Wayne G. Basler Library: Primary Sources: Finding Primary Sources

Searching For Primary Source Materials

You can search the Internet for just about any topic and find many thousands of sources and images, but it is important to find materials from a reputable source, one that you can use and cite confidently in an assignment or paper. Images and sources from a government, library, museum, or university website will be more useful to you than those on a public or personal website. A number of museums, archives, and major public libraries provide searchable digital collections and include large numbers of primary source materials. Most of these digital collections will allow you to search broadly, by specific historical periods, or by particular material types, for instance, newspaper articles or images of artwork. The resources provided on this page are great places to begin your search for primary source materials.

Primary Source Collections Available Through Our Library

American Memory
More than 9 million items from the Library of Congress and other institutions are organized into over 100 collections. Items include books, manuscripts, pamphlets, sheet music, prints, photographs, maps, posters, motion pictures, and sound recordings related to the American experience.
Chronicling America : Historic American Newspapers
Search America's historic newspaper pages from 1770-1963 or use the U.S. Newspaper Directory to find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present.
Classical Music Library
Audio: Searchable classical music resource which includes tens of thousands of recordings you can listen to over the internet. Includes biographies and images of select composers, a glossary of musical terms, and a history of musical periods from medieval to contemporary.
Tennessee Virtual Archives
The Tennessee Virtual Archive (TeVA) is a digital repository of the Tennessee State Library & Archives providing open access to thousands of photographs, documents, maps, postcards, film, audio and other records relating to the history and culture of Tennessee.
Veterans History Project
The Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress collects, preserves and makes accessible the firsthand recollections of U.S. military veterans who served from World War I through more recent conflicts and peacekeeping missions, so that future generations may hear directly from veterans and better understand what they saw, did and felt during their service.

Other Primary Source Collections

Archives of American Art
Images. Coverage: Various.
A collection of over 16 million letters, photographs, diaries, oral history interviews, sketches, scrapbooks, business records, and other documents.
Digital Public Library of America Primary Source Sets
Full-Text. Coverage: Various.
Digital Public Library of America Primary Source Sets are designed to help students exploring topics in history, literature, and culture through primary sources. Drawing online materials from libraries, archives, and museums across the United States, the sets use letters, photographs, posters, oral histories, video clips, sheet music, and more. Each set includes a topic overview, ten to fifteen primary sources, links to related resources, and a teaching guide.
Getty Search Gateway
Images. Full-Text. Coverage: Various.
Search several collections for images of artwork, printed works, photographs, and many other types of materials.
Library of Congress Digital Collection
Full-Text. Coverage: Various.
Library of Congress collection of wide variety of primary sources from American History, including printed materials, video, audio, maps, newspapers, and more. Use search bar at top of page.
New York Public Library Digital Collections
Full-Text. Coverage: Various
Digitized items in the NYPL collections. Includes printed materials, photographs, maps, manuscripts, video, and more. Includes 700,000+ digital images from the diverse collections of the New York Public Library archives.
Smithsonian Institution Collections Search Center
Images. Coverage: Various
Search the Smithsonian collections for images of paintings, drawings, sculptures, prints, photographs, and more.
EuroDocs: Online Sources for European History
Links connect to European primary historical documents that are transcribed, reproduced in facsimile, or translated.
In addition you will find video or sound files, maps, photographs or other imagery, databases, and other documentation.
The sources cover a broad range of historical happenings (political, economic, social and cultural).
The order of documents is chronological wherever possible.
The Avalon Project: Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy
Perseus Digital Library Collections
Perseus maintains a web site that showcases collections and services developed as a part of research efforts over the years. The flagship collection, under development since 1987, covers the history, literature and culture of the Greco-Roman world. We are applying what we have learned from Classics to other subjects within the humanities and beyond.
Internet History Sourcebooks Project
Use the links on the left of the page to navigate through sources in Ancient History, Medieval History, and Modern History.
Hosted by Fordham University, the Internet History Sourcebooks Project is a collection of public domain and copy-permitted historical texts presented cleanly (without advertising or excessive layout) for educational use.
Online Exhibits of the National Archives
Over 40 online exhibits of primary sources from American History
Hearst Museum Portal - The Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology
"The Hearst Museum Portal is a simplified gateway to publicly accessible data and images for all objects in the care of the University of California, Berkeley’s Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology. We invite you to use the Hearst Museum Portal to explore and discover our collections."
HathiTrust
HathiTrust is a partnership of academic & research institutions, offering a collection of millions of titles digitized from libraries around the world.
Umbrasearch: African American History
685,857 items from more than 1,000 U.S. archives, libraries, and museums.
National Archives