HIST 7908: Introduction to Historical Research-Fall 2025: Primary Resources

A guide to helpful resources for HIST 7908 based on provided research interests

Primary Source Databases at LSU Libraries

History Commons
History Commons assembles diverse primary source materials reflecting broad views across American history and culture into comprehensive databases.
History Vault
For the first time ever, ProQuest is introducing primary source materials from its University Publications of America (UPA) Collection in a digital format. ProQuest History Vault unlocks the wealth of archival materials with a single search. Researchers can access letters, papers, photographs, scrapbooks, financial records, diaries, and much more from a single interface.
Gale Primary Sources
Digital curated historical artifacts from over 500 years of world history, curated by Gale and partnering libraries from around the world.
JSTOR
JSTOR is a not-for-profit organization and a shared digital library archive of critical scholarly journal literature. Louisiana State University currently participates in the following JSTOR Collection(s): Arts & Sciences Collections I-XV, Ireland Archive Collection, Life Sciences Collection, University of California Press Collection, University of Chicago Press Collection, Business IV Collection, Lives of Literature Collection, and the Sustainability Collection.

TAM 4071 & TAM 4072: History of Dress and Adornment
by Larissa Elliott Last Updated Sep 22, 2025 214 views this year

Caribbean Literature
Starting with the literature produced in Spanish and French colonies in the 1800s, the collection offers an extensive selection of 19th- and 20th-century works from every Caribbean country. As the database grows, we will supplement the novels, short stories, and poems of these artists with author interviews and reference works, including dictionaries of various Creole languages.
European Views of the Americas: 1493 to 1750
A bibliographic database of more than 32,000 entries, providing a comprehensive guide to printed records about the Americas written in Europe before 1750, this database is the result of a cooperation between EBSCO Publishing and the John Carter Brown Library. The database is created from "European Americana: A Chronological Guide to Works Printed In Europe Relating to The Americas, 1493-1750," and is available to LSU free from EBSCO.
Hispanic Life in America Series 1: 1704 – 1942
Hispanic Life in America is the single most comprehensive digital archive of primary source documents related to Hispanic American life. Combining deep historical content with current sources, Hispanic Life in America is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in examining the full spectrum of American history and culture.

Early English Books Online
Early English Books Online (EEBO) contains digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700 - from the first book printed in English by William Caxton, through the age of Spenser and Shakespeare and the tumult of the English Civil War.
Index of Medieval Art
A thematic and iconographic index of early Christian and Medieval art objects. Besides iconographic descriptions of works of art, the database includes bibliographic records, and information such as style, school, location, and more.
Medieval and Early Modern Sources Online (MEMSO)
Medieval and Early Modern Sources Online (MEMSO) provides a large and growing resource of essential medieval and early modern Britain and Ireland sources online.
Medieval Family Life
The Paston, Cely, Plumpton, Stonor and Armburgh Papers

This resource contains full colour images of the original medieval manuscripts that comprise these family letter collections along with full text searchable transcripts from the printed editions, where they are available. The original images and the transcriptions can be viewed side by side.
Middle Ages Online
It is hosted by LSU and represented on the English Department website. It is a unique source for anyone (at any level) interested in the study of civilization from the ancient world through the Reformation.
State Papers Online I, 1509-1603 Tudor Domestic
Part I delivers the complete series of State Papers Domestic for the Tudor era, encompassing every facet of early modern government, including social and economic affairs, law and order, religious policy, crown possessions, and intelligence. The collection is of immense value to researchers of religious history, chronicling social unrest in England as it pitched back and forth between the religious positions of its rulers: from the boy-king Edward VI's promotion of the Reformation, to Mary I's bloody reassertion of Catholicism and Elizabeth's loyalty to Protestantism and enduring suspicion of Catholic plots.
State Papers Online II, 1509-1603 Tudor Foreign
Part II: The Tudors: Henry VIII to Elizabeth I, 1509-1603: State Papers Foreign: Ireland, Scotland, Borders and Registers of the Privy Council completes the State Papers of the Tudor period by reuniting the Foreign, Scotland, Borders, and Ireland papers for the sixteenth century together with the Registers (Minutes) of the Privy Council for the whole of the Tudor period. Part II opens up a window on the Tudor world beyond the borders of England, documenting Tudor England's relations with other states both near and distant, including those it sought to control (Scotland, Ireland, and Wales), those it fought wars or maintained peace with in Europe (the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, and France), and those it traded with (the Ottoman Empire, the Barbary Coast, and Russia).

