Building Context Around a Work of Art: Worksheet 3 (Finding Additional Primary Sources)
Artist Name: _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Title and date of Artwork: _____________________________________________________________________________________________
The next stage of research is to begin to build a set of primary sources around your work of art with the goal of deepening or complicating the
meaning and significance of the artwork.
The first step is to go back to Worksheet 2 and ask yourself, which of these contexts seems most promising to develop further? A few
considerations may play into this decision:
the objectives of your lesson or unit
depth/richness of information that you have been able to develop in a given context
availability of primary sources
accessibility of primary sources to you
accessibility of primary sources to your students
It is usually best to choose two contexts to develop, with the goal of finding 1-2 sources per context.
The worksheet on the next page offers a place for you to work out which contexts seem best and to develop a rationale for your choice.
The next step is to consider what types of sources and/or collections might be likely candidates for further research. We have attached a list of
online source collections, organized by type of source or theme. If you are working on a political topic, you might begin first with newspapers or
political documents. If you are working on a thematic topic (like women’s history, or the history of African Americans), you might turn to that
section.
Though it is appropriate to pair artwork with other visual sources, it is also important to try to find at least one textual source—remember, these
need not be dense, but could be “accessible” text that you might excerpt from denser sources, or that appears in song lyrics, advertisements, or
newspapers.
Keep in mind, as you go, the parameters of your search need to honor the chronological findings that you developed in Worksheets 1 & 2.
Finally, once you have chosen a few primary sources, you may well want to read a bit more deeply about the issues that you are developing. At
that point, you can turn to traditional secondary sources—or scholarly articles and books. We will provide an overview of good strategies for
delving into those materials, as well as links to use to obtain some of that material.
Chosen Context
& Rationale
Likely Types of Sources
Sources (Tentative, with URL or other citation)
Chosen Context &
Rationale
Likely Types of Sources
Sources (Tentative, with URL or other citation)
Suggested Online Source Collections and Databases
I. Primary Source Collections
Finding primary sources is easier than ever thanks to digital archiving. What follows are selected collections of digitized primary sources—they
are grouped either by type of material or general collection focus. If they are marked “password protected,” you will need to use your AIC
password to access them from home, or use the ERC computers at the AIC. “Open access” materials are available for free from anywhere.
Newspapers
American Periodicals Series Online (1740-1900) (password protected)
Full text, searchable collection of more than 1,100 historically-significant periodicals published between 1740-1900.
Chronicling America: http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ (open access)
Full text, searchable collection of 1,770 digitized American newspapers dating from 1836-1922.
Chicago Tribune Archive (1849-1988) (password protected)
Full text, searchable archive of historical Tribune articles.
Harper’s Weekly (1857-1912) (password protected)
Full text, searchable archive of one of the most important periodicals in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—includes editorials,
cartoons, advertisements, pictures, and literature.
New York Times Archive (1851-2008) (password protected)
Full text, searchable archive of historical Times articles.
Vogue Historical Archive (password protected)
Full text, searchable archive of Vogue magazine issues, 1892-current.
Freedom’s Journal: First African American Newspaper: http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/libraryarchives/aanp/freedom/ (open access)
The Wisconsin Historical Society presents digitized copies of the first African-American owned and operated newspaper in the United
States.
The Friend of Man (Cornell): http://fom.library.cornell.edu/
Digitized version of this important anti-slavery newspaper, published from 1839-1842 in central New York.
Chicago Public Library Newspaper Databases: https://www.chipublib.org/resources-types/newspaper/ (library card restricted)
Available only to current library card holders, these databases include a nice range of local and national newspapers, including the Chicago
Defender Historical Archive.
The Stars and Stripes: World War I, 1918-1919: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/sgphtml/sashtml/sashome.html
This collection presents the complete seventy-one-week run of the World War I edition of the newspaper The Stars and Stripes, written by
American soldiers in France from February 8, 1918, to June 13, 1919.
General & Multi-Disciplinary
AMDOCS: Documents for the Study of American History: http://www.vlib.us/amdocs/ (open access)
Nearly 450 historical documents, organized by chronological period.
American Memory (Library of Congress): http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ (open access)
Includes a wide range of very rich material in digital form, including newspapers as part of the “Chronicling America” projects, and published
legislative records as part of “A Century of Lawmaking.”
Archive.Org: The Internet Archive: https://archive.org/
The Internet Archive is a 501(c)(3) non-profit that was founded to build an Internet library. Its purposes include offering permanent access for
researchers, historians, scholars, people with disabilities, and the general public to historical collections that exist in digital format.
Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History Primary Source Collections: https://www.gilderlehrman.org/collections
Free membership for K-12 teachers allows you access to fantastic array of U.S. primary sources from colonial through the twentieth century.
Note that there are a range of resources for teachers and students as well.
HathiTrust Digital Library: http://www.hathitrust.org/ (open access; expanded use with institutional subscription)
Truly remarkable digital library containing millions of books in the public domain. If you are looking for public published poetry, fiction or
nonfiction online, this is the place.
