Historical Newspapers
Newspapers are invaluable for their immediacy, recording history as it happened. The following are a few of the databases that provide historical newspaper access (other available titles can be found by searching the Library's Databases A-Z list):
- 17th and 18th century Burney newspapers collection This link opens in a new window
- America's historical newspapers. Kansas newspapers This link opens in a new windowOver two hundred Kansas newspapers from 1854 to 1981. Among those included are titles from the Sunflower State that are part of African American Newspapers, 1827-1998. This collection provides access to some years of the Emporia Gazette.
- Harper's weekly This link opens in a new windowProvides access to Harper's Weekly, the illustrated 19th and early 20th century "national newspaper," an important resource for examining America on a cumulative week-to-week basis from 1857-1912. Through this database one can discover news stories, illustrations, cartoons, editorials, biographies, literature, and advertisements that shaped and reflected public opinion of the times. This is an important primary resource for the study of the U.S. Civil War, and the era of reconstruction.
This resource is being supported through collaborative efforts between the KU Libraries and the KU Parent’s Campaign.
Historical Magazines & Periodicals
The following are examples of historical popular magazines and periodical literature (other than newspapers) accessible through KU collections:
Find Original Prose, Poetry & Drama
The following databases may be useful in finding primary source literature, including novels, stories, pamphlets, broadsides and more:
- Black Short Fiction and Folklore This link opens in a new windowAccess over 82,000 pages and an estimated 11,000 works of short fiction produced by writers from Africa and the African Diaspora from the earliest times to the present.
- Columbia Granger's World of Poetry This link opens in a new windowIndexes poetry in anthologies. Some poems are full-text, others are excerpts. Also includes short biographies of selected poets, comments on poems and poets by well-respected scholars, and a poetry glossary.
- Early American imprints. Series 1, Evans, 1639-1800 and supplement This link opens in a new windowThe Evans collection covers virtually every book, pamphlet and broadside published in America over a 160-year period. Digitized from one of the most important collections ever produced on microform, Early American Imprints, Series I is based on Charles Evans' renowned American Bibliography and Roger Bristol's supplement. Including more than 36,000 printed works and 2.3 million pages, Series I also offers new imprints not available in microform editions. This link also includes access to Early American Imprints, Series I: Supplement from the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1670-1800.
- Early American imprints. Series 2, Shaw--Shoemaker, 1801-1819, and supplement This link opens in a new windowEarly American Imprints, Series II: Shaw-Shoemaker, 1801-1819 provides a comprehensive set of American books, pamphlets and broadsides published in the early part of the 19th century. It is based on the noted -American Bibliography, 1801-1819 by Ralph R. Shaw and Richard H. Shoemaker. With more than four million pages from over 36,000 items, including 1,000 catalogued new items unavailable in previous microform editions. This link also includes access to Early American Imprints, Series II: Supplement from the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1801-1819.
- Early English books online This link opens in a new windowContains digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700. It contains over 125,000 titles included in Pollard & Redgrave's Short-Title Catalogue (1475-1640) and Wing's Short-Title Catalogue (1641-1700) and their revised editions, as well as the Thomason Tracts (1640-1661) collection and the Early English Books Tract Supplement.
- Eighteenth Century collections online This link opens in a new windowEighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO) comprises over 200,000 printed volumes. It includes every significant English-language and foreign-language title printed in the United Kingdom in the 18th century, thousands of important works from the Americas produced in the same period, along with contemporary titles that debate and analyze those works.
Historical Ephemera & More
The following collections include diaries, letters, and various ephemera including posters, maps, advertisements, trade cards, programs, and more:
- American Civil War: letters and diaries This link opens in a new windowPresents a collection of American Civil War letters, diaries, memoirs and biographies written between 1855 and 1875, including material that was previously unpublished. Covers the military, social, economic, and political aspects of the war.
- American West This link opens in a new windowThis digital collection of primary sources from the Everett D. Graff Collection of Western Americana at the Newberry Library contains over 300 manuscripts, broadsides, maps, and rare printed works. Material in the collection ranges from 1722 to 1939, with the majority covering 1830 to 1839.
- London Low Life This link opens in a new windowThis collection brings its users to the teeming streets of 19th century London through posters, penny fiction, chapbooks, maps, cartoons, song sheets, and more. Of interest to scholars and students of social history, popular culture, language and literature, and urban development
- North American immigrant letters & diaries This link opens in a new windowProvides a personal view of what it meant to immigrate to America and Canada. Included are approximately 100,000 pages of primary source such as letters, diaries, pamphlets, autobiographies, political cartoons, and oral histories. Materials included cover a period from approximately 1840 to the present, with most of the focus on the period from 1890 to 1920. People from many countries are represented, including more recent waves of immigrants from Latin America and Asia. Several thousand pages of Ellis Island oral history interviews are indexed and searchable as well.
- Popular Culture in Britain and America, 1950-1975 This link opens in a new windowIncludes printed and manuscript sources, visual material, ephemera, and video clips. Covers music, tv, movies, fashion, youth culture, student protests, civil rights movement, and women's liberation.
- The Sixties This link opens in a new windowLetters, diaries, memoirs, and oral histories; accounts from official, radical, and alternative organizations; posters, broadsides, pamphlets, advertisements, and rare materials; and Universal newsreel footage of the times.
- Victorian popular culture This link opens in a new windowContains a wide range of material relating to popular entertainment in America, Britain, and Europe in the period from 1779 to 1930.