LibGuides: Literature: 20th century literature texts and sources

Databases: Primary Source Collections, 1900-

African Writers Series
Novels, plays, poetry, traditional African folk materials and non-fictional accounts of African culture and history.
Asian American Drama
Plays by Asian-American playwrights along with biographical, production and theatrical information.
Black Drama
Over 1200 plays by more than 200 playwrights from North America, English-speaking Africa, the Caribbean, and other African diaspora countries.
Some 440 of the plays are published here for the first time, including a number by major authors.
Black Short Fiction and Folklore
Works of short fiction produced by writers from Africa and the African Diaspora from the earliest times to the present.
Part of ProQuest One Literature combined search portal
Black Women Writers
Works by Black women writers from the African diaspora, including African American women and Caribbean writers.
Part of ProQuest One Literature combined search portal
Caribbean Literature
Good for: Exploring poetry, fiction and essays from Caribbean writers.
Contains: Literary works, biographies, reference works, and literary criticism.
Drama Online
Good for: Reading play scripts and scholarly books analyzing drama.
Contains: Scripts for over 1000 plays, from Aeschylus to the present day, including modern classics from Tom Stoppard, David Mamet, Caryl Churchill and many more.

Faber Poetry Library
The works of 50 poets comprising 140 volumes of poetry published by Faber. Authors include Simon Armitage, Rupert Brooke, Wendy Cope, T. S. Eliot, Lavinia Greenlaw, Thom Gunn, Seamus Heaney, Ted Hughes, David Jones, Louis MacNeice, Andrew Motion, Paul Muldoon, Tom Paulin, Sylvia Plath, Siegfried Sassoon, Stephen Spender and Edward Thomas.

Latin American Women Writers
1600-
Memoirs, letters, and essays by Latin American women.
Latino Literature: Poetry, Drama, and Fiction
1872-
Novels, short stories and poems, and plays written by Americans of Spanish or Latin American heritage.
Latino Literature brings together more than 100,000 pages of poetry, fiction, and drama written in English and Spanish by hundreds of Chicano, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Dominican, and other Latin authors working in the United States. Among the gems of the collection are nearly 800 items (poems, novels, and plays) that have never been published before. Researchers will also find numerous Chicano folk tales and audio files of selected poems and plays. It currently contains over 106,000 pages of poetry.

Literature, Culture and Society in Depression Era America: Archives of the Federal Writers' Project

London Low Life
1800-1910
Primary sources like ballads, slang dictionaries, brothel guides and posters sold on the street during the 19th century in London.
Theatre in Context
Reference texts in American theater, as well as images of posters, playbills, photos, architectural images, floor plans, and other ephemera.
Update frequency: quarterly
North American Women's Drama
1770-present
Plays written by women in the United States and Canada.
Many of the works are rare, hard to find, or out of print. Almost a quarter of the collection consists of previously unpublished plays. Plays are also included in North American Theatre Online.
South and Southeast Asian Literature in English
Fiction, short fiction, and poems written from the end of the colonial era to the present by South Asian and Southeast Asian writers.
The collection captures a broad range of personal experiences—South Asian elites educated in legacy British colonial schools; Indian descendants of 19th-century indentured plantation and railroad laborers, now living in the Caribbean or Africa; and writers born into immigrant communities in London, Toronto, and New York. Part of the ProQuest One Literature combined search portal.
Travel Writing, Spectacle and World History
1818-1974
Travel writing in manuscripts, diaries and correspondence as well as drawings, guidebooks and photographs.

Twentieth Century African American Poetry
1900-2000
9,000 poems by the most important and influential African American poets of the last century. Coverage begins with the key writers of the early decades, continues with major figures of the Harlem Renaissance and the Black Arts movement of the 1960s, and concludes with a considerable body of writing of the 1980s and 1990s.
Twentieth Century American Poetry
1900-2000
50,000 poems by over 300 poets. Major movements of the century are represented, including modernism, the Black Mountain school, Deep Image poetry, underground literature by the Beat poets, influential feminist works, and works by the confessional poets.

Twentieth Century Drama
1900-2000
Full text scripts of plays.
Authors from Britain and Ireland, North America, India, Africa, Australia and the Caribbean, indexed by subject and keyword-searchable. Strengths of this collection include Irish drama, off-Broadway and alternative theatre, political plays, and global and postcolonial theatre. The "Find Monologue" feature helps actors find good audition pieces. Also searchable from within LION.

Twentieth Century English Poetry
1900-2000
598 volumes of poetry by 283 poets, including W.B. Yeats, Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy, Wilfred Owen, Thom Gunn, Fleur Adcock, Paul Muldoon, Tony Harrison, Benjamin Zephaniah and Carol Ann Duffy, and incorporating poets from The Faber Poetry Library.