New York Public Library Digital Library Collection: http://www.nypl.org/digital/
Visual and text sources on such topics as the history of the performing arts and African Americans in the 19th century.
Digital History: Primary Source Documents: http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/documents/documents.cfm (open access)
A searchable data base of 600 primary sources dealing with political, diplomatic, and social history. From the Gilder Lehrmann Institute and
University of Houston.
Political and Government Documents
Avalon Project (Yale University): http://avalon.law.yale.edu/
Includes documents from ancient times to present day relevant to the study of law, history, economics, politics, diplomacy and government.
The New Deal Network (Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute): http://newdeal.feri.org/texts/default.cfm
Digital images, speeches, advertisements, letters, articles, and Roosevelt administration documents related to the history of the New Deal.
Political Americana (Cornell): http://cidc.library.cornell.edu/political/default.htm
Contains digital copies of thousands of items of American political campaign memorabilia, 1789-1960, such as ballots, broadsides, buttons,
cartoons, maps & charts, pamphlets, posters, prints, sheet music, songbooks, etc.
Rare Map Collection at the Hargrett Library (Univ. of Georgia): http://www.libs.uga.edu/darchive/hargrett/maps/maps.html (open access)
More than 800 historical maps.
Red Scare (1918-1921) (CUNY): http://newman.baruch.cuny.edu/digital/redscare/default.htm (open access) A database of images
(cartoons, photographs, and advertisements) from the period immediately after World War I.
Fold3.com: http://www.fold3.com/ (mostly open access)
A range of military, social, and political records from the National Archives, about one-third of them free without subscription.
Thematic
Alcohol, Temperance, and Abolition (Brown): http://library.brown.edu/cds/temperance/index.html (open access)
1500 documents related to the history of the temperance movement in the United States.
Contagion: Historical Views of Disease & Epidemics (Harvard): http://ocp.hul.harvard.edu/contagion/
Contains documents relevant to the study of disease epidemics, including the TB, the Spanish Flu outbreak of 1918-19, the smallpox
epidemic in colonial Boston, and the Philadelphia yellow fever outbreak of the early national period.
Digital Schomburg: Images of African Americans from the 19th Century: (New York Public Library)
http://digital.nypl.org/schomburg/images_aa19/
Engravings, photographs, reproductions of newspaper pages and postcards, and other visuals portraying African American life in the 1800s.
Disability History Museum: http://www.disabilitymuseum.org/dhm/lib/browse.html (open access)
Primary sources related to history of people with disabilities, their contributions and struggle for civil rights.
Home Economics Archive: Research, Tradition, & History (Cornell):http://hearth.library.cornell.edu
Full text digital collection of books about “home economics” and related issues, published between 1850-1925.
Immigration to the United States, 1789-1930 (Harvard): http://ocp.hul.harvard.edu/immigration/
Historical materials documenting voluntary immigration to the U. S. from 1793 through the 1930s, including books, pamphlets, serials,
manuscript and archival collections, and photographs.
Women Working, 1800-1930 (Harvard): http://ocp.hul.harvard.edu/ww/
Contains a wide range of published and unpublished material dealing with all aspects of women’s work life, including diaries, industrial
documents, photos, trade catalogs, and memoirs.
Regional & Local
A Century of Progress: 1933 -34 World’s Fair (University of Chicago): http://century.lib.uchicago.edu/
Include the majority of materials published for the World’s Fair.
Haymarket Digital Collection (Chicago History Museum): http://www.chicagohistory.org/hadc/index.html
Provides digital access to key documents related to the Haymarket Incident of 1886.
Illinois Digital Archives: http://www.idaillinois.org/cdm/
Contains a range of documents, newspapers, photographs, maps, etc. from the collections of the Illinois state library and other repositories
in Illinois
Behind the Veil: Documenting Jim Crow (oral history collections)
http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/behindtheveil/?page=1 (open access)
A selection of 410 recorded oral history interviews chronicling African-American life during the age of legal segregation in the American
South, from the 1890s to the 1950s.
Documenting the American South (UNC): http://docsouth.unc.edu/browse/collections.html (open access)
Includes a range of documents on the political, social, and economic history of the southern United States.
Western History Gallery: http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/ (open access)
Large collection of photographs on the American West from the Denver Public Library.
Pamphlets, Magazines, and Other Print Culture
American Broadsides and Ephemera from Duke University: http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/broadsides/?page=1 (open access)
Thousands of broadsides, pamphlets, form letters, posters, newspapers, tickets, and other printed items on a wide range of topics from
across the United States.
Emergence of Advertising in America:
http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/eaa/?page=1
Over 3,300 advertising items and publications dating from 1850 to 1920, illustrating the rise of consumer culture and the birth of a
professionalized advertising industry in the United States.
Historic American Sheet Music
http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/hasm/?page=1
Provides access to digital images for over 3,000 pieces from the collection, published in the United States between 1850 and 1920.
Making of America (Cornell): http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/moa/index.html
Making of America (University of Michigan): http://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/moagrp/
Two sites manage a single project, with each containing different sets of materials, most of which are full text, searchable periodical
literature from the nineteenth and early twentieth century, including Harper’s Monthly and Scientific American, among many others.
Photography and Other Visual and Material Culture
American Photography: A Century of Images: http://www.pbs.org/ktca/americanphotography/
Selected historic photographs and information and tools to help students analyze photos as primary sources.
All Sewn Up: Millinery, Dressmaking, Clothing, and Costume: http://uwdc.library.wisc.edu/collections/HumanEcol/MillineryBooks (open
access)
Includes millinery, dressmaking, clothing and costume books collections published in the first half of the 20th century (1907 – 1940’s).
Ryerson and Burnham Digital Collections (password protected)
Digital image and text collections from the archival holdings of the Art Institute, including finding aids.
William Gedney Photographs and Writings: http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/gedney/?page=1 (open access)
The 5,000 item collection documents Gedney's work from the 1950s to 1989. Subjects include photographs of cross country road trips; rural
New York; Manhattan; Brooklyn; rural Kentucky; Hippies in San Francisco; composers; gay rallies and demonstrations; St. Joseph's School
for the Deaf; India; England; Ireland; France; and, a large number of nocturnal pictures.
War
The Civil War in Art (Terra Foundation): www.civilwarinart.org
Features a range of Civil War-related artwork from Chicago institutions.
The Coming of the American Revolution: http://www.masshist.org/revolution/index.html (open access)
The Massachusetts Historical Society presents lessons, biographies, primary sources, and analysis on the events leading up to the
American Revolution.
The Crisis of the Union: Causes, Conduct and Consequences of the American Civil War (U Penn):
http://sceti.library.upenn.edu/sceti/abolitionism/
Digital collection of pamphlets, books, broadsides, cartoons, clippings, paintings, maps, and other print memorabilia about America during
the period 1830 to 1880. Items are drawn primarily from the collection of the Library Company of Philadelphia.
Decision to Drop the Atom Bomb (Truman Library):
http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/index.php (open access)
Numerous primary source documents on the decision, including pages from President Truman’s diary, plus lesson plans.
Dr. Suess Went to War: A Catalog of Political Cartoons (UC, San Diego): http://libraries.ucsd.edu/speccoll/dswenttowar/
More than 400 World War II-era political cartoons drawn by Dr. Seuss.
The Great War, 1914-1918 (Emory University): http://beck.library.emory.edu/greatwar/ (open access)
Features two unusual sources from World War I—poetry and postcards.
eHistory Primary Sources (Ohio State University): http://ehistory.osu.edu/osu/sources/ (open access)
Presents a variety of sources; particularly strong in the Civil War era.
Japanese American Relocation Digital Archives (UCLA): http://www.calisphere.universityofcalifornia.edu/jarda/
Documents related to Japanese internment during WWII, including personal and official photographs, letters and diaries, camp newsletter,
official documents, transcribed oral histories, and art.
The Valley of the Shadow: Two Communities in the Civil War (UVA): http://valley.vcdh.virginia.edu/
Contains virtually all extant documents from two communities—one in Virginia and one in Pennsylvania, before, during and after the
American Civil War, including personal letters and diaries, census records, newspapers, and government documents.
Vietnam Center and Archive (Texas Tech): http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/ (open access)
Veteran-founded repository (most digitized) containing millions of pages of material and tens of thousands of photographs, slides, maps,
periodicals, audio, moving images, and books related to the Vietnam War, Indochina, and the impact of the war on the United States and
Southeast Asia.
World War I Digital Collection (Gettysburg College): http://gettysburg.cdmhost.com/cdm/landingpage/collection/p16274coll5 (open access)
A digital collection of letters, postcards, and memorabilia from World War I.
World War II Poster Collection (Northwestern): http://www.library.northwestern.edu/govinfo/collections/wwii-posters/ (open access)
More than 300 posters issued by government agencies during the war years
World War II—Historic Government Documents: http://digitalcollections.smu.edu/all/cul/hgp/ (open access)
Includes material published by the U. S. Government Printing Office during the second World War, such as pamphlets, government reports,
instructions, speeches.
II. Secondary Source Journal Articles (password protected)
What follows are databases that contain citations and, in most cases, links to full text PDF’s of scholarly journal articles. Secondary source journal
articles are very rich but also tend to be very academic. They are best used as ways to enrich your own knowledge; most articles would be
accessible only to those high school students who are working at an advanced level.
America: History and Life
Provides bibliographic access to over 2,000 international, state and local history journals covering the history of the United States and
Canada from prehistory to the present. This is a “first choice” database if seeking articles on American history subjects, including some
literary and art historical materials.
JSTOR
Provides full-text access to the back issues of hundreds of scholarly journals in the humanities and social sciences. This is an excellent
resource, but is something to use with care—always limit your searches to likely categories of journals (to art history or history, for instance)
to make your searches more manageable.
Museum Studies
Periodical published by The Art Institute of Chicago, 1966-2009.
Project MUSE
Provides full-text access to the entire Project Muse historical journal archive in the humanities, arts, and social sciences. Very good choice
for full text articles and some books as well.