writing on surviving pieces would be nearly illegible to the human eye.

By using computer technology and advanced artificial intelligence, researchers can now analyze the Herculaneum scrolls without unrolling and risking damage to the extremely fragile documents. More than 2,000 characters — the first full passages — have been deciphered from a scroll, according to an announcement Monday by computer scientists who launched the  Vesuvius Challenge , a competition designed to accelerate the discoveries made on the scrolls.

“It’s incredibly gratifying to know that these things are available, and we have now a mechanism to read them — and that reading them is going to create an entire field of study and scholarship for classicists,” said Brent Seales, a computer science professor at the University of Kentucky and a cocreator of the Vesuvius Challenge.

The  first word to be read  from an unopened scroll was found separately by both Luke Farritor and Youssef Nader — a computer science student at the University of Nebraska and a biorobotics graduate student at Freie University Berlin, respectively — in October. This year, joined by Julian Schilliger, a robotics student at ETH Zürich, the three have won the contest’s $700,000 grand prize for being the first team to decipher more than 85% of characters from four continuous passages within the same scroll.

A total of 15 passages were deciphered from the unrolled scroll. The first word to be decoded, the Greek word for purple, was detected in October 2023 and can be found within the newly interpreted passages.

What’s more, the team went above and beyond the contest requirements and read 15 partial columns of text, amounting to about 5% of the scroll.

The trio uncovered the text by applying a technique known as “virtual unwrapping” to the rolled-up scroll — one of several owned by the Institut de France — which was  released on the contest’s website . The process involved using computer tomography, an X-ray procedure to scan the coiled-up, warped papyrus, allowing the researchers to virtually flatten the scrolls and detect the ink on the page with advanced AI. After Farritor, Nader and Schilliger found the Greek letters, expert papyrologists from England, France and Italy were brought in to assess the text.

“If you look at the level of the vocabulary (from the passages), there is a really nuanced, intellectual conversation going on here. … It just makes me excited to want to deliver to the scholars an absolutely pristine, complete copy of what this is, so that they can do their work, and then we can fully understand it,” said Seales, who originally created the unwrapping method and has been developing the technology for nearly 20 years.

Words from an ancient philosopher

Over 1,000 carbonized scrolls were recovered from the eruption of Vesuvius, a volcano near Naples, Italy, that covered the ancient Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in volcanic mud. The charred documents, now referred to as the Herculaneum scrolls, were recovered from a building believed to be the house of Julius Caesar’s father-in-law,  according to the University of Kentucky .

The recently decoded passages were pulled from the end of a scroll and reveal words written by the philosopher Philodemus, who was believed to be the philosopher-in-residence working at the library in which the scrolls were found, the announcement said.

The unique preservation of the tree, Sanfordiacaulis densifolia, where the trunk is surrounded by more than 250 spirally arranged leaves, was the result of earthquakes in a 352-million-year-old rift-lake system, now exposed in New Brunswick, Canada.

Rare ancient tree discovery has scientists ‘gobsmacked’

In the deciphered text, Philodemus writes on “pleasure,” and whether the abundance of goods available can affect the amount of pleasure they give. “As too in the case of food, we do not right away believe things that are scarce to be absolutely more pleasant than those which are abundant,” the first sentence reads.

“Philodemus was dismissed over the years because we couldn’t really read his passages extensively. Only with difficulty, we just get these little snippets. … (In these passages) he’s persuading the people who are listening to him to sort of relax, find good friendships, spend your time living in the moment and enjoying pleasures,” said  Roger Macfarlane , a professor of classical studies at Brigham Young University, who has studied the Herculaneum scrolls. Macfarlane was not involved with the discovery but participated in certifying the first word that came out in October.

Fig_1-blurred bars.jpg

Bones found in 8-meter-deep pit may ‘fundamentally change’ history of humans in Europe

Seales said he hopes that almost an entire scroll will be deciphered this year — and the new grand prize contest puts forth an even more ambitious goal, offering a cash prize of $100,000 for the first team that can decipher at least 90% of all four scrolls released on the  contest’s website .

“The winners of the Vesuvius Challenge are able to get a text that’s authentic but doesn’t result in the destruction of the scroll. And that’s probably the most miraculous thing about it,” Macfarlane said.

