Primary++Resources

=What are primary resources?=

==

**Primary sources are the evidence left behind by participants or observers.**


 * Diaries, journals, speeches, interviews, letters, memos, manuscripts and other papers in which individuals describe events in which they were participants or observers
 * Memoirs
 * Autobiographies
 * Records of organizations and agencies of government
 * Published materials written at the time of the event
 * Photographs
 * Audio recordings,
 * Moving pictures, video recordings documenting what happened
 * Artifacts

**Secondary sources are works that interpret or analyze an historical event**. Examples of secondary sources include textbooks and encyclopedias. = = =**Importance of Primary Sources**=

** From the Library of Congress **
[]

Why Use Primary Sources?
==Primary sources provide a window into the past—unfiltered access to the record of artistic, social, scientific and political thought and achievement during the specific period under study, produced by people who lived during that period.==

Bringing young people into close contact with these unique, often profoundly personal, documents and objects can give them a very real sense of what it was like to be alive during a long-past era.
[|Student Primary Source Guide from Blackburn]

=Where do I find primary resources?=

The LOC Web site offers more than 16 million digitized items, many of which are primary sources. Primary sources are the raw materials of history—original documents and objects created at the time under study, such as photographs, maps, prints, manuscripts, sound recordings, and motion pictures. Primary sources offer unique learning opportunities for students of all levels, interests and learning styles to connect with content and develop new understandings.
 * [|Library of Congress]**


 * [|Historical Newspapers 1836 - 1922]**

[|National History Day List of Primary Sources]

[|Authentic History - Popular Culture]

[|Pennsylvania Digitized Newspapers]

 * [|National Archives]**


 * [|Depression Era Color Photos]**


 * [|Digital Collections at the State Library of PA]**

[|**Old Time Radio Shows - You Are There**]

[|Public Domain Sherpa: Finding and Using Public Domain Photographs]
[|Exhibitions A-Z from LOC]

=**Guides to analyzing materials**=

[|How to analyze oral histories]
=**How do I cite sources?**= The Library of Congress maintains a website with information for MLA citation. MLA citation style requires the source’s digital ID and URL.

Here is the link: http://www.loc.gov/teachers/usingprimarysources/mla.html

This website from Purdue University is good to use. [|**Purdue Online Writing Lab**]

=**Need more help?**=

**[|LOC's Ask a Librarian]**

 * [|Teacher's Page at the LOC]**

**[|Interactive Lesson from America's History in the Making]**

 * CalUTPS**