Library Guides: National History Day Guide: Using Other Resources from the Iowa State University Library

University Library Resources

Materials from Special Collections and University Archives are important in History research, however, you may need to look beyond those collections to find sources. The Iowa State University Library has a variety of resources that might be able to help. Be sure to look for books, articles in databases, and historical newspapers to augment your search.

Find Books with Quick Search

Free to Access Databases

Free Databases (Access Anytime!)

JSTOR: Open Content This link opens in a new window
This is a subset of the full JSTOR collection, limited to content found in the JSTOR Open Collection. It is primarily a collection of book chapters, but it also contains several thousand freely-accessible journal articles.

Chronicling America
This website providing access to information about historic newspapers and select digitized newspaper pages, and is produced by the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP).
Digital Public Library of America
All of the materials found through DPLA—photographs, books, maps, news footage, oral histories, personal letters, museum objects, artwork, government documents, and so much more—are free and immediately available in digital format.

ISU Databases

Paid Databases (Login on Campus)

JSTOR This link opens in a new window
JSTOR spans many disciplines, primarily in the humanities, social sciences, and life sciences. It includes digitized current and back issues of academic journals, books and primary source materials.
America: History and Life This link opens in a new window
Covers the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present. With indexing for 1,700 journals from publications going back to 1910.
Historical Abstracts This link opens in a new window
Historical Abstracts covers the history of the world (excluding the United States and Canada) from 1450 to the present, including world history, military history, women's history, history of education, and more.
Academic Search Ultimate This link opens in a new window
This database covers almost all subject areas and is especially good at interdisciplinary areas. Good place to start for class assignments. It contains full text articles for more than 6,500 journals.

Related Guides

Primary Sources

ProQuest Historical Newspapers This link opens in a new window
An archive of 14 major historical U.S. newspapers that can be searched collectively or individually. Every issue of each title includes the complete paper, cover to cover.

The Goldfinch: Iowa History for Young People
An Iowa history magazine for people aged 8 to 13. Each issue focused on a theme (ranging from Immigrants to Diaries, from Home and Family to Iowa’s Kid Heroes) and includes articles, games, photos, and fiction.

HathiTrust This link opens in a new window
A very large (17+ million items) collection of digitized books and journals, including full access to items in the public domain. To enable additional full-text access, after the HathiTrust page loads, click on "Login" in the upper right corner, then select "Iowa State University" on the dropdown list, and enter your ISU Net-ID and password.

National History Day Guide
by Special Collections & University Archives Last Updated Apr 2, 2024 135 views this year