These are just a few of the primary source collections available to you through Wellesley and on the open web. For more ideas, see our Primary Sources guides for History and Literature, or contact me for help finding sources related to your topic!
A growing collection of nearly 3,000 oral history video interviews with both well-known and unsung African Americans, highlighting the history, lives, careers, and accomplishments of African Americans across a wide variety of fields.
Primary sources documenting slavery and abolition, including court records, slavery testimonies, pamphlets, books, maps, and more. Areas of focus include the African coast, the Middle Passage, slavery and the Islamic world, spiritualism and religion, resistance and the Underground Railroad, free Black settlements.
Dates: 1490-2007 CE
Focusing primarily on Atlanta, Chicago, New York, and North Carolina, this resource documents multiple aspects of African American communities through pamphlets, news, letters, photos, maps, and oral histories. Themes include arts and culture, civil rights and Black power, education, policing, and faith and religion.
Dates: 1810-2011 CE
Thousands of articles by scholars focused on the lives and events that have shaped African American and African history and culture, along with primary source documents, encyclopedias, and biographies.
Primary sources from a library in New York spanning American history. Particular strength in the papers of elite white men, but materials include the papers of others as well.
Dates: 1493-1945 CE
Documents published in America up to 1819, including books, pamphlets, broadsides, and ephemera, covering topics such as daily life, politics, religion, science, and more.
Dates: 1640-1819 CE
Full-text of 282 Black American newspapers.
Dates: 1827-1998 CE
Full text of more than 170 wide-ranging publications by and about African Americans, including academic journals, magazines, newsletters, reports, and other genres.
Dates: 1825-1997 CE
Full text of more than 1,000 historical U.S. newspapers. Contains Early American Newspapers, 1690-1922, and African American Newspapers, 1827-1998.
Dates: 1690-1998 CE
Full text of over 1,000 American magazines and journals from colonial times to the early 20th century, including special interest and general magazines, literary and professional journals, and children's and women's magazines.
Dates: 1740-1940 CE
Full-text historical news articles in major American and British newspapers, including the New York Times, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, Washington Post and more.
Dates: 1791-2003 CE
One way to find primary sources in books is to use the library catalog to search for your topic AND (documents OR sources)
EXAMPLES:
slave* AND (documents OR sources)
slave* AND massachusetts AND (documents OR sources)
You have access to many rare books and manuscripts through Wellesley's Special Collections, including materials related to the history of slavery and resistance. Go to the Library Catalog Advanced Search and choose Location: Special Collections to search for relevant material. See the Special Collections page for how to make an appointment to access materials in print. Some materials have been digitized and are available in the Digital Repository.
You can find some primary sources through SuperSearch, but don't stop there, or you'll miss a lot of materials that are accessible to you through the library and beyond. SuperSearch does not include materials from several of our historical newspaper databases and other primary source collections.
Try a search in SuperSearch, then use the filters under Refine Results to narrow your search. The Publication Date filter allows you to focus on sources created during a particular time period. You can also filter by Source Type, such as newspaper articles. If you're searching for images, use the filter Non-Print Resources.