History

Primary sources are accounts produced by a participant, observer, or institution, at the time, or shortly after an event or time period.  They can be published or unpublished. Common sources are:

• diaries

• letters

• memoirs

• interviews

Other sources may include:

• censuses

• magazines and newspapers of the time

• criminal investigations and trials

• government documents, reports, and other institutional records

• creative works that shaped or were shaped by historical events

• etymologies of words and place names

• maps

• illustrations and photographs

• motion pictures and recordings

• artifacts

To search for books and eBooks that include primary sources, try searching the library catalog with keywords such as:

"autobiographies," "correspondence," "diaries," "documents," "interviews," "letters," "personal narratives," "pictorial works," "speeches," "sources," or "manuscripts"

(pacific northwest OR washington state) AND (diaries OR letters OR personal narratives) 

will retrieve books like, Dividing the Reservation : Alice C. Fletcher's Nez Perce Allotment Diaries and Letters 1889-1892

Many reference works containing primary sources are also in the reference collection on the main floor of Haselwood Library! 

The following databases include primary sources. JSTOR (you can limit to images) is highly recommended! Enter your student email address and password to access off campus.