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Memoirs, Journals, and Letters
One category of primary sources are those written by individuals at the time, describing events during their lives. These include memoirs, journals, diaries, letters, and so on.
Most catalogs (such as our catalog and WorldCat) use standardized terms to describe these kinds of materials, making it easier for researchers to locate them.
Below are terms used and some example searches. To find your own: search the catalog using these terms with your topics. For example, civil war and personal narratives.
- Sample catalog search for "Correspondence""Correspondence" is used to describe compilations of letters.
- Sample catalog search for "Diaries"This is the term used for diaries and journals.
- Catalog search for "Sources" in the Subject Headings"Sources" is used for a wide array of primary source material.
- Sample catalog search for "Personal narratives"This is the term used for diaries and oral histories.
Newspaper, Magazine Articles, and Other Primary Source Collections
To find newspaper articles, think about the time frame you're researching, and perhaps the geographic location. For example: 1940s New York, or London during World War I. Larger newspapers are more likely to have indexes. For smaller papers, check libraries in the geographic area, as many will have local history resources.
Sometimes, you can just browse newspapers around particular dates or events. If you're searching for a topic in a newspaper, you'll need to use an appropriate newspaper index to find citations to relevant articles. Below are a few examples.
- African American Newspapers Series 1 and 2, 1827-1998 (America's Historical Newspapers) This link opens in a new window
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- What’s included? More than 350 U.S. newspapers covering a century and a half of the African American experience. Includes historically significant papers from more than 35 states and features many rare 19th-century titles.
- What dates are covered? 1827-1998
- American History, 1493-1945 (AM) This link opens in a new window
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- What’s included? Letters, diaries, maps, pamphlets, printed books, newspapers & ephemera on the political, economic and social history of the United States up until the 20th Century. Mostly manuscripts, but includes a wide range of document types. Primarily covers revolutionary, early national, antebellum and civil war eras.
- What dates are covered? 1493-1945
- Gale Primary Sources (Gale) This link opens in a new window
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- What’s included? Gale Primary Sources, an academic research environment, integrates primary source collections onto a single research platform that helps researchers search across a wide array of materials and points in time, and uncover new ways to analyze and contextualize information.
- ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Boston Globe (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
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- What’s included? Page image and full-text index to The Boston Globe. Additional year of content added annually.
- What dates are covered? 1872 - 2007.
- ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The New York Times with Index (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
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- What’s included? Page image and full-text index to The New York Times. Additional year of content added annually.
- What dates are covered? 1851 - 2018.
- Providence Journal (Newsbank) This link opens in a new window
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- What’s included? Articles from the Providence Journal. Searchable page images available for 1829 to present. Full text available from 1981 to present.
- What dates are covered? 1829 - Present.
- Readers’ Guide Retrospective: 1890-1982 (EBSCOhost) This link opens in a new window
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- What’s included? Access almost 100 years of cultural history with citations to over 3 million articles that appeared in 373 leading U.S. magazines.
- What dates are covered? 1890 - Present.
Online Archival Materials Related to Childhood and Youth
- Adoption History Project
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Curated by the University of Oregon, this is a collection of digitized primary sources related to adoption. - American Academy of Pediatrics Oral History Collection
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"Interviews with selected pediatricians and other leaders in the advancement of children's health care..." - Children's Lives at the Turn of the Twentieth Century
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Collection of images of childhood from the Library of Congress's collection of photographs and ephemera. - Children and Youth in History - Primary Sources
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An international collection of primary source materials presented by the Center for History and New Media and the University of Missouri-Kansas City. - Digital Collections from the Strong National Museum of Play
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Includes oral histories and archival materials related to childhood and play. - Girlhood Diaries from American History
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An extension of an exhibit at the Smithsonian, this is a collection of diaries and other materials related to girlhood in the United States. - Guide to the Victor Remer Historical Archives of the Children's Aid Society 1836-2006
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A finding aid to information about the work of the Children's Aid Society in New York, which facilitated foster care, adoption, and "orphan trains." Some items are digitized; others need to be consulted in person. - Society for Research in Child Development Oral History Project
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"Interviews of major figures in the fields of child development and child psychology..."