North American Indian Drama
Good for: Reading plays by Native American playwrights
Contains: Dramatic works from playwrights from Cherokee, Métis, Creek, Choctaw, Pembina Chippewa, Ojibway, Lenape, Comanche, Cree, Navajo, Rappahannock, Hawaiian/Samoan, and other American Indian and First Nation communities.
Dates covered: 1920-2019
North American Indian Drama contains 244 plays by 48 playwrights representing the stories and creative energies of American Indian and First Nation playwrights of the twentieth century. More than half of the works are previously unpublished, and hard to find, representing groups such as Cherokee, Métis, Creek, Choctaw, Pembina Chippewa, Ojibway, Lenape, Comanche, Cree, Navajo, Rappahannock, Hawaiian/Samoan, and others. Together, the plays demonstrate Native theater’s diversity of tribal traditions and approaches to drama—melding conventional dramatic form with ancient storytelling and ritual performance elements, experimenting with traditional ideas of time and narrative, or challenging Western dramatic structure.
North American Indian Thought and Culture
1784-2006
Biographies, oral histories, personal papers, images and audio files documenting the history of American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Canadian First Peoples with representation of historical events as told by the individuals who lived through them.
Twentieth Century North American Drama
1900-2000
Plays from the United States and Canada.
Update frequency: quarterly
In addition to providing a comprehensive full-text resource for students in the performing arts, the collection offers a unique window into the economic, historical, social, and political psyche of two countries. Plays are also included in North American Theatre Online.

The full text of letters and diary entries, often from works that have been previously published as books containing collections of letters or diaries. Use the Browse indexes to find works about specific historical or life events.

Manuscript Women's Letters and Diaries from the American Antiquarian Society
Good for: Exploring women’s letters and diaries to learn about historical events and details of daily life in the past.
Contains: Handwritten letters and diaries with a detailed index
Dates covered: 1770s-1970s
The letters and diaries reveal, in each woman’s own hand, the details of the authors’ daily lives, their activities and concerns, and their attitudes towards the people and world around them. The collection is drawn entirely from the extensive holdings of the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Massachusetts.
North American Immigrant Letters & Diaries
1840-
Personal narratives, including letters, diaries, pamphlets, autobiographies, and oral histories about immigrating to the U.S. or Canada.
North American Women's Letters and Diaries
1770-1950
Diaries, journals, and letters written by famous and not-so-famous North American women.

Use the date range limit to narrow your search to a relevant time period.

America's Historical Newspapers
1690-1923
Historical newspapers from every state in the U.S.
Indigenous Newspapers in North America
1828-2016
Includes national periodicals as well as local community news and student publications from an Indigenous perspective.
Historical Black Newspapers from ProQuest
1893-2010
African American newspapers from Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Cleveland, Los Angeles, New York, Norfolk VA., Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh.
British Library Newspapers
1732-1950
National and regional British newspapers representing different political and cultural views.
Historical Newspapers: Chicago Defender, 1909-2010
1909-2010
African American newspaper from Chicago, Illinois.
Historical Newspapers: Chicago Tribune
1849-2014
Major daily newspaper from Chicago.
Historical Newspapers: Christian Science Monitor, 1908-2007
1908-2007
Articles and images from The Christian Science Monitor newspaper.
Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers
Good for: Researching historical events through American newspapers, including Nevada newspapers.
Contains: Historical newspapers.
Dates covered: 1789-1963.
Hispanic American Newspapers, 1808-1980
1808-1980
Newspapers published by Hispanic-American communities primarily in Arizona, California, New Mexico, Texas and New York.
Las Vegas Review Journal Archive (1929-1996)
3/30/1929-present
Nevada daily newspaper. 1929-1996 is page images only; 1997- is article text only, no images.
Historical Newspapers: Los Angeles Times
1881-2015
Historical California newspaper.
Historical Newspapers: New York Times
1851-2020
Historical New York newspaper.
Historical Newspapers: New York Tribune, 1841-1922
1841-1922
Full text of New York Tribune, 1841-1922.
Historical Newspapers: South China Morning Post, 1903-2001
1903-2001
English-language Hong Kong daily newspaper.
Times Digital Archive, 1785-2019
1785-2019
The Times (London) newspaper.
Historical Newspapers: Washington Post
1877-2007
Daily newspaper from Washington, DC.

Google News Archive
Mostly American and Canadian papers, 19th and 20th century.
United States Online Historic Newspapers
List of digitized historical newspaper collections, including many that are free.

search tips

Search for articles published in popular magazines and journals from different times in history.