Correction: A previous version of the story misstated the grand prize amount for the Vesuvius Challenge.

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Black Public Health Heroes Who Made—And Are Making—History

For Black History Month, Bloomberg School faculty recognize individuals who shaped public health and continue to impact the field.

Aliza Rosen

In honor of Black History Month, we asked some of our faculty to identify Black public health icons who influenced the work they do here at the Bloomberg School. From individuals renowned in history books to those still actively saving lives, these are just some of the leaders who have shaped the field of public health.

Sir George Alleyne

George Alleyne

Sir George Alleyne is director emeritus of the Pan American Health Organization, which he led from 1995 to 2003, part of a long career committed to international health and health equity. A native of Barbados, he also served as the United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean region from 2003 to 2010, working with policymakers, politicians, and communities to reduce HIV transmission and increase access to tools for prevention and treatment.

“In addition to his leadership and long-standing commitment to improve the health and well-being of those in the region, he has made notable contributions as a visiting faculty member in the Department of International Health at the Bloomberg School,” says Victoria Chou , PhD '11, MS, associate scientist in International Health . “He continues to inspire and educate the next generation of global health researchers and practitioners.”

F. DuBois Bowman

F Dubois Bowman

F. DuBois Bowman is the dean of the University of Michigan School of Public Health and a researcher in high dimensional and complex data. As an undergraduate student majoring in mathematics, Bowman shifted his focus to biostatistics following a conversation with Bill Jenkins [see below]. "I remember leaving that conversation very excited,” Bowman told the UM Public Health community upon becoming dean. “Biostatistics seemed like a perfect field for bringing together my dual interests in quantitative approaches and mathematics, paired with the opportunity to improve health and make a positive impact."

Specializing in functional brain imaging data, Bowman researches mental health and neurological disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s, and depression, and explores how environmental exposures impact brain health and overall well-being. In 2005, Bowman joined the Bloomberg School as a visiting professor of Biostatistics. “Dr. Bowman has a career of deep contributions across a broad spectrum of activities, including leadership as a dean and department chair, research, teaching, and practice,” says Brian Caffo , PhD, MS, professor in Biostatistics .

Robert D. Bullard

Robert Bullard speaking at podium

Robert D. Bullard is founding director of the Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice and distinguished professor of urban planning and environmental policy at Texas Southern University. Bullard was the first scientist to publish research (in support of Bean v. Southwestern Waste Management Corporation ), showing how pollution in a person’s surroundings could impact their health—in this case, how it was affecting predominantly Black neighborhoods in Houston.

That study launched a new path for Bullard, who expanded his research across the southern U.S. and found the same alarming trends tying environmental oppression to systemic racism. “My job is to connect the dots between who gets what, when, where, and why when it comes to pollution,” Bullard explained upon receiving a 2020 Lifetime Achievement award from the UN Environment Programme.

“He is known as the ‘father of environmental justice,’” says Aisha Dickerson , PhD, MSPH, assistant professor in Epidemiology . “Dr. Bullard’s research and advocacy has led to the reduction of environmental burden in under-resourced communities with the goal of reducing environmental disparities and associated health risk in historically marginalized populations.”

Goldie S. Byrd

Goldie Byrd

Goldie S. Byrd is a professor of social sciences and health policy and director of the Maya Angelou Center for Health Equity at Wake Forest University. Throughout her career, she has led research into the genetic risk factors among people of color for dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. In 2014, she founded the Center for Outreach in Alzheimer’s, Aging, and Community Health at North Carolina A&T State University, which focuses on the impact of Alzheimer’s on African Americans and offers support and education to family caregivers.

“Dr. Byrd has advocated for more representation of underrepresented communities’ involvement in clinical research and has used innovative methods to engage such populations,” says Lauren Parker , PhD, MPH, an associate scientist in Health, Behavior and Society . “My grandmother utilized these caregiving supports while caring for my grandfather who had vascular dementia. Dr. Byrd’s forward approaches in community health have inspired and enhanced my strategies for engaging Black and Latino caregivers of people living with dementia in research.”

