Cultural Readings: Colonization and Print in the Americas

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Image for Cultural Readings: Colonization and Print in the Americas
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Texts about the Americas produced in Europe from the 15th through the 19th centuries are examined in this well-organized online exhibit. Over 100 images of printed texts, drawings, artwork, and maps from published and unpublished sources are arranged into six thematic categories. Categories are named: "Promotion and Possession," "Viewers and the Viewed," "Print and Native Cultures," "Religion and Print," "New World Lands in Print," and "Colonial Fictions, Colonial Histories."

Five scholarly essays (5,000 to 7,000 words each) contextualize the documents. A bibliography and list of links accompany the presentation. A visually attractive, thoughtfully arranged site that explores connections between colonization and representation.

Core Historical Literature of Agriculture

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Image for Core Historical Literature of Agriculture
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Currently this website presents full-text, searchable facsimiles of 1,850 monographs and 288 journal volumes related to agriculture in the U.S. All were published between 1806 and 1989. Evaluations and 4,500 core titles are detailed in the seven volume series The Literature of the Agricultural Sciences. Fields of study covered include agricultural economics, agricultural engineering, animal science, forestry, nutrition, rural sociology, and soil science.

Types of materials include memoirs and transactions of early agricultural societies, newspapers, almanacs, agricultural periodicals, governmental publications, and archives of families, communities, and corporations. Users can search by author, title, subject, or keyword, then access the title page, table of contents, index, or pages of the text. These resources are valuable for studying the profound social, cultural, and economic effects of shifts in the history of American farming.

Hypertext on American History from the Colonial Period until Modern Times

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Image, Hypertext on American History from the Colonial Period until Modern Times
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With more than 375 documents related to United States history from the colonial period to the present, this site provides important historical documents and speeches. "Essays" contains more than 35 writings on various aspects of United States history. "Biographies" offers more than 200 biographies of historical figures related to American history, ranging from 350 words to 2,000 words in length. "Presidents" contains documents pertaining to each United States president, including inaugurations and State of the Union addresses.

Documents and essays are hyperlinked to four editions of the booklet An Outline of American History (1954, 1963, 1990, and 1994), a publication distributed abroad by the United States Information Service, along with similar volumes on American economy, government, literature, and geography. The site provides basic primary sources for American history survey courses.

Herblock's History: Political Cartoons from the Crash to the Millennium

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Image, "The other ascent into the unknown," Herbert Block, 1965
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The 150 cartoons presented here were drawn between 1929 and 2000 by three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning political cartoonist Herblock (Herbert Block). Cartoons comment on major events and public issues.

The website also presents an essay by Block on "the cartoon as an opinion medium"; a biographical essay; and 15 caricatures of the cartoonist by well-known colleagues. Cartoons are organized according to 13 chronological sections, with an additional segment devoted to presidents. Brief annotations provide historical context for each image.

A tribute site by the Washington Post, Herblock's longtime employer, offers additional cartoons and essays by Block.

Making the Macintosh: Technology and Culture in Silicon Valley

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Image, Apple II Reference Manual, 1978, Making the Macintosh
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The history of the Macintosh computer is presented on this website. Rather than profile Apple Computer's leader, Steve Jobs, and well-publicized software and hardware developers, materials include 13 interviews with designers, technical writers, Apple employees, a Berkeley user group organizer, and a San Francisco journalist who covered early developments.

In addition, nearly 90 documents from the late 1970s to the present chart company and user group developments, beginning with roots in the 1960s counterculture philosophy. Documents include "From Satori to Silicon Valley," a lecture by Theodore Roszak first delivered in 1985 with afterthoughts added in 2000. There are 13 texts by the first Mac designer, Jef Raskin, press releases and other marketing materials, and texts relating to user groups.

More than 100 images include patent drawings and product photographs.

Legacy Tobacco Documents Library

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Camel cigarettes advertisement, 1952, Legacy Tobacco Documents Library
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More than 40 million pages from more than seven million tobacco industry documents are presented on this website. Documents were made public as a stipulation of the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement to settle multiple lawsuits. Index records, prepared by tobacco companies, can be searched by full-text.