Newspapers.com
View Louisiana newspapers for free through a partnership between Louisiana State University Libraries and Newspapers.com.
Digital Sanborn Maps of Louisiana
Sanborn maps are large-scale plans of a city or town, drawn at a scale of 50 feet to an inch. They were created to assist fire insurance companies as they assessed the risk associated with insuring a particular property. The maps list street blocks and building numbers including numbers in use at the time the map was made including previous numbers.

Center for Louisiana Studies-ULL

Louisiana Digital Library
The Louisiana Digital Library (LDL) is an online library of Louisiana institutions that provides over 144,000 digital materials. Its purpose is to make unique historical treasures from the Louisiana institution's archives, libraries, museums, and other repositories in the state electronically accessible to Louisiana residents and to students, researchers, and the general public in other states and countries. The Louisiana Digital Library contains photographs, maps, manuscript materials, books, oral histories, and more that document history and culture.
Free People of Color in Louisiana: Revealing an Unknown Past
A collaborative digital project funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities that brings together and provides access to more than 30,000 pages of family and personal papers, business records, and public documents from the Louisiana State University Libraries' Special Collections, the Louisiana State Museum Historical Center, the Historic New Orleans Collection, Tulane University's Louisiana Research Collection, and New Orleans Public Library.

America's HIstorical Imprints
America's Historical Imprints contains 3 full-text and fully searchable collections: Afro-Americana Imprints, 1535-1922; Early American Imprints, Series 1-Evans; and Early American Imprints, Series 2-Shaw-Showmaker.
America's Historical Newspapers
As the first draft of history, newspapers document the life and times of a community,a region and a nation. For searching and browsing American newspapers published in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, Americas Historical Newspapers is the single most comprehensive online resource, providing more than 1,300 titles from all 50 states.
African American Newspapers, 1827-1998
African American Newspapers, 1827-1998, provides online access to approximately 270 U.S. newspapers chronicling a century and a half of the African American experience. This unique collection, which includes papers from more than 35 states, features many rare and historically significant 19th-century titles.
American Civil War: Letters and Diaries
Find detailed, firsthand descriptions of historical characters and events, glimpses of daily life in the army, anecdotes about key events and personages, accounts of sufferings at home, a rich battles database, and more. These and thousands of other experiences are represented in this massive, 100,000-page collection.
American Historical Periodicals from the American Antiquarian Society (Parts 1- 6)
*Part 6 is now accessible.*

Rich collections of periodicals detail American history and culture from the
late-17th century through the late-19th century meeting the research
needs of scholars and faculty in specific academic departments. See the More Info section below for a complete list of collections offered in this database. Collections can be searched individually or all at one time. The URL linking out from this database record searches all collections.