Virginia Caine

Virginia Caine

Virginia Caine is director and chief medical officer of the Marion County Public Health Department and an associate professor of medicine at Indiana University School of Medicine’s Infectious Diseases Division. She served as president of the American Public Health Association, and in 2023 was named president-elect of the National Medical Association. Throughout her career, Caine has led efforts on both the local and national levels to educate providers about HIV/AIDS, expand community prevention efforts, and improve access to care.

“Dr. Caine has had a tremendous impact on my career and, as an infectious disease physician, on the health of people across the country,” says Maya Rockeymoore Cummings, PhD, MA, a visiting scholar in Health Policy and Management who worked as Caine’s assistant during graduate school. “Over the years, she continues to be a quadruple threat in the field: a practitioner, a researcher, service-oriented, and a student mentor.”

W.E.B. Du Bois

W E B Du Bois

W.E.B. Du Bois was a sociologist, historian, author, and one of the early scholar activists. He was also a founding member of the NAACP , the oldest and largest civil rights organization in the U.S. As the first African American to receive his PhD from Harvard, Du Bois “opened the door for many future Black students to train at Harvard and other predominantly white institutions,” says Keshia Pollack Porter , PhD '06, MPH, Bloomberg Centennial Chair of Health Policy and Management .

Du Bois’ seminal and highly acclaimed publication The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study was the first case study of a Black community in the U.S. “His work was groundbreaking and highlighted the social and health consequences of slavery, racism, and discrimination against African Americans,” says Pollack Porter.

Felicity Enders

Felicity Enders

Felicity Enders is a professor of biostatistics at Mayo Clinic and director of the Mayo Clinic Office for Research Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity. In addition to biostatistics education, Enders focuses on health care academia’s hidden curriculum: the values and behaviors students need to excel—such as empathy, assertiveness, and professionalism—but are not explicitly taught.The term has been applied to other education environments for decades but not academic health care research, until Enders and her team introduced it and explained its added burden on students from diverse backgrounds .

Enders received her PhD in biostatistics and MPH from the Bloomberg School and “since then has done groundbreaking work at the Mayo Clinic, including on topics that include teaching biostatistics, highlighting and informing regarding the hidden curriculum for research, and important collaborative projects in psychology and women’s health, among other areas,” says Liz Stuart , PhD, professor and department chair of Biostatistics . “She has helped our field think more deeply about diversity and inclusion, both for institutions and in data analysis and study design.”

Donald Hopkins

Donald Hopkins speaking at podium

Donald Hopkins is the Special Advisor for Guinea Worm Eradication at the Carter Center, where he previously served as director of all health programs. When Hopkins joined the Carter Center in 1986 to lead its efforts to eradicate Guinea worm disease and river blindness globally, there were approximately 3.5 million human cases annually of Guinea worm disease . In 2023, only 13 human cases were recorded , thanks largely to the campaign designed by Hopkins.

“Donald Hopkins is a great public health hero,” says Kawsar Talaat , MD, an associate professor in International Health . “He led the CDC’s efforts to eliminate smallpox in Sierra Leone and India, and rose through the ranks to be acting director of the CDC in 1985.” Sierra Leone had the highest rate of smallpox in the world when Hopkins arrived there in 1966 to lead implementation of the CDC’s new strategy of surveillance and containment; the country reported its last case of smallpox just three years later. After also heading successful smallpox eradication efforts in India, Hopkins went on to write the Pulitzer-nominated book The Greatest Killer: Smallpox in History .

Sherman James

Sherman James

Sherman James is the Susan B. King Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Public Policy at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy. “He was one of the key figures in the development of social epidemiology,” says David Celentano , ScD '77, MHS '75, professor in Epidemiology , referring to James’ research into how socioeconomic circumstances, culture, and racism influence health disparities.

“He was a principal investigator of the stress that Blackpeople face, particularly in the rural South and in the diaspora to the North,” says Celentano. Trained as a social psychologist, James created the term “ John Henryism ,” which describes the physical health impacts caused by the stress of thriving in the face of adversity. He based the term—and his associated hypothesis and measurement methods—on John Henry , a Black American folk hero who tried his own strength against that of a machine, a challenge he won, only to die of exhaustion.

