Research Guides: Finding Primary Sources for History Research: Finding Archival Resources

Use Databases to Find Archival Resources

WorldCat Books and other materials in libraries worldwide. Records of any type of material cataloged by OCLC member libraries. Includes manuscripts written as early as the 12th century. Updated daily.

Online Archive of California Provides free public access to detailed descriptions of primary resource collections maintained by more than 200 contributing institutions including libraries, special collections, archives, historical societies, and museums throughout California
Digital State Archives
State-by-state listing of archival repositories. Not exhaustive, but a good place to start looking for U.S. archival collections.
CSU Japanese American Digitization Project
The central purpose of the California State University Japanese American History Digitization Project is to improve access to CSU archival collections about the history of Japanese Americans and to develop a functional model for ongoing planning and collaboration among the CSU archival and library community.
UK National Archives Discovery
More than 32 million descriptions of records held by The UK National Archives and more than 2,500 archives across the UK. Over 9 million records are available for download.

Daily Forty-Niner Archives Includes historical issues of Daily Forty-Niner (1949 - ), Forty-Niter (1958 - 1966), DIG MAG (2014 - ), DÍG EN ESPAÑOL (2019 - ), The Scooper, UniverCity (1973 - 1979), The University Magazine (1973 - 2003), as well as yearbooks. This archive does not include stories that were or are published online-only.
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Repositories of Primary Sources
A listing of over 5000 websites describing holdings of manuscripts, archives, rare books, historical photographs, and other primary sources for the research scholar. The site has not been updated since 2015, so links may be out of date. However, the list itself has value, and researchers may Google the names of the repositories therein, or contact the archivist for help finding them.

