Research Guides: Library Research Guide for HIST E-1710: More Than Just a Meal: American Food, a Global History: Finding Primary Sources

Finding Primary Sources

Library Research Guide for Ethnicity, Migration, Rights offers sources on particular ethnic groups. Note links to African American guides on first page.

Food Studies Online contains pamphlets, photos, videos, interviews, menu collections, and other primary sources (plus some secondary sources) related to the study of food. Much of the material is 20th century, though some is older.

Food in Colonial North America - essay on primary sources in the Colonial North America digital collection at Harvard

Search across all materials in the Colonial North American collection

Searching in HOLLIS

To find books, periodicals, manuscripts, videos, etc., on a topic in HOLLIS, put in likely keywords and choose Library Catalog. Look at pertinent records and find the terms under Subject. For example, searching for the keyword food yields:

Food: A Culinary History from Antiquity to the Present, ed. by Jean-Louis Flandrin and Massimo Montanari. English edition ed. by Albert Sonnenfeld. Translated by Clarissa Botsford. New York, Columbia University Press, 1999. HOLLIS Record
Subjects:

Food -- History
Food habits -- History
Diet -- History
Nutrition -- Social aspects -- History

Under Refine my results: Subject on the right of the results list there are more main terms (Cooking; Food industry & trade; Food supply; Agriculture) to try, but not the terms after the dashes ( -- Social aspects; -- History) which are called subdivisions. NOTE: If you hit one of the terms in this Subject list, HOLLIS will find records with the term, say "cooking", only on records in the set originally formed by searching food.

Redo your search using the terms that HOLLIS uses. Also, go to Starts with.../Browse (top black band) and put in Food habits United States adjusting to Browse by Subject. This is very useful in breaking down a large subject and in giving you more subdivisions, which can be applied to other Subject terms, to search. Thus:

Food habits -- United States -- Anecdotes
Food habits -- United States -- History -- 19th century

Whenever you have a reference to a useful book, look it up in HOLLIS and see what the Subject terms are.

Any pertinent book published during your era may be a primary source, but certain kinds of primary sources, including originally unpublished sources such as letters and diaries published later, have particular terms attached to their Subject terms in a HOLLIS record. Change Any field to Subject for cleanest results.

--Archives
--Correspondence
--Description and travel
--Diaries
--Manuscripts
--Notebooks, sketchbooks, etc.
--Personal narratives (refers to accounts of wars and diseases only)
--Sources (usually refers to collections of published primary sources)

Example:
Food "united states"
AND
Archives OR Correspondence OR Diaries OR Manuscripts OR Sources OR Narratives (as Subject)

When you find a pertinent book, go to Starts With.../Browse and put in the call number, adjusting the menu to Library of Congress (Wid-LC) or Other. This shows you other books on the same subject, even though they may be in storage or checked out.

See the Library Research Guide for History and the HOLLIS Help guide for more information on searching HOLLIS.

City Directories

City directories can give information on what businesses existed in the city. Look in the back of the directory for a classified section, listed by occupation/type of establishment.

To find print copies of city directories in HOLLIS:

In HOLLIS, choose Advanced Search from the menu at the top of the page.
Choose Library Catalog.
In the first line, change Keywords Anywhere to Subject, then type in the name of the city you are looking for (e.g., Cambridge, Boston) and the word Directories.

As well as the alphabetical name listing, most city directories have a business section classified by occupation, grocers, physicians, etc. Where available it is often easier to browse the paper copies. In HOLLIS Library Catalog search: 'Cambridge directories', adjusting 'Limit to:any field' to 'Limit to: subject'.

The major online sources are:

Ancestry Library Edition includes many city directories. Open Search in top black band, and choose Card Catalog. Then choose Schools, Directories & Church Histories, then City & Area Directories. Then refine by geography and/or date. Many of the directories can be browsed (on the right). For example; U.S. City Directories, 1822-1995.

Tufts Boston City Directories

HathiTrust In Advanced Catalog search try:

Title: Boston [etc.] – Subject: Directories
Also try Title: Boston Directory

These produce overlapping but different results.

Cookbooks & Recipe Collections

Finding Cookbooks at the Schlesinger Library

The Schlesinger Library holds a large collection of historic and contemporary cookbooks. This guide will help you get a sense of some of the highlights in the library's collection.