• Advertising Periodicals, 1815-1888
• Agricultural Periodicals from the Northeastern U.S., 1789-1879
• Agricultural Periodicals from the Southern, Midwestern, and Western U.S., 1800-1878
• Alternative Faith and Philosophy Periodicals, 1789-1878
• Alternative Medicine and Health Periodicals, 1810-1877
• American Civil War Periodicals, 1855-1868
• American Literary Periodicals, 1782-1834
• American Literary Periodicals, 1835-1858
• American Literary Periodicals, 1859-1891
• American Medicine, Surgery, Dentistry Periodicals, 1786-1877
• American Political and Social Movements, 1815-1884
• American Political Periodicals, 1715-1891
• Baptists, Quakers, and Independent Church Periodicals, 1797-1881
• Business and General Education Periodicals, 1800-1885
• Business, Industrial and Professional Periodicals, 1774-1858
• Business, Industrial and Professional Periodicals, 1859-1870
• Business, Industrial and Professional Periodicals, 1871-1901
• Canadian Periodicals, 1790-1877
• Catholic, Lutheran, Methodist, and Episcopal Periodicals 1797-1904
• College and Student Periodicals, 1806-1877
• Commercial Periodicals from the Southern U.S., 1811-1877
• Congregational, Presbyterian, and Reformed Church Periodicals, 1803-1902
• Cultural Periodicals from the Southern U.S., 1797-1877
• Current Events and History Periodicals, 1691-1912
• Drama, Humor, and Fine Arts Periodicals, 1764-1877
• Emerging American Religions, 1821-1895
• Fireside Companions and Family Literature Periodicals, 1805-1877
• Foreign Language Periodicals in America, 1684-1904
• General Interest Christian Periodicals, 1743-1889
• Hobbies, Socialization, and Sport Periodicals, 1775-1889
• Literary Periodicals of New England, 1789-1878
• Masons, Odd-Fellows and Other Societal Periodicals, 1794-1877
• Military and Law Enforcement Periodicals, 1691-1877
• Missionary and Charity Periodicals, 1793-1902
• Musical Periodicals, 1781-1879.
• Periodicals from Around the World, 1691-1880
• Periodicals of the American West, 1779-1881
• Periodicals of the British Empire and Its Colonies, 1702-1879
• Popular Educational Periodicals, 1758-1889
• Religious Periodicals for Women, Children, and Families, 1804-1878
• Religious Periodicals from the Southern U.S., 1801-1904
• Scientific Periodicals, 1771-1901
• Slavery and Abolition, 1789-1887
• Story Papers, Dimes and Dollar Periodicals, 1828-1877
• Sunday School Periodicals, 1818-1885
• Temperance Periodicals in America, 1826-1877
• Theology and Biblical Studies Periodicals, 1760-1877
• Women’s Periodicals of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century, 1733-1844
• Women’s Periodicals of the Nineteenth Century, 1845-1865
• Women’s Periodicals of the Nineteenth Century, 1866-1891
American History
This unique collection documents American History from the earliest settlers to the mid-twentieth century. It is sourced from the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the finest archives available for the study of American History.
American Periodicals Series Online
American Periodicals Series Online (APS Online) includes digitized images of the pages of American magazines and journals published from colonial days to the dawn of the 20th century. Titles range from Benjamin Franklin's General Magazine and America's first scientific journal, Medical Repository; popular magazines such as Vanity Fair and Ladies' Home Journal; regional and niche publications; and groundbreaking journals like The Dial, Puck, and McClure's.
Archive of Americana
The acclaimed Archive of Americana enables students and scholars to explore virtually every aspect of United States history, culture and daily life across three centuries. Providing unprecedented online access to newspapers, books, broadsides, ephemera, government publications and more, the Archive of Americana puts tens of millions of pages of primary documents at researchers' fingertips.
Black Life in America
Comprehensive coverage of the African American experience from the early 18th century to the present day. Sourced from more than 19,000 American and global news sources, including over 400 current and historical Black publications. An easy-to-use online resource—updated daily—for every institution working toward social justice and racial equity.
Illustrated Civil War Newspapers and Magazines
llustrated Civil War Newspapers and Magazines: Important and Rare Periodicals from Confederate, Union, Abolitionist, and British Presses is the definitive online Civil War media resource. The database contains 65,000 pages drawn from 49 periodicals, including 15 campaign newspapers, most of them illustrated3,720 issues published from 1860 to 1865.
Images of the American Civil War: Photographs, Posters, and Ephemera
Images of the American Civil War: Photographs, Posters, and Ephemera provides a vivid visual history of a nation in crisis. Thousands of dramatic images from the fields of battle, politics, and general society allow students and researchers to experience the events, both monumental and mundane, of the war that tested and defined the core meaning of America.
North American Women's Letters & Diaries
North American Women's Letters & Diaries is a collection includes approximately 150,000 pages of letters and diaries from Colonial times to 1950, including 7,000 pages of previously unpublished manuscripts.
Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture & Law
This HeinOnline collection brings together a multitude of essential legal materials on slavery in the United States and the English-speaking world. This includes every statute passed by every colony and state on slavery, every federal statute dealing with slavery, and all reported state and federal cases on slavery. Our cases go into the 20th century, because long after slavery was ended, there were still court cases based on issues emanating from slavery. To give one example, as late as 1901 Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court had to decide if a man, both of whose parents had been slaves, could be the legitimate heir of his father, because under southern law, slaves could never be legally married. The library has hundreds of pamphlets and books written about slaverydefending it, attacking it or simply analyzing it. We have gathered every English-language legal commentary on slavery published before 1920, which includes many essays and articles in obscure, hard-to-find journals in the United States and elsewhere. We have provided more than a thousand pamphlets and books on slavery from the 19th century. We provide word searchable access to all Congressional debates from the Continental Congress to 1880. We have also included many modern histories of slavery. Within this library is a section containing all modern law review articles on the subject. This library will continue to grow, not only from new scholarship but also from historical material that we continue to locate and add to the collection.
ATLA Religion Database
This database combines the premier indexing from ATLA Religion Database with access to ATLA's online full-text collection of major religion and theology journals.

