Clio: Visualizing History

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This website provides free access to a variety of visual materials and "seeks to illustrate the unique role of visual images in American history." Clio is an educational organization developing American history projects with appeal to a wide audience, including students, educators, and researchers. This site aims to not only provide access to a variety of visual historical materials, such as photographs, illustrations, and material objects (namely quilts), but also "to promote visual literacy by exploring the variety of ways that images enhance our understanding of the past and challenge us to hone our interpretive skills."

The website is organized into three main sections. The first, "Visualizing America," includes two collections of modules, titled "Picturing the Past: Illustrated Histories and the American Imagination, 1840-1900," and "Quilts as Visual History." A second section, "Photography Exhibits," includes three photography collections: one focusing on the work of Frances Benjamin Johnston, another on the work of The Allen Sisters (Mary and Frances Allen), and the Peter Palmquist Gallery. A third section, "Creating History," examines the figure of Lowell Thomas, who became one of America's best known journalists, as well as the media version and reality of Lawrence of Arabia.

A valuable website to students and researchers alike, it suffers only slightly from a lack of search capabilities.

Guampedia

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Illustration, Landing Place at Guam, Jan-July 1863, T. Coghlan, Flickr Commons
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Don't let Guam be forgotten in your classroom! After all, it is one of only 16 non-self-governing territories worldwide that are recognized by the UN. As such, leaving Guam out of history is to ignore a rather remarkable political exception.

Guampedia offers a range of short articles on everything from architecture to World War II. These pages also feature relevant photographs and further resource listings. Additional sections offer basic facts on Guam (motto, population, etc.) and its major villages. Be sure to check out the history lesson plans to see if there's any ready-made content appropriate for you to introduce to your classroom.

Additional ways to explore include a selection of media collections including photographs, illustrations, soundbites, and video; MARC Publications, including issues of the Guam Recorder, lectures, and additional e-publications on topics such as archaeology and stonework; and traditional recipes.

Digital Library of Georgia

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Postcard, 270 Peachtree Building, Historic Postcard Coll., Digital Library of Ga
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Bringing together a wealth of material from libraries, archives, and museums, this website examines the history and culture of the state of Georgia. Legal materials include more than 17,000 state government documents from 1994 to the present, updated daily, and a complete set of Acts and Resolutions from 1799 to 1995. "Southeastern Native American Documents" provides approximately 2,000 letters, legal documents, military orders, financial papers, and archaeological images from 1730–1842. Materials from the Civil War era include a soldier's diary and two collections of letters.

The site provides a collection of 80 full-text, word-searchable versions of books from the early 19th century to the 1920s and three historic newspapers. There are approximately 2,500 political cartoons from 1946-1982; Jimmy Carter's diaries; photographs of African Americans from Augusta during the late 19th century; and 1,500 architectural and landscape photographs from the 1940s to the 1980s.

Kentuckiana Digital Library

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Image for Kentuckiana Digital Library
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These historical materials come from 15 Kentucky colleges, universities, libraries, and historical societies. There are nearly 8,000 photographs; 95 full-text books, manuscripts, and journals from 1784 to 1971; 94 oral histories; 78 issues of Mountain Life and Work from 1925-62; and 22 issues of Works Progress Administration in Kentucky: Narrative Reports.

Photographs include collections by Russell Lee, who documented health conditions resulting from coal industry practices; Roy Stryker, head of the New Deal Farm Security Administration photographic section; and others that provide images of cities, towns, schools, camps, and disappearing cultures. Oral histories address Supreme Court Justice Stanley F. Reed, Senator John Sherman Cooper, the Frontier Nursing Service, veterans, fiddlers, and the transition from farming to an industrial economy. Texts include Civil War diaries, religious tracts, speeches, correspondence, and scrapbooks. Documents cover a range of topics, including colonization societies, civil rights, education, railroads, feuding, the Kentucky Derby, Daniel Boone, and a personal recollection of Abraham Lincoln.

Library of Virginia Digital Library Program

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Image for Library of Virginia Digital Library Program
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More than 1.2 million items on Virginia and life in the South are available on this website, including 40,000 photographs and maps, 350,000 court documents, and 800,000 manuscripts. Manuscripts include governors' letters, land office grants, Revolutionary War bounty land warrants, Confederate pensions, and disability applications. Several complete collections are available, as well as 25 exhibits on Virginia history.

Users can find photographs that document buildings and people; patents and grants submitted to the Virginia Land Office between 1623 and 1992; Northern Neck Grants and Survey forms filed between 1692 and 1892; military records, including Revolutionary War state pensions material and World War I History Commission Questionnaires; WPA Life Histories; and Virginia Religious Petitions from 1774 to 1802. Exhibits deal with topics including the legacy of the New Deal in Virginia; resistance to slavery; Virginia roots music (with seven audio selections); Thomas Jefferson; John Marshall; Virginia's coal towns; and political life in the state.