Loretta Sweet Jemmott

Loretta Sweet Jemmott

Loretta Sweet Jemmott is Drexel University’s vice president of Health and Health Equity and a professor at its College of Nursing and Health Professions. She is one of the U.S.’s most prominent researchers in the field of HIV/AIDS prevention, with a particular focus on African American adolescents and adults.

By prioritizing understanding a community’s culture, issues, values, and needs, Jemmott has built effective community-based strategies to reduce STI risk and incidence. “She and her husband, John B. Jemmott, created several of the evidence-based interventions used by the CDC to prevent negative sexual health outcomes, like unwanted pregnancy, STIs, and HIV,” says Terrinieka Powell , PhD, MA, associate professor in Population, Family and Reproductive Health and vice chair of the Office of Inclusion, Diversity, Anti-racism and Equity .

Among Jemmott’s 100+ published works is the curriculum Making Proud Choices! An Evidence-Based, Safer-Sex Approach to Teen Pregnancy and HIV/STI Prevention . “We implemented Making Proud Choices! with high schools across the city in our OAH grant in partnership with the Baltimore City Health Department and Baltimore City Public Schools.”

Bill Jenkins

Bill Jenkins

William (Bill) Jenkins was a public health researcher, statistician, and professor who dedicated his career to racial equity in health care. He founded multiple organizations and programs to improve health outcomes and reduce disparities for people of color, including  Morehouse College’s Public Health Sciences Institute, the Master of Public Health Program at Morehouse School of Medicine, and the Society for the Analysis of African American Public Health Issues.

Jenkins is best known for his efforts to end the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and his subsequent support ensuring that the participants and their families received lifelong medical and health care services. “He really had a social justice and a civil rights approach to public health,” says Renee Johnson , PhD, MPH, a professor in Mental Health who was first introduced to public health in a class taught by Jenkins.

His advocacy around the ethics and impacts of the Tuskegee Study led the U.S. government to issue a formal apology. “That was a lesson about the type of scientist I want to be,” Johnson says. “Not only rigorous in terms of statistics and epidemiology, but also committed to acting with integrity, and ensuring that people who participate in research studies are treated fairly, humanely, and with dignity.”

Ruth E. Moore

Ruth Moore

In 1933, Ruth E. Moore became both the first Black woman to be awarded a PhD in the natural sciences and the first Black scientist of any gender to be awarded a PhD in bacteriology. A few years later, in 1936, she also became the first Black member of the American Society for Microbiology. Her research career continued at Howard University under the mentorship of Hildrus Poindexter, a Black pioneer in clinical microbiology, and she succeeded him as the chair of Microbiology at Howard University School of Medicine.

“Dr. Moore was a pioneer in the field of microbiology, facing a great deal of challenges and restrictions as a Black female scientist,” says Kimberly Davis , PhD, MSc, an assistant professor in Molecular Microbiology and Immunology . Her PhD dissertation focused on the isolation and detection of the tuberculosis-causing microbe Mycobacterium tuberculosis —at a time when tuberculosis was the second-leading cause of death in the U.S.—and would be referenced in work that helped scientists understand and control the disease. She also published some of the earliest research into the microbiome, looking at how microorganisms in the gut respond to antibiotics.

Lisa Newman

Lisa Newman

Lisa Newman is the Chief of Breast Surgery at Weill Cornell Medicine and New York Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center and an internationally renowned clinical and public health researcher in breast cancer management and disparities.

Newman also oversees an international breast cancer research and training program that involves physicians and researchers in Ghana, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Uganda, Haiti, Barbados, and Canada, and has provided surgical and cancer care to patients in these countries at no cost to them. “I accompanied this group to Ghana as part of my PhD training and learned so much about cancer from an international perspective, which has informed my own work as a new faculty member here at Johns Hopkins,” says Brittany Jenkins-Lord , PhD, MPH ’20, MS, an assistant professor in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology .

“Dr. Newman is truly a public health hero,” says Jenkins-Lord. “She continues to make strides in our understanding of breast cancer disparities through her groundbreaking work in genetics, medicine, and cancer risk and prevention in the U.S. and abroad.”

James McCune Smith

Portrait drawing of James McCune Smith

In 1837, James McCune Smith became the first African American to earn a medical degree, at the University of Glasgow, after being denied admission to U.S. universities due to his race. He returned to the U.S., where he became the first African American physician in the U.S. , opened the country’s first Black-owned pharmacy, and was the first African American to publish peer-reviewed articles in medical journals.

Despite his qualifications, Smith was denied membership in prominent medical associations. “Nevertheless, Dr. Smith continued to practice medicine and write medical reviews, highlighting the importance of using controlled comparison groups in medical research,” says Krystal Lee , EdD, MPA, a research associate in Health, Behavior and Society . “By the time of his death in 1865, Dr. Smith was a well-known doctor, apothecary, medical author, and statistician who Frederick Douglass referred to as the single most important influence on his life.”

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IMAGES

  1. A Step by Step Guide to Doing Historical Research

    how to do a history research project

  2. Writing an Historical Research Paper for Modern History Class

    how to do a history research project

  3. Modern History Research Project Directions

    how to do a history research project

  4. 43+ Research Paper Examples

    how to do a history research project

  5. The US History Research Project: A Manual for

    how to do a history research project

  6. WORLD HISTORY Research Projects

    how to do a history research project

VIDEO

  1. What is research

  2. Choosing a Research Topic

  3. Introduction to Research

  4. What is Research??

  5. World History Research Project

  6. Dr Sarah Inskip

COMMENTS

  1. A Step by Step Guide to Doing Historical Research

    This step-by-step guide progresses from an introduction to historical resources to information about how to identify a topic, craft a thesis and develop a research paper. Table of contents: The Range and Richness of Historical Sources. Secondary Sources. Primary Sources.

  2. Stages of a Historical Research Project

    Stages of a Historical Research Project Overview Discussion Overview A well-planned research project will help you avoid retracing your steps or forgetting to do something altogether. In real life, however, research projects rarely go exactly as planned. They are more likely than not thrown off course by the unpredictable and unexpected sources.

  3. How to Write a History Research Paper

    1. How do I pick a topic? Picking a topic is perhaps the most important step in writing a research paper. To do it well requires several steps of refinement. First you have to determine a general area in which you have an interest (if you aren't interested, your readers won't be either).

  4. PDF A Brief Guide to Writing the History Paper

    the History Paper The Challenges of Writing About (a.k.a., Making) History At first glance, writing about history can seem like an overwhelming task. History's subject matter is immense, encompassing all of human affairs in the recorded past — up until the moment, that is, that you started reading this guide.

  5. PDF The History Research Project: A Manual for Students

    • Get started as soon as the project is assigned. • Be sure to choose a topic that really interests you. • Map out a plan for completing the project. A Word about Historical Research and Writing Original research in history offers the writer a chance to gather information to answer a question and ultimately solve a problem.

  6. PDF Guidelines for Historical Projects

    Your project should start with "The Big Question." Argument= It's the main thing you want to tell others, the reason for doing the project. In other words, it is the THESIS, the proposition that you want others to accept. It expresses the thrill of your discovery. Don't be content with telling a story others have told hundreds of times.

  7. Independent Work in History: A Guide

    There are probably as many different ways to conduct a research project as there are historians. There are, however, certain general steps that most take as they pursue their research and writing. Finding a topic. Finding a topic is the hardest task of all the work that goes into a research project. It is also the first task that faces you.

  8. Tools and techniques for historical research

    For almost all historical topics, however, libraries filled with printed books and journals will remain the principal tools for research, just as museums will continue to be essential to any work dealing with the material culture of past science. The reason for this is simple: what is on the internet is the result of decisions by people in the ...

  9. Introduction to Historical Research : Home

    Overview. This guide is an introduction to selected resources available for historical research. It covers both primary sources (such as diaries, letters, newspaper articles, photographs, government documents and first-hand accounts) and secondary materials (such as books and articles written by historians and devoted to the analysis and ...

  10. Historical Research

    Use this checklist as a starting point for your historical research project, and find out whether you've overlooked an important step in your approach. This list can also be used to evaluate the ...

  11. Starting a History Research Project

    Sep 13 Want to start your own history project? Not sure what to research or where to begin? Circa's historians break down the steps of getting started on your own history research. History projects usually start from two places: a question that you want to know the answer to and a time and place that particularly interest you.