Defining Gender
Defining Gender provides access to a vast body of original British source material that will enrich the teaching and research experience of those studying history, literature, sociology and education from a gendered perspective.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Collection
A collection that enhances the representation of diverse cultures and viewpoints in library collections including Black Americans, LGBTQIA+, religious minorities, Indigenous peoples, Asian Americans, women, and more.
Everyday Life and Women in America, c1800-1920
Everyday Life & Women in America c.1800-1920 showcases unique primary source material for the study of American social, cultural, and popular history in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
North American Women's Drama
North American Women's Drama contains 1,517 plays by 330 playwrights, together with detailed, fielded information on related productions, theaters, production companies, and more. More than 30% of the plays in the collection have never been published before. The database also includes selected playbills, production photographs and other ephemera related to the plays.
North American Women's Letters & Diaries
North American Women's Letters & Diaries is a collection includes approximately 150,000 pages of letters and diaries from Colonial times to 1950, including 7,000 pages of previously unpublished manuscripts.
Perdita Manuscripts
This resource is produced in association with the Perdita Project based at the University of Warwick and Nottingham Trent University. “Perdita” means “lost woman” and the quest of the Perdita Project has been to find early modern women authors who were “lost” because their writing exists only in manuscript form. Thanks to the endeavours of the Perdita Project the valuable work of these “lost” women is being rediscovered.
Women and Social Movements 1600-2000
Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600-2000 is a resource for students and scholars of U.S. history and U.S. women's history. Organized around the history of women in social movements in the U.S. between 1600 and 2000, the collection seeks to advance scholarly debates and understanding at the same time that it makes the insights of women's history accessible to teachers and students at universities, colleges, and high schools.
Women in The National Archives
This collection consists of two distinct elements:

• A finding aid to women's studies resources in The National Archives
• Original documents on the suffrage question in Britain, the Empire and colonial territories
Women's Studies Archive
Women’s Studies Archive connects archival collections concerning women’s history from across the globe and from a wide range of sources. Focusing on the evolution of feminism throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the archive provides materials on women’s political activism, such as suffrage, birth control, pacifism, civil rights, and socialism, and on women’s voices, from female-authored literature to women’s periodicals. By providing the opportunity to witness female perspectives, Gale’s Women’s Studies Archive is an essential source for researchers working in Women’s History, Gender Studies and Social History.