African Americans in the Spanish Civil War

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Photo, Paul Williams, Pilot, December 1937
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This site documents the remarkable story of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, a volunteer brigade of Americans who traveled to Europe to fight in the Spanish Civil War. Out of the 2,800 volunteers, 90 (including two women) were African Americans.

"Introduction" features a 3,800-word essay in three parts on the Brigade and its commitment to fighting fascism. "Resources" includes six audio and video files, more than 130 pages of documents, and approximately 50 photographs. "Biography" contains an index listing each of the 90 African American soldiers, along with a 250-word biography for each and photographs of most.

The site makes available for the first time a complete (and downloadable) copy of Walter Garland's 60-page FBI file. Garland was a Communist Party activist and founder of the United Negro Allied Veterans Association (UNAVA). Maps, a glossary, timelines, and lesson plans are coming soon as the producers finish building the site. The audio and video interviews, as well as the supporting documents, are useful primary sources, and the site is a good place to begin research on the Abraham Lincoln Brigade.

A Civil War Soldier in the Wild Cat Regiment

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Print, Photographic Print of Tilton C. Reynolds, undated
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These documents focus on Captain Tilton C. Reynolds's experience in the Civil War. Tilton served in the Pennsylvania 105th Volunteer Regiment, and saw action in the eastern theatre of the war. The site includes some 360 digital items, including letters, drawings, and photographs (many of the letters have not been transcribed, and viewers must read the handwritten letters as they looked 140 years ago).

It contains a detailed timeline, documenting the week-to-week position and activities of Reynolds and his unit, punctuated with links to letters, maps, and supporting information. The letters provide detailed accounts of battles, and offer a good look at the day-to-day life of a Civil War soldier. There is also a timeline of the Reynolds family with links to and from Reynolds.

The site is searchable, and visitors may also browse the collection by subject, title, or name. The letters and primary sources will be valuable for those researching the Civil War.

North Carolinians and the Great War

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Poster, Blood or Bread, Henry Raleigh, 1914-1918
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A new addition to the Documenting the American South collection, this site focuses on the impact of World War I on the lives of North Carolinians. Drawn from multiple collections at the UNC-Chapel Hill Libraries, the digitized text and images are divided thematically into three sections, the "Home Front," "Propaganda and Posters," and "Soldiers' Experience." Each section includes an introductory essay (2,000- to 13,000-words) to provide historical context. "The Home Front," is divided into five subject categories: African Americans, educational institutions, mobilizing resources, patriotism and politics, and women. It concentrates on how North Carolinians responded to the war. The 11 documents on the contributions of African Americans and women to the war effort are especially informative.

"Propaganda Posters" includes 100 U.S. World War I posters distributed in North Carolina, covering topics such as military service and war work. "The Soldiers' Experience," focuses on the soldiers, sailors, airmen, and nurses, in and out of combat, and includes memoirs, unpublished diaries and letters, regimental histories, published biographies, and 17 photographs with descriptive captions. Students will also find 17 artifacts typical of soldiers' equipment—boots, field rations, and "dog tags"—fascinating.

Teachers will appreciate this thematic collection for its effective blend of descriptive text, primary and secondary documents, and historical photographs.

D-Day

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Title graphic, American Experience: D-Day
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D-Day is a companion website to the PBS American Experience documentary of the same name. On Tuesday June 6, 1944, the Allies landed in France in an attempt to end World War II. The PBS documentary consists of archival footage and the commentary of 43 eyewitnesses.

While the film itself is not streaming online, you can read the full transcript, which alternates between narration and oral history.

Special Features includes some trivia points, accounts of D-Day by both U.S. and German soldiers, two breaking news articles of the invasion, statistics on paratroopers, and six letters home written by U.S. soldiers following D-Day.

Other site features include a timeline, short biographies of key figures, a map, and a teacher's guide. The teacher's guide offers four activity suggestions—one each for history, economics, geography, and civics. The history suggestion includes writing alternate histories and preparing oral reports on decisive battles in U.S. history.

All in all, the site provides a decent amount of historical trivia and personal accounts, which could be used to enliven a unit on World War II.

Education by Design: Using Visual Aids

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Puzzle, Kindergarten cut-outs
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This site offers an online exhibit and an image database of more than 70 historic educational visual aids created for use by schools, libraries, and museums beginning in 1935 by the WPA's (Works Progress Administration) Museum Extension Project. The collection features items such as puppets, toys, architectural models, dioramas, jigsaw puzzles, handbooks and pamphlets, lantern slides, miniature furniture models, prints, and posters. Each item contains information about its size and place of production.

The collection is searchable by item and by state of manufacture and contains materials from Connecticut, Illinois, Kansas, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Suitable for those interested in material culture or government-sponsored education projects.