To search for online cookbooks at the Schlesinger, follow these steps:

In HOLLIS, go to the Advanced Search screen.
Select the Library Catalog radial button, and choose "Schlesinger Library" for your search scope.
On the first search line, change the default Keywords anywhere search to Form/genre, and type "Cookbooks."
Click the Search button. Once you have a list of results, choose the "Online" option from the right-hand refinement options, under "Show only".

You'll get a large set of results with this search. Keep in mind that you can then narrow your search by date, author, type of cuisine, etc. For further ideas on how to do a targeted search for particular kinds of cookbooks, Ask a Schlesinger Librarian!

Finding Recipes

The library also has recipe collections (loose recipes, rather than published cookbooks).

To search for online recipe collections, follow these steps:

In HOLLIS, go to the Advanced Search screen.
Select the Library Catalog radial button.
On the first search line, change the default Keywords anywhere search to Form/genre, and type "recipes."
Click the Search button. Once you have a list of results, choose the "Online" option from the right-hand refinement options, under "Show only".

Internet Archive

In Internet Archive search Cookbooks OR Cookery. This yields many items. Limit to: Mediatype: Collections. The first collection displayed,
Cookbooks and Home Economics, can be searched full text.

Digital Recipe Collections & Cookbooks

Wellcome Digital Collections - Domestic recipe manuscripts spanning the 16th century to the 19th century

search for recipe* and then limit to online
search for cookbook* and then limit to online

Diaries and other Personal Writings

Writings in which people reflect or report on their own lives and experiences are called personal writings. They are sometimes written for publication (autobiographies, memoirs) and sometimes for private use (diaries, letters, although diaries are sometimes written with an eye to publication) and published posthumously. Personal narratives are usually accounts of wars or diseases.

Find in HOLLIS

Search for your topic with an appropriate keyword or subject term and the following terms as subjects:

sources
diaries
narratives
correspondence

Example search: women AND (sources OR diaries OR narratives OR correspondence)

Online collections of personal writings

Social and Cultural History: Letters and Diaries Online is a unified search platform for cross-searching the following databases:

American Civil War: Letters and Diaries includes published and archival memoirs, letters, and diaries, plus supplementary chronologies, biographies, bibliographies, etc.

British and Irish Women's Letters and Diaries (1500-1950) includes letters and diaries of 430 women from Colonial times to 1950. Biographical information on the writers is included.

North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries and Oral Histories (IMLD) (1800-1950.) includes 342 authors and approximately 37,500 pages of information, illustrating what it meant to immigrate to America and Canada.

North American Women's Letters and Diaries includes approximately 150,000 pages of published letters and diaries from more than 600 women writing from Colonial times to 1950. Some 7,000 pages of previously unpublished materials are included in addition to biographical information.

Digital Libraries

HathiTrust Digital Library. Each full text item is linked to a standard library catalog record, thus providing good metadata and subject terms. Thus a full text search of the whole database can be limited by title or Subject term. The catalog can be searched separately. Many post-1923 out-of-copyright books, especially government documents, are full text viewable. You can search within copyright books to see what page your search term is on.

Internet Archive offers full text for a variety of digitized print materials and archived web pages (Wayback Machine), as well as films, audio files, TV News, and more.

Films

Southern Foodways Alliance Films Short films that explore "the diverse food cultures of the changing American South"

Newspapers

Chronicling America, enhancing access to historic American newspapers (1836-1922) (Library of Congress) includes the U.S. Newspaper Directory, 1690-Present in which searches for newspapers can be limited by ethnicity and language. Selected newspapers can then be searched full text, if available, in Advanced Search.

Ethnic American Newspapers from the Balch Collection (1799-1971) in America’s Historical Newspapers. Title list (In Quick Facts & Overview box on the right). The titles marked Forthcoming are in fact available.

America’s Historical Newspapers (1690-1993) (Readex) offers full text of over a thousand U.S. newspapers. Includes all papers listed in the standard History and bibliography of American newspapers, 1690-1820, by Clarence S. Brigham. Although a very rich resource, many important newspapers, especially for the later years, are not included. Now includes several post-1922 papers; title list (In Quick Facts & Overview box on the right).

