The Digital Classroom

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A series of activities, primary documents, lesson plans, links, and worksheets designed to encourage "teachers of students at all levels to use archival documents in the classroom."

Includes tasks to help students understand how to use National Archives materials; 20 thematically-oriented teaching activities covering the period from the Constitutional Convention to Watergate; detailed information about National History Day, an annual educational program and competition; and 35 lessons and activities organized around constitutional issues ranging from well-known patent cases to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the establishment of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Many of the activities correlate to specific sections of the National History Standards and the National Standards for Civics and Government. Also contains a handful of links and material about books, workshops, and summer institutes for teachers.

A well-organized introduction to the practice of historical research.

Voices from the Gaps: Women Writers and Artists of Color

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Descriptive information about the lives and works of 136 "women writers of color in North America" is provided in this site, designed primarily for high school and college classroom use. Offers introductory material, including images, bibliographies, quotations, biographical sketches, and critical views with regard to writers such as Toni Morrison, bell hooks, Evelyn Lau, Winona LaDuke, Terry McMillan, and Alice Walker.

While the site concentrates primarily on 20th-century figures, it also contains 10 entries on women from the 19th century, including Sarah Mapps Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley, and Frances Ellen Watkins Harper.

The material is arranged into four indexes: name, birthplace, racial/ethnic background, and significant dates. Annotated links to 18 related resources are included.

The site relies on contributions from interested students and teachers, and promises to grow to more than 500 entries in the future.

WWW-Virtual Library, History Central Catalogue

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Created by an international group of volunteer institutions, this site offers a gateway with thousands of links to general history resources and seeks to provide "effective tools for practicing historians wishing to work online." Links are presented for the following categories: "Research: Methods and Materials"; "Eras and Epochs"; "Historical Topics"; and "By Countries and Regions."

Washington As It Was: Photographs by Theodor Horydczak, 1923-1959

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Presents approximately 14,350 photographs by Theodor Horydczak (1890-1971), most of which document the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area between the 1920s and 1950s. Subjects include the architecture and interiors of government, commercial, and residential buildings; views of streets and neighborhoods; images of work and leisure; and events such as the 1932 Bonus March and the 1933 World Series. Also includes a limited number of shots taken in other U.S. locations and in Canada and a background essay, "Discovering Theodor Horydczak's Washington." Provides visual documentation of official and everyday life in the nation's capital and its environs.

Center for Working-Class Studies

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Introduces an organization begun in 1996 that "creates social spaces for civic and academic conversations on working-class life and culture and its intersections with other identities and serves as a clearinghouse for information on working-class culture, issues, and pedagogy." The site presents information about the Center, its outreach programs and electronic discussion network; a 1,000-word essay defining working-class studies and commenting on recent trends; six course syllabi; online student exhibitions for a course on "Working in Youngstown," which deals with the history and representations of work in "Steeltown, U.S.A." and throughout the U.S.; 88 abstracts of papers presented at the 1999 conference on "Class, Identity, and Nation"; 84 partially annotated links to related resources, including 24 for museums on working-class and labor history; and a bibliography organized into 24 thematic categories such as "Working-Class Fiction," "Class as Culture," "Class Perception in the U.S.," and "Class and Sexuality." A useful site for introducing students to discussions of class and labor issues in American history.

California Heritage Collection

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An impressive archive of more than 30,000 digitally reproduced images "illustrating California's history and culture," taken from nearly 200 collections at UC Berkeley's Bancroft Library. The site, searchable by keyword, features photographs, sketches, and paintings in six categories: early California missions and mining activities, natural landscapes, Native Americans, San Francisco, World War II and Japanese relocation, and portraits of notable and ordinary Californians from diverse backgrounds. More than 100 images selected from the larger collection are included in an accompanying California Cornerstones Collection. Includes 158 finding aids, additional links to the Bancroft Library, and six "web-based lesson plans" for using the collection in K-12 classrooms. While the text accompanying each image is limited to artist/photographer, subject, and date, the sheer number of images available makes this a valuable resource for those studying California's history.

Say it Plain: A Century of Great African American Speeches

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This small website assembles transcripts and audio recordings of 12 important speeches by prominent African Americans of the late 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. These include: Booker T. Washington, Marcus Garvey, Mary McLeod Bethune, Dick Gregory, Fannie Lou Hamer, Stokely Carmichael, Martin Luther King, Jr., Shirley Chisholm, Barbara Jordan, Jesse Jackson, Clarence Thomas, and Barack Obama.

Topics include Washington's speech to the 1895 Atlanta Cotton States and International Exposition, Bethune's 1939 speech "What Does Democracy Mean to Me?," a 1966 speech by Carmichael at U.C. Berkeley, and King's 1968 "I've Been to the Mountaintop" sermon delivered in Memphis just before his assassination. The speech by Marcus Garvey is his only known recording. Each speech is accompanied by a brief introduction. The site provides 40 links to related websites.

Presidential Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower

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This website allows the user to search Eisenhower's presidential papers for both his first and second terms (volumes XIV through XXI of the published correspondence series). The correspondence deals with all aspects of the presidency, such as diplomacy and international relations, politics, national policy, and military affairs. The correspondence also includes Eisenhower's personal correspondence to and from family members and friends. The site is divided into first term papers, with 2,173 documents, and second term papers, with 1,782 documents. Each division is introduced by a 7,000-word essay written by the editors.

Both quick and advanced searches are available and there are three methods of browsing the papers: sequentially through "table of contents," by document number, or by subject using the "general index." Each paper is accompanied by footnotes and bibliographic references. There is also a monthly chronology available, along with bibliographies of primary and secondary sources. The site also lists 50 suggested readings and books by or about Dwight D. Eisenhower. For those researching the Eisenhower papers or his presidency, this website provides an invaluable resource.

Louisiana State Museum Jazz Collection

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This small site, part a larger collection, offers a music archive dealing primarily with traditional New Orleans jazz. Composed of photographs, audio recordings, and audio interviews of musicians and bands that were primarily active in New Orleans, the collection is currently composed of more than 1,000 total items, including more than 380 audio recordings. Of particular interest are the 160 Louis Armstrong items. The collection can be searched by keyword. The site's authors plan to make additional items available as they are digitized and catalogued. A useful resource for those studying the history of jazz or jazz culture.

New Jersey Public Records and Archives

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For historians researching New Jersey, this site's main interest will be its "state archives." "Catalog" provides access to nearly 200 pre-established searches on the archive's manuscript series, genealogical holdings, business and corporate records, cultural resources, and maps. Topics include military conflicts, society and economics, transportation, public works agencies, and photographic collections, as well as state, county, municipal, and federal government records. The other major feature consists of eight image collections with themes that include New Jersey Civil War soldiers, Spanish-American War Infantry Officers, Spanish-American War Naval Officers, Gettysburg Monuments, and views of the Morris Canal. The archives site also includes a searchable index of New Jersey Supreme Court cases, a transcription of New Jersey's 1776 constitution, and a table summarizing the holdings of the state archives. This site is a useful aid for researching the history and culture of New Jersey.