Documents range from the 1930s to 2002, though most were created since the 1950s, and deal with industry concerns such as marketing, sales, advertising, research and development, manufacturing, and expansion of business to developing countries. There are 80 links to related sites and promises to include more documents in the future. This project offers an abundance of material for studying the history of smoking, advertising, and 20th-century American business practices.

Medicine and Madison Avenue

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Image, Ayds ad, Carlay Company Inc., 1953, Medicine and Madison Avenue
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Designed to help users better understand the evolution and complexity of medicinal marketing in the 20th century, this website provides more than 600 health-related advertisements printed in newspapers and magazines from 1910 to 1960. Ads are organized into six categories: Household Products; Over-the-Counter Drugs; Personal and Oral Hygiene; Vitamins and Tonics, Food, Nutrition and Diet Aids; Institutional and Pharmaceutical; and Cigarettes. Over-the-Counter Drugs; Personal and Oral Hygiene; Vitamins and Tonics, Food, Nutrition and Diet Aids provide the largest number of advertisements; the Cigarette category offers only one.

Supplementary materials, such as internal reports from marketing companies, American Medical Association reports and editorials, Federal Trade Commission archival records, transcripts of 1930s radio commercials, and medical journal articles, focus on the production and influence of health-related advertisements. A bibliography provides 80 further reading suggestions. The project highlights materials for case studies on Fleischmann's Yeast, Listerine, and Scott Tissue.

Inventing Entertainment: The Early Innovations of the Edison Companies

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Image, Catalog for Edison cylinder records, 1911, Inventing Entertainment
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These materials—early motion pictures from 1891 to 1918, 81 sound recordings from 1913 to 1920, and related materials, such as photographs and original magazine articles—document Thomas Edison's impact on the history of American entertainment. Edison's inventions included the phonograph, the kinetograph motion picture camera, and the kinetoscope motion picture viewer.

Sound recordings are accessible by title and according to six genres: instrumental selections, popular vocals, spoken word, spoken comedy, foreign language and ethnic recordings, and opera and concert recordings. Films are organized by title, chronologically, and according to genres, including actualities (nonfiction films), advertising, animation, drama and adventure, experimental, humorous, trick, and reenactments. Actuality subjects include disasters, expositions, famous people, foreign places, the navy, police and fire departments, railroads, scenic America, sports and leisure, the variety stage, and war. Special pages focus on the life of the inventor and his contribution to motion picture and sound recording technologies.

American Family Immigration History Center

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Photo,"Immigrants aboard [...],"1892, American Family Immigration History Center
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Records on the more than 25 million passengers and ship crew members who passed through Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924 are available through this website. Most passengers came from Europe and Russia, although there are some records from Asia, the Caribbean, and Latin America.

The website requires a free, simple registration to view detailed records that include name, residence, date of arrival, age on arrival, ethnicity, place of residence, marital status, ship of travel, place of departure, and a copy of the original ship manifest (a transcription is also available). The website includes extensive contextual information about Ellis Island, immigration, and genealogical research. "Family Histories" illuminates the genealogical research experiences of six Americans of diverse ethnic backgrounds.

The "Peopling of America" exhibit covers six periods from pre-1790 to 2000, with graphs, photographs, and immigration statistics geared to place of origin. Additional information is available for an annual fee.

Lost Museum

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Photo, Fejee Mermaid, Lost Museum
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P. T. Barnum's American Museum burned down under mysterious circumstances in 1865 after nearly a quarter century of patronage. The original museum tried both to entertain and educate with exhibits on natural history, American history, and reform efforts along with attractions of a sensational nature. With the exception of African Americans, who were barred from entry until the Civil War, New Yorkers of diverse ethnic, gender, and class identities mingled in the museum's shared cultural space.

Visitors to this website can explore an interactive 3D recreation of the museum or an archive of images, documents, accounts, and essays on 16 original Barnum exhibits, including the Fejee mermaid; Joice Heth, a former slave advertised as George Washington's nursemaid; "Swedish Nightingale" Jenny Lind; John Brown; Jefferson Davis; the Lincoln assassination; the Civil War in New York; and phrenology. The website allows visitors to immerse themselves in the popular culture of Barnum's era.