What are Primary Sources?
Primary Sources are original sources: they were created by someone who participated in or observed an event. They include diaries, letters, newspapers, government documents, photographs, and other manuscripts.
General Collections
- Gale Primary Sources This link opens in a new window
Gale Primary Sources offers a comprehensive platform for research, enabling users to search multiple collections simultaneously. It goes beyond basic retrieval, providing tools for analysis and discovery of new material.
- Archives of Sexuality and Gender (Gale Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window
The Archives of Sexuality and Gender program spans the sixteenth to twentieth centuries and is the largest digital collection of historical primary source publications relating to the history and study of sex, sexuality, and gender research and gender studies research.
- GallicaA digital library created by the National Library of France, includes French newspapers of the 1800s and 1900s.
- Defining Gender This link opens in a new windowDiscover five centuries of advice literature from the mid-15th to early 20th century. Research the ideals of social conduct, power distribution within the family, consumption and leisure, education of men and women and gendered perceptions of the body to analyse and challenge the changing views and ideas surrounding traditional gender roles.
- Mass Observation Online This link opens in a new window
A resource for sociologists and cultural historians with data for researchers across a wide range of disciplines. Includes diaries, surveys and questionnaires that reveal everyday life in Britain between the 1930s and 1960s.
- Popular Culture in Britain and America, 1950-1975 This link opens in a new windowA wide range of material, from government documents to fanzines, video content to posters and scrapbooks, tells the story of a time of music, political unrest, fashion and new technology.
- Sex and Sexuality This link opens in a new windowThis collection explores changing attitudes towards human sexuality, gender identities and sexual behaviors from the nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries. Investigating the breadth and complexity of human sexual understanding through the work of leading sexologists, sex researchers, organizations and personal accounts.
- Women in the National Archives This link opens in a new window
A finding aid to the collections of The National Archives, UK, at Kew. Also includes a selection of rare documents relating to women's suffrage in the UK and the British Empire.
European Newspapers
- British Library Newspapers (Gale Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window
British Library Newspapers, sourced from the British Library, offers a unique perspective on historical events from the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries. It provides a unique perspective on regional attitudes, cultures, and vernaculars.
- Financial Times Historical Archive (Gale Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window
The Financial Times Historical Archive, 1888-2016, is a complete facsimile run of the authoritative daily business newspaper.
- Times Digital Archive, The (Gale Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window
Covers all news printed by The Times newspaper between 1785 and 1985. Includes everything from top news stories to editorials, obituaries, sports, and advertisements, excluding Sunday editions.
- Illustrated London News Historical Archive: 1842-2003, The (Gale Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window
Full facsimile run of the world's first illustrated weekly newspaper. Presents a vivid picture of British and world events — including news of war, disaster, ceremonies, the arts, and science — with coverage in the first issue ranging from the Great Fire of Hamburg to Queen Victoria’s fancy dress ball at Buckingham Palace. Includes full color imaging of every page.
- Economist Historical Archive, The (Gale Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window
The Economist Historical Archive delivers a complete searchable copy of every issue of The Economist from 1843 to 2014. Covering the 19th and 20th centuries, it includes full-color images, multiple search indexes, and the ability to browse every issue.
American Newspapers/Magazines
- ProQuest Historical Newspapers This link opens in a new window
This database offers full-text and full-image articles for newspapers dating back to the 19th century.
- Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive This link opens in a new window
Full-text archive of many important magazines documenting the early days of the film, television and popular music industries. Notably, includes Billboard (1894-2000), Variety (1905-2000), and The Stage (1880-2000).
- Vogue Archive, The This link opens in a new window
A complete searchable archive of American Vogue, from the first issue in 1892 to the current month, reproduced in high-resolution color page images. Every page, advertisement, cover and fold-out has been included, with indexing allowing users to find images by garment type, designer and brand names.
Websites
- EuropeanaMulti-lingual online collection of millions of digitized items from European museums, libraries, archives and multi-media collections.
- Internet Modern History Sourcebookimportant documents about British, French, German, Italian history of the 1400s-1900s, covers the World Wars, Great Depression, Reformation, Enlightenment, Absolutism, the French Revolution, Cold War, and more
- Internet Women's History SourcebookFordham University web portal to digitized primary documents.
- Margaret Thatcher ArchiveFree access to thousands upon thousands of declassified secret documents from archives all over the world, something never done before for any political figure in any country.
- French Women & Feminists in History: A Resource GuideContains links to freely available digitized sources.
- British LibraryNational Library of the UK. Includes digital collections.
- The National ArchivesNational Archives of Great Britain.
Streaming Video & Images
- Vanderbilt Television News Archive This link opens in a new window
The TVNA collection holds individual network evening news broadcasts from the major U.S. national broadcast networks - ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN - and hours of special news-related programming, including ABC's Nightline since 1989.
- Criterion Collection This link opens in a new window
The Criterion Collection showcases the definitive versions of seminal titles in the history of motion pictures in streaming format. This film selection details the history of film in the 20th Century, covering the works of Charlie Chaplin, Ingmar Bergman, Jean-Luc Godard, Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Welles, among others.
- Films On Demand This link opens in a new window
Film on Demand is a digital video streaming service providing access to educational videos from producers like A&E, PBS, National Geographic, and more. The Master Academic Collection includes videos across various fields of study, including health, humanities, science, business, and archival films.
- British Library ImagesImages from the national library of the UK.