Access to 2 sections: Issues and Identities & Voice and Vision

The Listener Historical Archive 1929-1991
The Listener was a weekly magazine established by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) in 1929 under its director-general, Lord Reith. It was developed as the medium for reproducing broadcast talks, initially on radio, but in later years television as well, and was the intellectual counterpart to the BBC listings magazine Radio Times. The Listener is one of the few means of accessing the content of many early broadcasts. In addition to commenting on the intellectual broadcasts of the week, The Listener also previewed major literary and musical shows and regularly reviewed new books.
Vanderbilt Television News Archive
The mission of the Vanderbilt Television News Archive focuses on creating, preserving and providing access to the news broadcasts from the U.S. national television networks. We create recordings of news broadcasts from the U.S. national television networks, preserve the content for future generations, and provide the widest access possible within the copyright limitations.
Archive of Americana
The acclaimed Archive of Americana enables students and scholars to explore virtually every aspect of United States history, culture and daily life across three centuries. Providing unprecedented online access to newspapers, books, broadsides, ephemera, government publications and more, the Archive of Americana puts tens of millions of pages of primary documents at researchers' fingertips.
Popular Culture in Britain and America
Popular Culture explores the dynamic period of social, political and cultural change between 1950 and 1975. The resource offers thousands of colour images of manuscript and rare printed material as well as photographs, ephemera and memorabilia from this exciting period in our recent history.

Archive of Americana
The acclaimed Archive of Americana enables students and scholars to explore virtually every aspect of United States history, culture and daily life across three centuries. Providing unprecedented online access to newspapers, books, broadsides, ephemera, government publications and more, the Archive of Americana puts tens of millions of pages of primary documents at researchers' fingertips.
Archives of Sexuality & Gender
The Archives of Sexuality and Gender program provides a robust and significant collection of primary sources for the historical study of sex, sexuality, and gender. With material dating back to the sixteenth century, researchers and scholars can examine how sexual norms have changed over time, health and hygiene, the development of sex education, the rise of sexology, changing gender roles, social movements and activism, erotica, and many other interesting topical areas. This growing archival program offers rich research opportunities across a wide span of human history.

The Archives of Sexuality and Gender program consists of four archives:
LGBTQ History and Culture Since 1940, Part I
LGBTQ History and Culture Since 1940, Part II
Sex and Sexuality, Sixteenth to Twentieth Century
International Perspectives on LGBTQ Activism and Culture
Defining Gender
Defining Gender provides access to a vast body of original British source material that will enrich the teaching and research experience of those studying history, literature, sociology and education from a gendered perspective.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Collection
A collection that enhances the representation of diverse cultures and viewpoints in library collections including Black Americans, LGBTQIA+, religious minorities, Indigenous peoples, Asian Americans, women, and more.
LGBT Life with Full Text
LGBT Life with Full Text contains all of the content available in LGBT Life as well as full text for more than 120 of the most important and historically significant LGBT journals, magazines and regional newspapers, as well as more than 150 full-text monographs/books.
LGBT Studies in Video
LGBT Studies in Video is a cinematic survey of the lives of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people as well as the cultural and political evolution of the LGBT community. The collection features award-winning documentaries, interviews, archival footage, and select feature films exploring LGBT history, gay culture and subcultures, civil rights, marriage equality, LGBT families, AIDS, transgender issues, religious perspectives on homosexuality, global comparative experiences, and other topics.

Congressional Publications
Description: Provides access to Committee Prints & Miscellaneous Publications, Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports, and Congressional Hearings (1824-2003)
Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Daily Reports
The Foreign Broadcast Information Service is a federal agency that monitors and translates foreign media into English. FBIS Daily Reports are translated transcripts of foreign radio and television broadcasts, news agency transmissions, newspapers, periodicals, and government statements. The reports contain political, military, economic, environmental, and sociological news and information.
Foreign Office Files for the Middle East
This collection is an essential resource for understanding the events in the Middle East during the 1970s.
It addresses the policies, economies, political relationships and significant events of every major Middle East power. Conflicts such as the Arab-Israeli War, the Lebanese Civil War and the Iranian Revolution are examined in detail, as are the military interventions and peace negotiations carried out by regional and foreign powers like the United States and Russia.
Military & Government Collection
Designed to offer current news pertaining to all branches of the military, this database offers a thorough collection of periodicals, academic journals and other content pertinent to the increasing needs of those sites. The Military & Government Collection provides cover-to-cover full text for nearly 300 journals and periodicals. The database also includes full text for 245 pamphlets and offers indexing and abstracts for nearly 400 titles.