Archives & Manuscripts
- Digital Public Library of AmericaSingle point of access to millions of items from libraries, archives, and museums around the United States.
- ProQuest History Vault (Harvard Login)Collection of primary source documents on American history and international relations, including on Native American history, women's history, and race relations and civil rights.
- Adam Matthew AM Explorer (Harvard Login)Primary source collections curated by Adam Matthew Publishers that can be searched all at once or browsed by collection. Topics cover a wide range of political, social, cultural, and military of the United States, as well as select British and world history.
- EuropeanaPortal to millions of digitized historical documents, manuscripts, and artifacts from European national libraries, museums, and cultural heritage institutions.
- Archives Unbound (Harvard Login)Offers collections of primary source documents, mostly from the U.S. National Archives, on a vast variety of topics ranging from early modern witchcraft to 19th- and 20th-century colonialism to U.S. reactions to the AIDS epidemic.
For a fun—and slightly different—kind of primary source, check out HKS's own Rothstein Political Buttons Collection.
Additionally, both Harvard's Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America and Houghton Library provide access to a wealth of primary sources within a short walking distance from the HKS campus.
Additionally, both Harvard's Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America and Houghton Library provide access to a wealth of primary sources within a short walking distance from the HKS campus.
For more in-depth suggestions for primary sources from archives, libraries, and museums, check the page with related resource guides. Of course, you may also schedule individual consultations with your HKS librarians to find primary sources for your specific project.
Newspapers, Magazines & Journals
- America's Historical Newspapers (Harvard Login)Full-text database of newspapers published in the United States. Includes titles from all 50 states from 1690-1993. Also includes Ethnic American Newspapers from 1799-1971 and Hispanic American Newspapers from 1808-1980.
- Newsweek Archive (Harvard Login)Provides scanned images of almost the entire run of Newsweek from 1933 to 2012.
- American Periodicals (Harvard Login)Contains a wide range of U.S. periodicals from the mid-18th to the mid-20th century.
- Proquest Historical Newspapers Online (Harvard Login)Digital archives of major newspapers. Search specific newspapers or search them all at once. Coverage varies by newspaper beginning in the 1840's.
- World Newspaper Archive (Harvard Login)Archive of newspapers dating from the 19th to the early 20th century. Coverage currently includes publications from Africa, Latin America, South Asia, and the United States.
- British Periodicals (Harvard Login)Collection of British periodicals, both academic and popular, from the late 17th to the 20th century.
- EastView Universal Databases (Harvard Login)Contains archives of historical newspapers primarily of the Soviet Union and its successor states, with select other publications from Eastern Europe and East Asia.
- JSTOR (Harvard Login)Digital archives of scholarly journals, sometimes dating back to the early twentieth or even the nineteenth century. Contains strong coverage in subjects such as history, international relations, political science, as well as a variety of area studies.
Related Research Guides:
The following research guides contain additional resources on finding historical newspapers and other periodicals:
The following research guides contain additional resources on finding historical newspapers and other periodicals:
Audio & Video
- American History in Video (Harvard Login)Contains historic newsreel footage as well as documentaries on all aspects of U.S. history.
- AP ArchiveFilm and video archive of the Associated Press, on YouTube. The collection offers 1.7 million global news and entertainment video stories dating back to 1895. Curated playlists are also available.
- World Newsreels Online (Harvard Login)Contains full runs of many of the key international newsreels produced during the early to mid-twentieth century.
Government Documents
- U.S. Presidential DocumentsComprehensive research guide for U.S. presidential documents, by Harvard librarians.
- Proquest Congressional (Harvard Login)Coverage includes bills and laws, documents and publications of congressional committees, legislative histories, etc., from the first Congress to present.
For more detailed information, see the Resource Guide for U.S. Congressional Publications. - Foreign Relations of the United States (Harvard Login)Extensive documentary record of U.S. foreign policy, dating back to the nineteenth century.
- Supreme Court Insight (Harvard Login)Contains opinions, oral arguments, briefs, etc. of cases argued before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Related Research Guides:
The following research guides contain additional resources on finding historical U.S. government documents:
The following research guides contain additional resources on finding historical U.S. government documents:
For foreign government documents, please schedule an individual consultation with one of your HKS librarians.
Data & Statistics
- Historical Statistics of the United States (Harvard Login)Contains U.S. demographic, economic, social, and other statistics from Colonial times to the present.
- International Historical Statistics (Harvard Login)Collates key economic and social indicators for most countries of the world from the Industrial Revolution of the mid-eighteenth century onward.
Related Research Guides:
The following research guides contain additional resources on finding historical data and statistics:
The following research guides contain additional resources on finding historical data and statistics: