Archiving Early America

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Portrait, George Washington
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Presents about 50 facsimile reproductions and transcriptions of original documents, newspapers, books, autobiographies, biographies, portraits, and maps from the 18th and early 19th centuries. Examples include the Declaration of Independence, the Jay Treaty, George Washington's journal of his trip to the Ohio Valley, published in the 1754 Maryland Gazette, and 15 contemporary obituaries of well-known figures. Portraits include 24 statesmen and 12 "notable women." The site also furnishes guidelines for deciphering early American documents; seven "short films of noteworthy events," including a 35-minute feature entitled "The Life of George Washington"; four discussion forums; a collection of interactive crossword puzzles; the online journal, The Early America Review; and a news-ticker relating events that occurred "On This Day in Early America." Includes an "Early American Digital Library" from which visitors can view more than 200 digital images from early American engravings of people, places, and events (full-size images are available for purchase). Created by a collector of early Americana.

Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture

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Logo, OIEAHC
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Introduces the Omohundro Institute, "the only organization in the United States exclusively dedicated to the advancement of study, research, and publications bearing on the history and culture of early America to approximately 1815." The site provides background information about the institute, including descriptions of its fellowships, publications, conferences, and colloquia.

Also provides tables of contents and texts of selected book reviews from recent editions of The William and Mary Quarterly, articles from Uncommon Sense, and four links to related resources—including one to the Institute's own online discussion forum, H-OIEAHC, which offers 13 syllabi for undergraduate courses on early American history, a bibliography of approximately 50 titles, and links to 102 libraries, museums, historical societies, organizations, online exhibits, and collections of documents pertaining to the period. These latter materials can be valuable to students and teachers of the early American period.

Kate and Sue McBeth, Missionary Teachers to the Nez Perce

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Image, Hal-hal-tlos-tsot or "Lawyer," Gustav Sohon, 1855, Kate and Sue McBeth
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Presenting full-text letters and diaries, this website focuses on the lives and careers of Kate and Sue McBeth, missionaries and teachers among the Nez Perce Indians during the last quarter of the 19th century. Government documents and images pertaining to the tribe's history accompany these materials. Sue McBeth established a successful theological seminary for Nez Perce men, collected and organized a Nez Perce/English dictionary, and wrote journal articles. Kate McBeth provided literacy education for Nez Perce women, taught Euro-American domestic skills, and directed a Sabbath school and mission society.

Divided into five sections, materials include more than 150 letters, a diary, a journal, five treaties, more than 70 commission and agency reports and legislative actions, excerpts from a history of the Nez Perce, and 19 biographies. Six maps and approximately 100 images, including 13 illustrations depicting the 1855 Walla Walla Treaty negotiations, are also available.

Indian Peoples of the Northern Great Plains

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Image for Indian Peoples of the Northern Great Plains
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These 685 items represent 27 current and former American Indian tribes of the Northern Great Plains and cover a period from 1870 to 1954. Most of the materials are photographs with identifying text. The collection also includes stereographs, ledger drawings, and other sketches.

Users can view three unique collections. The Barstow Ledger Drawing Collection offers 66 Crow and Gros Ventre drawings from the late 19th century. A portfolio entitled Blackfeet Indian Tipis, Design and Legend includes 26 works and an introductory essay. Another collection offers treaties with the Assiniboine, Blackfeet, and North Piegan tribes from 1874 and 1875.

Searching is available by subject, date, location, name, tribe, collection, and artist or photographer. This valuable site documents folkways, material culture, and the history of American Indians from the Northern Great Plains region.

Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties

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Image, Indians Traveling, Seth Eastman, 1847, Indian Affairs.
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Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties is the digitized version of Indian Affairs, a highly regarded, seven-volume compendium of treaties, laws, and executive orders relating to U.S.-Indian affairs. Charles J. Kappler originally compiled the volume in 1904 and updated afterward through 1970.

