Archives and Digital Repositories - HIS 452 - Senior Thesis - A.C. Buehler Library at Elmhurst University

Identifying and Locating Primary Sources

List originally compiled by Katie McMahon, Reference Services Librarian, The Newberry Library (Chicago).

Finding Primary Source Materials
from the UNC University Libraries
Finding Historical Primary Sources
from the University of California Berkeley Library
Making Sense of Evidence
from History Matters, created by the American Social History Project

Illinois Digital Archives This link opens in a new window
Library of Congress Digital Collections This link opens in a new window
Gateway to the Library of Congress’s vast resources of digitized American historical materials. Comprising more than 9 million items that document U.S. history and culture and organized into more than 400 thematic collections.

ArchiveGrid This link opens in a new window
ArchiveGrid includes over 7 million records describing archival materials, bringing together information about historical documents, personal papers, family histories, and more. With over 1,400 archival institutions represented, ArchiveGrid helps researchers looking for primary source materials held in archives, libraries, museums and historical societies.

Illinois Archival Repositories Directory search
Search this to find out what archives are available in a given municipality in Illinois.
Archives Wiki
Currently suspended. Originally sponsored by the American Historical Association, a clearinghouse of information about archival resources throughout the world. While it is primarily designed to be useful to historians and others doing historical research, also useful to researchers in many disciplines.