Established in 1905, Las Vegas, NV, officially became a city in 1911. Its growth and development over the course of the 20th century is documented through this diverse collection of oral histories. Eight oral histories, in video, audio, and transcript format, expose aspects of daily life in early Las Vegas from the 1930s to the 1960s. Las Vegas showgirls Anna Bailey, Carol Baker, Betty Bunch, Sook-ja, Ai-ja, Mia Kim, and Virginia James discuss working conditions on the Las Vegas strip in the 1960s and 70s as well as their involvement with prominent shows, the racial integration of showrooms, and the growth of the Las Vegas Korean community. Present-day Las Vegas comes to life through oral histories and videos of six women in their 70s and 80s who tap dance together several times a week at the West Las Vegas Arts Center. Segregation, integration, the Nevada Test Site, and local history in Las Vegas are the focus of the oral history roundtable with Rose Hamilton and four other women who grew up together in Las Vegas and remain friends to this day.

This site offers a large archive of selected documents, reports, records, maps, photographs, newspapers, artifacts, and oral history interviews. Items are searchable by ethnic group, keyword, archive, type of material, date, or subject. Brief historical overviews and bibliographies for each ethnic group profiled are also available in the archive section. Another section has lessons plans for teachers on African Americans, immigration and settlement, migration, and ethnic culture and identity, 1850-1950. It also offers tutorials on using the archive, using history databases on the web, interpreting photographs, interpreting documents, and interpreting oral history. Historical overviews are provided on the various ethnic groups that settled the Columbia River Basin.

A discussion forum offers a place to talk about discoveries in the archive or questions. Topics currently include ethnic groups, ethnicity and race, work and labor, immigration and migration, family life, religion, social conditions, discrimination, and civil rights. A very useful site for researching or teaching the social and cultural history of the Columbia River Basin.

During World War II, the U.S. Government forced more than 100,000 Japanese Americans to leave their homes and businesses, relocating them to internment camps from California to Arkansas. Well-known photographer Ansel Adams documented the lives of Japanese Americans at the Manzanar War Relocation Center in California—from portraits to daily life, including agriculture and leisure.

This site presents 242 original negatives and 209 photographic prints, often displayed together to show Adams's developing and cropping techniques. His 1944 book on Manzanar, Born Free and Equal is also reproduced. Adams donated the collection to the Library of Congress in 1965, writing, "The purpose of my work was to show how these people, suffering under a great injustice . . . had overcome the sense of defeat and dispair [sic] by building for themselves a vital community in an arid (but magnificent) environment."

Historical aspects of many of the 384 areas under the National Park Service's stewardship are presented in this expansive site. A "Links to the Past" section contains more than 25 text and picture presentations on such diverse history-related topics as archeology, architecture, cultural groups and landscapes, historic buildings, and military history. Of particular interest to teachers, a section entitled "Teaching with Historic Places" features more than 60 lesson plans designed "to enliven the teaching of history, social studies, geography, civics, and other subjects" by incorporating National Register of Historic Places into educational explorations of historic subjects. Examples include an early rice plantation in South Carolina; the lives of turn-of-the-century immigrant cigar makers near Tampa, Florida; a contrast between the Indianapolis headquarters of African-American businesswoman Madam C. J. Walker and a small store in Kemmerer, Wyoming, that grew into the J. C. Penney Company, the first nationwide department store chain; the Civil War Andersonville prisoner of war camp; President John F. Kennedy's birthplace; the Liberty Bell; Finnish log cabins in Iowa; and the Massachusetts Bay Colony's Saugus Iron Works. Especially useful for teachers interested in connecting the study of history with historic sites.

Presents a narrative in exhibit format—with hyperlinks to archival documents and photographs—on the cultural and economic life of the people who came to the Central Illinois River region from 1875 to 1950. Organized into three sections on the harvesting of fish, waterfowl, mussels, and natural ice; transportation by boat, railroad, and plank roads; and the settlement and development of six area river towns. The site delivers oral histories (audio and video), as well as illustrations and photographs. It may serve as a useful introduction to those studying this particular region and regional history in general.

This site is a collection of 253 travel narratives written between 1750 and 1920. The narratives were written by American citizens and foreign visitors about their travels in America. Some of the accounts were written by famous Americans (James Fenimore Cooper and Washington Irving, for example), but most of the authors were not famous. The narratives include their observations and opinions about American people, places, and society; and are valuable sources for the study of early American attitudes. Most accounts are viewable either as scanned images or as transcribed texts. Also included is the 32-volume set of manuscript sources entitled Early Western Travels, 1748-1846. The collection is searchable by keyword, and may be browsed by subject, author, and title. Students and teachers will find these primary sources invaluable for research and study of the late 18th and 19th centuries.

By the time Thomas Jefferson became the third President of the United States in 1801, interest in exploring the West had begun to shape U.S. policy. This chronological narrative traces Jefferson's life, participation in politics, and accumulation of scientific geographical knowledge from 1735 to 1804. There are four main sections: "The Jeffersons and Their Frontier Virginia Neighborhood," "From Colony to Commonwealth," "Science and Statecraft at Home and Abroad," and "Public Servant to the Early Republic."

This narrative is accompanied by an archive of 169 letters, statues, books, treaties, maps, and journals providing primary source insight into Jefferson's thoughts about the West and the Lewis and Clark expedition in particular. Three interactive maps from the 1700s, overlaid with historical data about cities, private dwellings, natural features, courthouses, and waterways, provide important insight into the geographic and social environment at the time.

An exhibition on Jewish life in America emphasizing the themes of accommodation, assertion, adaptation, and acculturation. The website features more than 200 illustrations, portraits, and images of books and documents from Library of Congress collections. The website offers an explanatory overview of the exhibition and four brief electronic exhibits focused that help to tell a part of the Jewish story in America from 1654 to the present. Some of the items highlighted by the exhibition include the first book printed in the English settlements of America, The Bay Psalm Book printed in 1640, the first published American Jewish sermon, and a hand-drawn plaque from c. 1942 with dual Hebrew prayers for Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt. A small bibliography lists 10 books plus six books for children. The site provides an introduction to the Library of Congress collections and is useful for teaching about the history of Jewish life in America.

This exhibit tells "the story of Southern Jewish settlers and their descendants from the late 1600s through the 21st century." It currently consists of two presentations, each with more than 50 pages presenting an image from the exhibit's collection with accompanying explanatory text. Images include portraits, maps, historical documents, photographs of Jewish ritual books and religious and cultural objects, paintings and photographs of synagogues, and photographs of Jewish businesses. "First Families" explores the period from the 1600s to the 1820s through more than 50 images and "This Happy Land" explores the antebellum and Civil War years through more than 90 images. (The presentation "Pledging Allegiance," recounting the story of Jewish migration to the South in the first half of the 20th century, is under construction.) Visitors can listen to six interviews featuring voices from the past (transcripts are available). Additionally, a photographic essay with more than 40 photographs, "Palmetto Jews" by Bill Aron, examines Jewish life in South Carolina over the past 50 years. There is no site search capability.