Volume II presents treaties signed between 1778 and 1882. Volumes I and III-VII cover laws, executive and departmental orders, and important court decisions involving Native Americans from 1871 to 1970. Some volumes also provide tribal fund information. This version includes the editor's margin notations and detailed index entries, and allows searches across volumes. It provides a comprehensive resource for legal documents on U.S. relations with Native Americans.

Chickasaw Historical Research Page

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Logo, Chickasaw History website
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Dedicated to making documents available concerning the Chickasaw Indian Nation—originally located in the South but removed in the 1830s to Oklahoma territory. This site, created by a member of the Chickasaw Indian Nation, contains a collection of more than 130 letters written by, to, or about the Chickasaw between 1792 and 1849; the texts of more than 30 treaties; and more than 25 additional documents such as tribal rolls, census information, government records, and Bible entries.

Includes a link to the author's other site Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory: 1837-1907, that contains a 650-word essay on Chickasaw Nation History and links to more than 15 additional sites pertaining to the Chickasaw and resources on more general Native American subjects.

American Indians of the Pacific Northwest

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northwest indians
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These 2,300 photographs and 7,700 pages of text focus on the lives of American Indians in the Northwest Coast and Plateau regions of the Pacific Northwest. Materials illustrate housing, clothing, crafts, transportation, education, employment, and other aspects of everyday life among American Indians in this region. Most of the photographs were taken before 1920.

Texts include more than 3,800 pages from the Annual Reports of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs to the Secretary of the Interior from 1851 through 1908; 89 Pacific Northwest Quarterly articles from 1906—1998; and 23 titles in the University of Washington Publications in Anthropology series. The site also offers 14 maps and 10 lengthy essays authored by anthropologists on specific tribal groups and cross-cultural topics.

America Votes: Presidential Campaign Memorabilia

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Photo, FDR campaign button, America Votes
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A potpourri of 69 images of campaign memorabilia focusing primarily on presidential elections, beginning with a 1796 letter from Supreme Court Justice William Paterson picking John Adams to win against Thomas Jefferson and closing with a Bush/Cheney 2000 button. Includes flags, letters, sheet music, bumper stickers, handbills, buttons, and even a pack of "Stevenson for President" cigarettes.

Items are indexed by candidates and parties. Includes a 600-word background essay and links to 13 sites pertaining to current political parties. Though limited in size, this site can be useful to students interested in comparing visual materials from presidential campaigns throughout U.S. history.

American Leaders Speak: Recordings from World War I and the 1920 Election

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Photo, detail from "James W. Gerard. . . ," 1915, American Leaders Speak
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These 59 sound recordings document speeches by American leaders produced from 1918 to 1920 on the Nation's Forum record label. The speeches—by such prominent public figures as Warren G. Harding, James M. Cox, Calvin Coolidge, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Samuel Gompers, Henry Cabot Lodge, John J. Pershing, Will H. Hays, A. Mitchell Palmer, and Rabbi Stephen S. Wise—deal for the most part with issues and events related to World War I and the 1920 presidential election. Additional topics include social unrest, Americanism, bolshevism, taxes, and business practices.

Speeches range from one to five minutes in length. A special presentation, "From War to Normalcy," introduces the collection with representative recordings, including Harding's famous pronouncement that Americans need "not nostrums but normalcy." This site includes photographs of speakers and of the actual recording disk labels, as well as text versions of the speeches.

American State Papers, 1789-1838

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Logo, Readex
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This subscription-only website presents an extensive archive of U.S. history documents, offering roughly 6,300 publications. The archive provides access to every Congressional and Executive document of the first 14 U.S. Congresses, and additional coverage through the 25th Congress, as well as tables, maps, charts, and other illustrations. The collection is particularly strong in military history, with 205 documents about military bases and posts and 134 on military construction. Other documents address topics such as westward expansion, Native American affairs, and issues surrounding slavery. This collection also includes numerous speeches and messages by Presidents Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison.

Users can browse the archive by category: Subjects, Publication Category, Standing-Committee Author, Document Class, and Congress. Simple and advanced searches are available, enabling easy access into this large collection of documents. For those with access, this site is a valuable resource for researching the government and military in the early United States.