American Church History Resources at the University of Chicago Library

This guide is intended to help students in HCHR 43301 Religion in Modern America, 1865-1920 and HCHR 42901 Christianity and Slavery in America, 1619-1865 find primary source material for their research projects.

Relevant Subject Guides:

• African American Studies
• Religion
• History

Finding Early American Books:

• Early American Imprints: Series I. Evans, 1639-1800 "Also known as Early American Imprints, Series I. Based on the American bibliography by Charles Evans. For research on 17th and 18th century American life. Upon completion, it will consist of over 36,000 works and 2,400,000 images."
• Early American Imprints: Series II. Shaw-Shoemaker, 1801-1819
• Early English Books Online (EEBO) "Titles from Pollard & Redgrave (1475-1640), Wing (1641-1700), Thomason Tracts (1640-1661) and Early English Books Tract Supplement. Subjects include literature, history, philosophy, linguistics, theology, music, art, education, mathematics, and science."
• Eighteenth Century Collection Online (ECCO) "Comprehensive digital edition of The Eighteenth Century, a microfilm collection of 150,000 English-language titles and editions published between 1701 and 1800. Includes books and broadsides, Bibles, tract books and sermons to printed ephemera by well-known and lesser-known eighteenth-century authors."
• Google Books
• Guide to Microfom and CD-ROM Sources for History and Political Science in the University of Chicago Library. See part 1 United States -- Collections of published books and serials. The Guide includes a helpful index.
• Project Gutenberg
• Open Content Alliance Internet Archive
• Sabin Americana Collection 1500-1926
• Library catalog
• WorldCat : A worldwide union catalog created and maintained collectively by more than 9,000 member institutions. With millions of online records built from the bibliographic and ownership information of contributing libraries, it is the largest and most comprehensive database of its kind.

Finding Archival and Manscript Collections:

• ArchiveGrid "Thousands of libraries, museums, and archives have contributed nearly a million collection descriptions to ArchiveGrid. Researchers searching ArchiveGrid can learn about the many items in each of these collections, contact archives to arrange a visit to examine materials, and order copies."
• Archives USA "Part of Nineteenth Century Index. Directory of Archives and Manuscript Repositories in the US; National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections; and National Inventory of Documentary Sources in the United States, with finding aids from 300 U.S. repositories."
• National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections (NUCMC). The NUCMC includes information on manuscript collections gathered and indexed by the Library of Congress, and provided with names and detailed subject indexing.
• University of Chicago Library Special Collections Research Center Archival and Manuscript Online Finding Aids. Archives and Manuscripts Guides and Databases. Digital Collections
• WorldCat : A worldwide union catalog created and maintained collectively by more than 9,000 member institutions. With millions of online records built from the bibliographic and ownership information of contributing libraries, it is the largest and most comprehensive database of its kind.

Examples of Collections, including diaries, correspondence, sermons, etc.:

• African-American Religion: A Documentary History Project
• American Civil War: Letters and Diaries
• American Memory (Library of Congress). A large and growing collection of digitized manuscript, print, photographic, and mapping materials for United States history. See also, American Memory Religion and American Memory African American History
• Documenting the American South. A collection of sources on Southern history, literature and culture from the colonial period through the first decades of the 20th century. The 1,165 books and manuscripts come primarily from its Southern holdings of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
• Early Encounters in North America: Peoples, Culture, and the Environment "Letters, diaries, memoirs and accounts describing explorations of North America. Provides perspectives from traders, slaves, missionaries, explorers, soldiers, native peoples, and officials, both men and women. Searchable in a variety of ways."
• The First American West: The Ohio River Valley, 1750-1820 consists of 15,000 pages of original historical material documenting the land, peoples, exploration, and transformation of the trans-Appalachian West from the mid-eighteenth to the early nineteenth century. The collection is drawn from the holdings of the University of Chicago Library and the Filson Historical Society of Louisville, Kentucky. Among the sources included are books, periodicals, newspapers, pamphlets, scientific publications, broadsides, letters, journals, legal documents, ledgers and other financial records, maps, physical artifacts, and pictorial images.
• Guide to Microfom and CD-ROM Sources for History and Political Science in the University of Chicago Library. See part 4 United States -- Archives, Manuscripts, Sources and part 5 Women's studies. Gender studies, Sexuality. The Guide includes a helpful index.
• In the First Person: Index to Letters, Diaries, Oral Histories and Other Personal Narratives "Indexes over 2,500 collections of oral history in English from around the world. With future releases, the index will broaden to identify other first-person content, including letters, diaries, memoirs, and autobiographies, and other personal narratives."
• Making of America (free Cornell site) includes digitized page images and searchable full text of 955 volumes for American serials from Antebellum times to the end of the 19th century:
• Making of America (free University of Michigan site) includes digitized page images and searchable full text of 2,457 journal issues for American serials from Antebellum times to the end of the 19th century
• Newberry Library (private research library in Chicago): Civil War Manuscript Collection. Religion Manuscription Collection
• North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries, and Oral Histories "Contains letters and diaries, oral histories, interviews, and other personal narratives, of immigrants to the United States and Canada between 1800 and 1950. Includes 342 authors and approximately 37,500 pages of material, including some audio material."
• North American Women's Letter and Diaries "Contains diaries and letters, dating from colonial times to 1950 drawn from more than 1,000 sources, including journal articles, pamphlets, newsletters, monographs, and conference proceedings, and 7,000 pages of previously unpublished materials."
• Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600-2000 More than 30,000 pages of text selected from a wide variety of sources, including some complete works. The full text can be searched by words and phrases, including subject terms, dates, characteristics of authors, etc.