  12. PDF Guidelines for Historical Research and Writing

    HOW TO APPROACH RESEARCH AND WRITING A. Fourteen Steps to a good historical research paper. In A Short Guide to Writing About History Richard Marius outlines fourteen steps that every student should follow in writing a historical research paper. 1. Identify your audience.

  13. How to Do Historical Research: 5 Tips for Studying History

    1. Keep the big picture in mind. If you approach your historical research as a big picture examination of a person or time period, you can make studying history into a creative activity, rather than just a bunch of memorization of historical data.

  14. Where Research Begins: Choosing a Research Project That Matters to You

    This book will help you start your new research project the right way for you with a series of simple yet ingenious exercises. Written in a conversational style and packed with real-world examples, this easy-to-follow workbook offers an engaging guide to finding research inspiration within yourself, and in the broader world of ideas.

  15. PDF The U.S. History Research Project: A Manual for Students

    Students who completed the U.S. History project gave these words of advice: • Anticipation of this task is your greatest obstacle. • The project requires a significant investment of time and energy. • Approach this assignment as a series of steps. • Begin the project as soon as your instructor assigns it to you.

  16. A Beginner's Guide to Starting the Research Process

    Step 1: Choose your topic Step 2: Identify a problem Step 3: Formulate research questions Step 4: Create a research design Step 5: Write a research proposal Other interesting articles Step 1: Choose your topic First you have to come up with some ideas. Your thesis or dissertation topic can start out very broad.

  17. How to do historical research

    $7.00 Additional resources Researching for a History assessment piece can often be the most daunting part of the subject. However, it needn't be. Research is a systematic process that, if followed step-by-step, will become a logical and efficient part of your work.

  18. Step-by-Step Guide to Oral History

    Plan the project. Consider such things as end products, budget, publicity, evaluation, personnel, equipment, and time frames. Conduct background research. Process interviews. Evaluate research and interviews and cycle back to step 1 or go on to step 7. Organize and present results. Store materials archivally.

  19. How to Do Oral History

    Technique: The methodology of oral history can be adapted to many different types of projects from family history to academic research projects in many different disciplines. The interviews should usually be conducted in a one-on-one situation, although group interviews can also be effective. ... The following six considerations are basic to ...

  20. How to Write a History Research Proposal Like a Pro

    Start Writing a Research Proposal with a Clear and Concise Introduction Summary Statement/Abstract of the Research Proposal Review of Research Literature Use Appropriate Sources Methodology Describe Relevant Academic Resources Results Provide a Realistic Timeline and Budget Include Appendices, If Required Use Clear and Concise Language

  21. 10 History Passion Project Ideas for High School Students

    1) History Research Paper About Your Favorite Event Jump in and get your hands dirty by exploring your favorite historical event! Once you choose your theme, identify your primary questions, find primary sources, and study up on your topic, draft your findings into a history research paper. Idea by previous history research mentor Charles

  22. American History Research Guide

    Material History of American Religion Project: The Material History of American Religion Project studied (1995-2001) the history of American religion in all its complexity by focusing on material objects and economic themes. North Star: A Journal of African-American Religious History: An online journal sponsored by Princeton University.

  23. Black History Month Research Project: A Step-by-Step Guide

    Phase 1: Building Research Skills Before beginning, students need a research subject! Included in this resource is a list of over 140 Black individuals who have made significant contributions to society— including many influential women! Personally, I like to randomly assign names to students.

  24. Can more ethical histories be written about early colonial expeditions

    Truth-telling is at the heart of a new research project we are currently leading that re-examines the legacy of the Hann Expedition, which travelled Queensland's Cape York Peninsula in 1872. Our project seeks to rewrite this period of history - and others - to honour the voices and experiences of Aboriginal people whose contributions to ...

  25. First complete passages from ancient Herculaneum scroll decoded

    After using artificial intelligence to uncover the first word to be read from an unopened Herculaneum scroll, a team of researchers has revealed several nearly complete passages from the ancient ...

  26. Recognizing Black Public Health Leaders Through History

    Robert D. Bullard is founding director of the Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice and distinguished professor of urban planning and environmental policy at Texas Southern University. Bullard was the first scientist to publish research (in support of Bean v. Southwestern Waste Management Corporation), showing how pollution in a person's surroundings could impact their health ...