General Web Resources
- Digital Public Library of America (DPLA)
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The DPLA serves as a portal to the openly available, digitized contents of America’s libraries, archives, and museums. It indexes materials in all formats. - Library of Congress Digital Collections
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Multimedia collections of digitized documents, photographs, recorded sound, moving pictures and text from the Library of Congress. - Prelinger Archive
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Online archive "of over 60,000 'ephemeral' (advertising, educational, industrial, and amateur) films."
General Nearby Archives
This list presents a selection of archives in Rhode Island. Many public libraries or towns may also have archival collections related to local history. If you know of an archive in RI that you think should be added to the list please send us an e-mail.
- RIAMCO
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The Rhode Island Archival and Manuscript Consortium Online (RIAMCO) allows you to search for manuscript collections and primary source material on Rhode Island history from repositories around the State. From the home page enter a search query using keywords. Your search will allow you to view the finding aid for collections related to your topic. You can also browse the materials by institution or by major subject. - Rhode Island History Navigator (Rhode Island Historical Society)Includes citations to published writings about the history of Rhode Island, some with links to the full text of items in the public domain. Items not available in full text can be requested via Interlibrary Loan.
- RIHRAB Directory of Historical Records RepositoriesLengthy list of town historical and preservation societies, libraries, archives, and museums compiled by the RI Historical Records Advisory Board.
- American-French Geneological Society"More than 10,000 volumes of repertoires (marriage records), genealogies, biographies, and histories, as well as genealogical journals and publications of regional, national, and international scope."
- Brown University ArchivesThe Brown University Archives contain materials relating to the history of Brown University, including faculty, staff, and student publications and ephemeral materials.
- Brown University, Digital CollectionsOnline access to materials at Brown that have been digitized.
- Brown University, Pembroke Center ArchivesThe Pembroke Center Archives house materials relating to "the history of women at Pembroke College and Brown University and of women in Rhode Island."
- Johnson and Wales University, Culinary Archives and Museum"The museum's collection contains over 250,000 items, of which more than 60,000 are cookbooks. Recent acquisitions include a donation of several hundred ethnographic artifacts, a significant cookbook collection of over 7,000 volumes, several restaurant ephemera and menu collections, and an exceptional travel-related collection of printed matter from an industry insider."
- Neighborhood Snapshots (City of Providence)
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Provides demographic, economic, transportation, health, and historical information about the 25 neighborhoods in the city of Providence. - Providence City ArchivesLocated in City Hall, the City Archives provide a wealth of resources related to life in Providence, from laws and legislation to historical information about neighborhoods.
- Providence College Archives"Our collections consist of primary and secondary 20th century resources that have been acquired and preserved by the Library since the founding of the department in 1967."
- Providence Public Library Special Collections"The Providence Public Library Special Collections Department is comprised of several distinct collections of over 40,000 books, manuscripts, pamphlets, ephemera, newspapers, maps, broadsides, art, and artifacts, representing over four thousand years of human history and culture."
- Redwood Library and Athenaeum Special CollectionsThe oldest lending library in the country, the Redwood Library & Athenaeum still holds some of its original collection, as well has having additional special collections of art, furniture, sculpture, and more. "Manuscript collections at the Redwood Library and Athenaeum relate primarily to Newport and Rhode Island history from the colonial era through the twentieth century."
- Rhode Island Historical Society
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The RI Historical Society is a museum and library that provides both serious and casual researchers with access to information on structures, objects, paintings, graphics, manuscripts, and printed matter. - Rhode Island School of Design Archives"RISD’s Archives collects, preserves and provides access to records and artifacts, including photographs and publications that document the history and development of RISD programs, policies and procedures and contributions of individuals and organizations associated with the School and Museum. Records in the Archives date from RISD’s founding in 1877 to the present."
- Rhode Island State ArchivesThe Rhode Island State Archives "preserves and makes available for research Rhode Island's historical public records, which date from 1638 to the present. Our reception area also features exhibits that are free and open to the public." (From their about page.)
- Salve Regina University Archives and Special CollectionsIn addition to materials related to the University, Salve Regina's Special Collections also include "faculty publications, material related to Newport and our gilded age mansions, and books related to the Religious Sisters of Mercy, our founding order."
- University of Rhode Island University Archives and Special CollectionsCollections in URI's University Archives and Special Collections include materials about the University as well as specialized political papers, oral histories, and much more.