Finding Early American Newspapers:

• American Periodicals Series, 1740-1900 (APS Online) "Part of Nineteenth Century Index. Full-text of over 1,000 periodicals, including special interest and general magazines, literary and professional journals, children's and women's magazines, and other historically-significant periodicals"
• America's Historical Newspapers 1690-1922
• C19: The Nineteenth Century Index "draws on the strength of indexes such as the Nineteenth Century Short Title Catalogue, The Wellesley Index and Periodicals Index Online, along with full-text resources, to create integrated bibliographic coverage of books and official publications, archives, and articles published in journals, magazines and newspapers. Years of coverage: 1790-1919."
• Newspapers at the Center for Research Libraries (in Hyde Park).
• Eighteenth Century Journals II. Full text of more than 60 British and Irish journals and newspapers dating from 1683 to 1799, not duplicating any material in Early English Books Online, Eighteenth Century Collections Online, or Early English Newspapers.
• Guide to Microfom and CD-ROM Sources for History and Political Science in the University of Chicago Library. See part 1 United States -- Collections of published books and serials. The Guide includes a helpful index.
• Harper's Weekly (1857-1889)
• Historical Newspapers "Contains 4 major historical resources for events of the last 200 years: Palmer's Index to the Times, The Official Index to the Times, The Historical Index to the New York Times, and Palmer's Full Text Online, 1785-1870"
• ProQuest Historical Newspapers: Boston Globe (1872-1924), Chicago Defender (1905-1975), Chicago Tribune (1890-1945), Los Angeles Times (1881-1986), New York Times, The Wall Street Journal (1889-1987), The Washington Post (1877-)
• Reader's Guide Retro Readers' Guide Retrospective is a database containing comprehensive indexing of the most popular general-interest periodicals published in the United States and reflects the history of 20th century America.

Additional Resources for HCHR 42901 Christianity and Slavery in America, 1619-1865:

• African American Biographical Database (AABD)
• American Civil War: Letters and Diaries
• African American Studies (research guide)
• American Memory African American History (Library of Congress)
• Black Drama "Full text of over 900 plays by 171 African American playwrights, together with detailed, fielded information on related productions, theaters, production companies, and more."
• Black Thought and Culture "Over 400 sources by African American authors, including monographs, essays, articles, speeches, and interviews written by leaders within the black community from the earliest times to 1975."
• Early Encounters in North America: Peoples, Culture, and the Environment "Letters, diaries, memoirs and accounts describing explorations of North America. Provides perspectives from traders, slaves, missionaries, explorers, soldiers, native peoples, and officials, both men and women. Searchable in a variety of ways."
• Examples of relevant archival materials in SCRC: The Slavery and Indentured Servitude Collection; Reuben T. Durrett Collection; Encyclopedia Britannica Collection of Literature for Children; Sunday School Union pamphlets and tracts (search catalog for "American Sunday School Union" or "Sunday School Union"
• Examples of relevant rare books in SCRC books:
  • Facts for the people of the South. Abolition intolerance and religious intolerance united. Know-nothingism exposed.
    Imprint: Washington, Printed at the Union Off., 1855.
    Description: 42 p. 23 cm.
    Subject: American Party
    Location: Special Collections, Rare Books
    Copy No.: c.1
    Call No.: JK2341.A6F18
    Status: Not checked out
  • Minutes ...
    Author: American Convention for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery and Improving the Condition of the African Race
    Imprint: Philadelphia [etc.] 1794-1839.
    Description: v. 20-24 cm.
    Subject: Slavery -- United States -- Societies, etc.
    Location: Special Collections, Rare Books
    Copy No.: c.1 v.13
    Call No.: E446.A5
    Status: Not checked out
  • Remarks on the slave trade : extracted from the American Museum for May, 1789.
    Author: Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery
    Imprint: Philadelphia : Printed by Mathew Carey, 1789.
    Description: 1 sheet ([1] p.) : ill. ; 27 x 44 cm.
    Subject: Slave-trade -- America.
    Location: Special Collections, Rare Books
    Copy No.: c.1
    Call No.: HT991.E4
    Status: Not checked out
• Finding books in the library catalog: Search for one of the following subjects: Slavery and the church United States; Abolitionists; Women abolitionists; Antislavery movements United States; Christianity and politics United States History 19th century; Racism United States History; Slave insurrections United States. Subject sub-headings which highlight primary sources include Correspondence; Diaries; Personal Narratives.

Finding Articles (Secondary sources):

• ATLA Religion Database
• America: History and Life--"the definitive index of literature covering the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present. With indexing for 1,700 journals from 1964 to present, this database is the most important bibliographic reference tool for students and scholars of U.S. and Canadian history."
• Academic Search Premier
• AnthroSource
• History Cooperative "Provides access to full text of recent issues of over a dozen scholarly history journals"
• Reader's Guide Retrospective "a database containing comprehensive indexing of the most popular general-interest periodicals published in the United States and reflects the history of 20th century America."
• ViVa: A Bibliography of Women's History "A current bibliography (1995- ) of articles about women's and gender history. Articles published in English, French, German and Dutch are selected from more than 90 European, American and Indian Journals."

Other Secondary Resources:

• American National Biography
• Biography and Genealogy Master Index "Indexes current, readily available reference sources, as well as the most important retrospective works that cover individuals, both living and deceased, from every field of activity and from all areas of the world."
• Humanities E-Book Project (previously History E-Book Project) "Offers electronic texts selected from the current output of American university presses, as well as those from a specially selected backlist of titles. American Council of Learned Societies project."
• Oxford Reference Online "Provides access to over 120 language and subject dictionaries, reference works, and biographical directories in a variety of disciplines published by OUP that can be searched individually or in one cross-searchable database." Browse by subjects history and religion.

For additional resources, see Database Finder (browse subjects history, religion) and subject pages for Religion and for History.