Research Guides: AMST 150A: The History of Childhood and Youth in America: Digital Collections of Primary Sources

Search Tips

If you are using a database with an Advanced Search form, try using the Advanced Search features to refine your search.

Since these databases cover many decades, it can be helpful to limit your search to a specific date range.

Think about what terms that might have been used to describe your topic during the time period. For example: the name of a specific person or organization or even a term that wouldn't be used today.

These databases often sort results in chronological order. In some cases, it might be helpful to sort by relevance/best matches first.

In addition to searching, try browsing these collections to learn about sources that you wouldn't have necessarily thought of searching for.

Digital Collections

Public Health Archives: Public Health in Modern America, 1890-1970 This link opens in a new window
Documents the rise of the twentieth-century public health system in the United States through correspondence, reports, pamphlets, ephemera, and more.
Nexis Uni (formerly LexisNexis Academic) This link opens in a new window
Provides full-text news, business, industry and legal information from major newspapers and magazines.
HistoryMakers Digital Archive This link opens in a new window
An African American video oral history archive. Provides access to oral history interviews with historically significant African Americans.

Digital Public Library of America
Digitized materials from libraries, archives and museums around the country. Includes historical advertisements. To limit to video, check the box for "moving image" from the menu on the left side of your search results.

Archives of Sexuality and Gender This link opens in a new window
Digitized primary sources for the historical study of sex, sexuality, and gender. Find a wide range of materials, such as: oral histories from the African Women's Life History Project; declassified FBI files detailing surveillance of gays and lesbians in the U.S. from 1950 to 1982; and erotica from the "Private Case" of the British Museum Library.
Our access includes: LGBTQ History and Culture Since 1940, Parts I and II; Sex and Sexuality, Sixteenth to Twentieth Century; International Perspectives on LGBTQ Activism and Culture; and Community and Identity in North America.
Women's Studies Archive This link opens in a new window
Provides a history of the social, political, and professional aspects of women's lives and offers a look at the roles, experiences, and achievements of women in society. Includes documents such as diaries, letters, photographs, news clippings, organizational records, and journals, covering the nineteeth and twentieth centuries.
Sixties: Primary Documents and Personal Narratives, 1960-1974 This link opens in a new window
Includes diaries, letters, autobiographies and other memoirs, written and oral histories, manifestos, government documents, memorabilia, newspapers, press, underground press, alternative publications, and scholarly commentary. This collection includes materials digitized from collections in Brandeis University Archives & Special Collections, including materials on student activism and radical politics.
Women and Social Movements in the United States (1600-2000) This link opens in a new window
A collection of document projects--comprised of essays with supporting documents, images, and web links--focused on the history of women in social movements in the U.S. between 1600 and 2000

ProQuest History Vault
Digitized archival collections on a variety of topics. For this class, students might be particularly interested in the Black Freedom Struggle and NAACP Papers.