LibGuides: American History Research Guide: Find Articles

Searching the Databases

Refer to the Other Video Tutorials Page (on the left) for videos on how to navigate our databases.

Finding Primary Sources

Use these databases to find primary source material for your research.

Chicago Tribune (Historical, 1849-1993)
This historical newspaper provides genealogists, researchers and scholars with online, easily-searchable first-hand accounts and unparalleled coverage of the politics, society and events of the time.
Coverage: 1849 - 1993
Early American imprints. Series I, Evans (1639-1800)
Full-text collection of books, pamphlets, broadsides, newspapers, government documents and ephemera printed in America from 1639-1800. This collection is based on the bibliography originally compiled and edited by Charles Evans.
Hartford Courant (Historical: 1764-1996)
This historical newspaper provides genealogists, researchers and scholars with online, easily-searchable first-hand accounts and unparalleled coverage of the politics, society and events of the time.
Coverage: 1764 - 1996
Library of Congress American Memory
American Memory is a gateway to the Library of Congress's vast resources of digitized American historical materials. Comprising more than 9 million items that document U.S. history and culture, American Memory is organized into more than 100 thematic collections based on their original format, their subject matter, or who first created, assembled, or donated them to the Library.
The original formats include manuscripts, prints, photographs, posters, maps, sound recordings, motion pictures, books, pamphlets, and sheet music.
New York Times with Index (Historical 1851-2013)
This historical newspaper provides genealogists, researchers and scholars with online, easily-searchable first-hand accounts and unparalleled coverage of the politics, society and events of the time. The Historical New York Times with Index (1851-1993) provides search capability using subject terms and topics for focused and targeted results in combination with searchable full text, full page, and article-level images from the Historical New York Times.
Coverage: 1851 - 2013
Vogue archive
The full contents of Vogue magazine (US edition) in full color page image, from the first issue in 1892 to the present, with monthly updates for new issues.
Women's Studies Archive: Women's Issues and Identities
Focusing on the 19th and 20th centuries, this archive provides a history of the social, political, and professional aspects of women's lives and offers a look at the roles, experiences, and achievements of women in society. Through a variety of documents such as diaries, letters, photographs, news clippings, organizational records, and journals, it provides a close look at some of the pioneers of women's history, a deep dive into the issues that have affected women, and the many contributions they have made to society. The archive includes records from Planned Parenthood, the Women's Peace Party, the Women's Labor League, and more.
Women and social movements in the United States 1600-2000, Scholar's Edition
The Scholar's Edition of Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600-2000 includes all content from the "basic" edition along with the addition an important new resource: The Women's Commission Reports collection, an archive of the publications and documents of local, state, and federal Commissions on the Status of Women from 1963 to the present.

Finding Secondary Sources

Use these databases to find scholarly articles (secondary sources) for your research.

America: History & Life
America: History and Life is the definitive index of literature covering the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present. With indexing for 1,700 journals from as far back as 1910, this database is without question the most important bibliographic reference tool for students and scholars of U.S. and Canadian history.
History Reference Source
History Reference Source offers full text from more than 1,620 reference books, encyclopedias and non-fiction books, cover to cover full text for more than 150 leading history periodicals, nearly 57,000 historical documents, more than 78,000 biographies of historical figures, more than 113,000 historical photos and maps, and more than 80 hours of historical video
JSTOR
JSTOR provides articles of core scholarly journals in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. You can search the full text, titles, authors, and abstracts, or browse by journal title or discipline. JSTOR works with a diverse group of nearly 1,200 publishers from more than 57 countries to preserve and make their content digitally available. Many JSTOR collections are multidisciplinary and comprised of several core subjects, including language and literature, history, economics, and political science.

Evaluating Sources: Databases vs. "Open Web"

Google Scholar: Off-Campus Access to Scholarly Resources

Google Scholar is a subset of Google allowing users to search scholarly literature across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites.

What you find may be available in one or more ways:

1. Freely available on the web (i.e, open access). Click on the link for the article,

2. Available for a fee behind a "paywall". Request the article through Interlibrary Loan,

3. Freely available through one of CCSU's research databases. Look for (click on) the 'Find a Copy @ CCSU' link. ***

*** If you are off-campus, you will need to configure your device to see the 'Find a Copy' link. Here's how:

Go to scholar.google.com
Click on the in the upper left hand corner and choose 'Settings'.

Choose 'Library Links' and search for 'Central Connecticut State University'. Choose each occurence and 'Save'.

American History Research Guide

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