Gale Primary Sources - Archives Unbound Primary Source documents that support research in African American Studies, American Studies, Asian American Studies, Latin American and Caribbean Studies, and Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies. The collection also has primary source documents focused on Business and Economic History and International Relations.
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Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Nichols Newspaper Collection The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Nichols Newspapers Collection features the newspapers, periodicals, pamphlets, and broadsheets that form the Nichols newspaper collection held at the Bodleian library in Oxford, UK, covering the period 1672-1737.
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Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection represents the largest single collection of seventeenth and eighteenth century English news media available from the British Library and includes more than 1,000 pamphlets, proclamations, newsbooks and newspapers from the period.
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Indigenous Newspapers in North America Nearly 200 years of Indigenous print journalism from the US and Canada.
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Women's Magazine Archive‎ Collection 1 & 2 (1846 - 2005) Access to the backfiles of the foremost titles of this type, including Good Housekeeping, Ladies’ Home Journal, and Woman’s Day, which serve as canonical records of evolving assumptions about gender roles and cultural mores.
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Women's Wear Daily Archive Women's Wear Daily magazine on fashion, marketing, retail business, and twentieth-century material culture. Holdings from 1910 to most recent six months.
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American Antiquarian Society (AAS) Historical Periodicals Collection (1684-1912) Provides full text journal and magazine content, with illustrations, documenting the life of America from colonial times up to the early 20th century.
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America's Historical Newspapers, 1690-1876 This offers fully searchable, facsimile reproductions of 650 historical American newspapers. Northern & “Old Northwest” newspapers are covered up until 1876. Southern newspaper coverage stops by the 1820s.
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Historical Chinese Newspapers Full text historical content of 12 English language Chinese newspapers published 1831-1952 in China.
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Vogue Archive‎ The Vogue Archive presents the full run of the American Vogue, 1892 to present, for the library market. Every page, cover, advertisement, image, and fold out is indexed, searchable, and viewable in beautiful high-resolution color.
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Eighteenth Century Journals Features rare journals from 1685-1835, shedding light on 18th-century social, political, and literary life. Covers topics from colonial and rural affairs to the French and American revolutions, European literature, fashion reviews, and London coffee house discussions.
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LGBT Magazine Archive Complete issues of 27 key titles, chronicling the history and evolution of LGBT history and culture, including civil rights, health, lifestyle, politics, art and more from local, national and international writers, editors, thinkers, organizers and activists. From 1950s to 2015.
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Historical Hartford Courant, 1764 - 1992 America's longest continuously published newspaper, the Hartford Courant is literally older than the nation. It provides researchers a front-row seat from which to view the birth of an independent nation. Firsthand accounts of colonist reactions to the Stamp Act, Boston Tea Party and a copy of the Declaration of Independence. Coverage of 1764-1990, including news articles, photos, advertisements, classified ads, obituaries, cartoons, and more.
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Index of Medieval Art Images and descriptive data related to the iconography of works of art produced between late Antiquity and the sixteenth century.
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AATA Online: Abstracts of International Conservation Literature AATA Online is a comprehensive database of over 130,000 abstracts of literature related to the preservation and conservation of material cultural heritage. AATA now includes selected subject-specific bibliographies produced as part of the Getty Conservation Institute's own conservation and scientific research projects or as part of specific collaborative projects in which the Institute is involved.
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Acta Sanctorum Acta Sanctorum is a principal source for research into the societies and cultures of early Christian and medieval Europe. This collection includes text published over a period of 300 years by the Societe des Bollandistes.
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Index of Medieval Art Images and descriptive data related to the iconography of works of art produced between late Antiquity and the sixteenth century.
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California Digital Newspaper Collection This collection contains 492,311 issues comprising 5,430,664 pages and 37,145,576 articles. The California Digital Newspaper Collection is a project of the Center for Bibliographical Studies and Research (CBSR) at the University of California, Riverside.
California Newspaper Archive Full text facsimile content of California newspapers from 1846 to date. Includes Long Beach newspapers, 1938-1977, Orange County Register 1913-2016 and many other regional California newspapers.
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Daily Forty-Niner Archives Includes historical issues of Daily Forty-Niner (1949 - ), Forty-Niter (1958 - 1966), DIG MAG (2014 - ), DÍG EN ESPAÑOL (2019 - ), The Scooper, UniverCity (1973 - 1979), The University Magazine (1973 - 2003), as well as yearbooks. This archive does not include stories that were or are published online-only.
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Legislative and Executive Historical Publications U.S. Government publications U.S. Bills & Laws (1789-2013); House and Senate Hearings & Reports (1817-2018) and Miscellaneous documents (1789-2003); Maps (1789-2007); CRS-Congressional Research Service Reports (1916-2003); Executive Orders & Proclamations (1789-2017). 
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Political Extremism and Radicalism in the 20th Century Collection of primary documents covering a range of fringe political movements and a broad assortment of both far-right and radical left political groups. Cover 1900s to 2010 when the world saw the formation of several movements. Some collections included are Hall-Hoag Collection of Dissenting and Extremist Printed Propaganda; John Birch Society; Black Panthers; Norwegian Nazi Party; American Radicalism Collection; Searchlight Archive; and more.
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Black Abolitionist Papers Primary source of individual and community activism within the Black abolitionist community. Covering the period 1830-1865, the collection presents the massive, international impact of African American activism against slavery, in the writings and publications of the activists themselves.
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JSTOR Archive of scholarly journals cover to cover. Interdisciplinary coverage of journals back to the first issue through to the last few years. Also includes over 2 million images originally from Artstor.
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Academic Search Complete Comprehensive scholarly, multi-disciplinary full text database with more than 5,300 full text periodicals, including 4,400 peer-reviewed journals. Offers indexing and abstracts for more than 9,300 journals and a total of 10,900 publications including monographs, reports, conference proceedings, etc.
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Biography and Genealogy Master Index Comprehensive index of over 13 million biographical sketches from current and retrospective reference books, featuring contemporary and historical figures globally. Complete source list available under 'Sources Indexed' on each screen. Updated biannually.
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Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO), 1700-1800 Access over 180,000 full-text 18th-century titles in various topics, including books, music, and pamphlets. Covers significant English and foreign-language works printed in the UK and thousands from the Americas.
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Early European Books Offers digital access to pre-1701 European books and incunabula in high-resolution color. Includes materials from major libraries like Det Kongelige Bibliotek, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Welcome Library London and more.
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EEBO Early English Books Online, 1473 -1700 A full text collection of over 100,000 facsimile e-books. Provides full text access to books in many subject areas, including: English literature, history, philosophy, linguistics, theology, music, fine arts, education, mathematics, and science.
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Nineteenth Century Collections Online: Women and Transnational Networks
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African Diaspora: 1860-Present Discover the world history, culture, and migration of people of African descent with a focus on communities in the Caribbean, Brazil, India, United Kingdom, and France. Includes primary source documents, personal papers, journals, newsletters, and court documents.
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Colonial America: 1606-1822 Full text primary documents covering the period 1606-1822 from the British Colonial Office relating to North America, including the American Revolution.
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Slavery & Antislavery: A Transnational Archive This 4-part archive includes 5.4 million pages of history, including collections on the transatlantic slave trade, the global movement for the abolition of slavery, the legal, personal, and economic aspects of the slavery system, and the dynamics of emancipation in the U.S. as well as in Latin America, the Caribbean, and other regions.
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USC Shoah Foundation: Visual History Archive Dedicated to making the audio-visual interviews of survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust and other genocides, the USC Shoah Foundation: The Institute for Visual History and Education provides a compelling voice for education, research, and action.
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Before using the Archive, a one-time registration is required for all users. If new to the Visual History Archive, register through here.

Finding Primary Sources

Some research requires digging in to archival collections, but there are times when general library resources can satisfy your need for primary sources:

http://csulb.libguides.com/primaryhist

Finding Primary Sources for History Research: Finding Archival Resources

Use Databases to Find Archival Resources

Before using the Archive, a one-time registration is required for all users. If new to the Visual History Archive, register through here.

Finding Primary Sources