Mary, The Primary Source Librarian | July 21, 2007
An entertaining online exhibit from the Smithsonian Archives of American Art has real potential for a back-to-school primary source introduction. It’s called “Wish You Were Here: Artists on Vacation,” and it has some delightful examples of primary sources produced by well-known American artists from the mid-1800s to about 1970. As stated in the introduction, “Like [...]
Mary, The Primary Source Librarian | July 11, 2007
I have finally found the courage to read the nearly 800-page tome by Doris Kearns Goodwin–Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005). Goodwin’s study of Lincoln’s quest for the presidential nomination against three more accomplished and nationally known competitors strikes me as quite an original approach to [...]
Mary, The Primary Source Librarian | July 4, 2007
It’s July 4th, and although most schools are on summer break, I thought I’d take a look at American Memory for lessons about Independence Day. I ran across a nicely presented lesson for beginning primary source analysis (all grade levels) called “Looking into Holidays Past through Primary Sources.” It includes some excellent analysis guides for [...]