19th Century U.S. Newspapers offers full text of about 500 newspapers.

More newspapers can be found in the Guide to Newspapers and Newspaper Indexes.

Magazines

General Interest Magazines

American Antiquarian Society (AAS) Historical Periodicals Collection (1691-1877)

American Periodicals (1740-1900) offers full text of about 1100 American periodicals. In cases where a periodical started before 1900 coverage is included until 1940.

Harper's Magazine Online offers the full text of Harper's Magazine (1850-1899).

Periodicals Index Online indexes contents of thousands of journals in the humanities and social sciences, from their first issues to 1995. Covers journals from North America, the United Kingdom, and the rest of the English-speaking world and journals in other European languages including French, German, Italian and Spanish. Includes the complete table of contents for each issue of each journal.

Nineteenth Century Masterfile includes several Nineteenth Century periodical indexes together with many separate indexes to individual periodicals. To see a list of the indexes and separately indexed periodicals, choose Browse Mode, select the "About" tab, and click "To see a full list of all titles currently online". The most important index included is Poole's index to periodical literature (1802-1906) which indexes 479 American and English periodicals.

Women's Magazines

Everyday Life and Women in America, c.1800-1920

Gerritsen Collection--Women's History Online, 1543-1945 has numerous periodicals. See Browse Periodicals on home screen. More info.rmation.

Godey’s Lady’s Book (1830-1880)

Women Working, 1800-1930 includes several magazines

Women's Magazine Archive (1883-2005)

Includes: Better Homes and Gardens (1922-2005) - Chatelaine (1928-2005) - Good Housekeeping (1885-2005) - Ladies' Home Journal (1883-2005) - Parents (1926-2005) - Redbook (1903-2005).

Food Magazines

Bon Appétit

We don't have access to a full digital run of Bon Appétit. Access options:

Online access to articles 1997-present via Factiva
Search Masterfile Premier (1984-Present) for relevant articles and then make a Scan & Deliver request for articles (see video)

To find what food-related newspapers and magazines existed for a certain year, use Ayer & Son's Directory of Newspapers and Periodicals (online 1869-1919). Publications are listed geographically. After the geographical listings, lists for specific categories of publications appear, including ones for restaurants & hotels and food & drink publications.

Maps

The Harvard Map Collection boasts a huge collection of a wide variety of map types, including thematic maps.

Search for maps in HOLLIS Advanced Search, selecting Library Catalog, then Location: Map Coll (Pusey). Not all the maps are available in HOLLIS, so it's always best to talk directly to the Map Collection librarians.

Menu Collections

Finding Menu Collections at the Schlesinger Library

There are a number of archival collections at Schlesinger Library that contain menus, as well as dedicated collections of menus. To take a look at the range of holdings, try the following search:

1. In HOLLIS, go to the Advanced Search screen.

2. Select the Library Catalog radial button, and choose "Schelsinger Library" for your search scope.

3. On the first search line, change the default Keywords anywhere search to Form/genre, and type "menus."

4. Under Resource Type, use the dropdown choices to limit to "Archives/Manuscripts."

Finding Digital Menu Collections

American menu collection from NYPL (1851-2008) - alternate view of collection
Culinary Institute of America Digital Collections of menus (1830s-2000s)
Menu collection from Cornell School of Hotel Administration
Art of the Menu

Find other digital menu collections:

Use Google advanced search
- All these words: menus
- Any of these words: guides archive sources "digital library" "digital exhibition" "digital collection"
- Site or domain: .edu

Oral Histories

Oral histories with full-text transcripts can be searched for mentions of food and diet.

Oral History Online indexes oral history collections, with links to interview-level bibliographic records and to full-text materials, audio files and visual files where these are available. Includes interviews from the collection: Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938.

The HistoryMakers contains oral history interviews with African Americans.

More oral history collections can be found on the Library Research Guide for History.

Slave Narratives

Personal accounts by slaves or former slaves can be searched for mentions of food and diet.

Slavery and Anti-Slavery: An Transnational Archive
Among other primary sources, contain some slave narratives and autobiographies. Choose Personal Accounts under Document Type and search in Part 3 (The Institution of Slavery) and Part 4 (The Age of Emancipation).

Slave narratives in Afro-Americana Imprints, 1535-1922

Florida Slave Narratives