African American Historical Serials Collection, 1816-1922
1816-1922
Newspapers and magazines published by African American churches, educational and service institutions.
American Historical Periodicals from the American Antiquarian Society, Part I-V (EBSCO)
1684-1912
Popular magazines, newspapers, and journals published in the United States.
American Periodicals Series
1740-1940
Magazines and journals published in the U.S. mostly before 1900.
Arte Público Hispanic Historical Collection
1750-present
Publications documenting the Hispanic culture of the United States - history, literature, political commentary, and culture. Written in Spanish (80%) and English (20%).
British Periodicals
1681-1920
Popular British periodicals mostly from the 19th century.
Economist Historical Archive, 1843-2015
1843-2015
Issues of The Economist, a news magazine with a global scope published in London.
Eighteenth Century Journals
1685-1835
Literary, satirical, political, religious and theatrical magazines and newspapers from Britain, Ireland, Scotland, India and the Caribbean.
Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive
1880-2015
Music, film, broadcasting and theater industry trade publications published before 2015 including Variety, Billboard, Spin, The Hollywood Reporter, American Cinematographer, American Film, Picturegoer and more.
Harper's Bazaar Archive
1867-
Harper's Bazaar magazine shows changes in American fashion, culture and society.
Media History Digital Library
1903-1995. Film industry and fan publications.
Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive, 1902-2013
1902-2013
London Times Literary Supplement publishes essays, letters, poems and articles.
Vogue Archive
Good for: Researching fashion and culture, including specific garments, accessories or brands.
Contains: Images and text from Vogue Magazine.
Dates covered: 1892-present.
Women's Magazine Archive
1887-2005
North American women's magazines including Better Homes and Gardens, Chatelaine, Good Housekeeping, Ladies' Home Journal, Parents Magazine, Seventeen, Cosmopolitan and Essence.
Women's Wear Daily Archive
1910-
Comprehensive archive of Women’s Wear Daily (WWD), the leading fashion-industry trade paper.

Collections of several types of primary sources curated around a topic or theme.

African American Archives
1792-1941
Primary source documents from the National Archives about the lives of African Americans in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
African American Communities
1860s-1980s
Primary sources documenting African American communities in Atlanta, Chicago, New York, and towns and cities in North Carolina.
Age of Exploration
1420-1920
Primary sources like manuscripts, maps and illustrated documents, diaries and ship logs recording the experiences of Europeans as they explored trade routes, colonized the Americas and Australasia, and raced to the North and South Poles.
Americana
1493-1975
Search all American history archival collections from Adam Matthew Publishers.
Combined search of American History, American Indian Histories and Cultures, American West, Everyday Life & Women in America c.1800-1920, Popular Culture in Britain and America, 1950-1975, Slavery, Abolition and Social Justice, and Virginia Company Archives.
American Consumer Culture
1850-1990s
Search three archival collections representing 20th century advertising and marketing from Adam Matthew Publishers.
Combined search of Market Research & American Business, 1935-1965, Trade Catalogues and the American Home, J. Walter Thompson: Advertising America
American History (Gilder Lehrman collection)
1493-1945
Primary sources from the Gilder Lehrman collection about American history from the earliest settlers to the mid-twentieth century.
Indigenous Histories and Cultures in North America
1400-1950s
Primary sources for American Indian history in the United States, Canada and Mexico. Manuscripts, artwork and rare printed books from pre-contact through the mid-20th century.
American West
1830-1939
Pamphlets, maps, books, ephemeral material and rare printed sources related to the history of the American West.
Part of Americana combined search portal
Archives of Sexuality and Gender: LGBTQ History and Culture Since 1940 (parts I and II)
1940-present
Primary sources from more than 35 countries related to LGBTQ activism and the HIV/AIDS crisis.
Also searchable in Gale Primary Sources.
Civil Rights and the Black Freedom Struggle
Good for: Primary sources from the civil rights movement in the United States.
Contains: Official publications and primary source material including records of the NAACP, papers from presidential administrations, and relevant records from the FBI and other federal agencies.
Dates covered: 1901-2000.
Black Studies Center
Scholarship and historical sources for Black Studies.
Chatham House Online
Good for: Researching international affairs from a British perspective.
Contains: Commentary, speeches, and analysis from a nonprofit NGO.
Dates covered: 1920-2008.
Children's Literature and Cultures
Good for: Exploring the socio-cultural history of the United States in the 19th century through children's literature.
Contains: Rare books, games, ephemera, and artwork.
Dates covered: 1790s-1930s.
China and the Modern World: Missionary, Sinology and Literary Periodicals, 1817-1949
Good for: Studying China's relations with the West in the 19th and early 20th century.
Contains: Academic and literary journals and missionary periodicals in English about China.
Dates covered: 1817-1949.
China Studies
Good for: Exploring Chinese life and culture over the past 300 years.
Contains: Primary source documents like printed books, pamphlets, paintings, manuscripts, diaries, newspapers, and periodicals.
Dates covered: 1750-1980.
Church Missionary Society Periodicals
Good for: Understanding the perspective of Anglican missionary administrators and workers on cultural encounters around the world.
Contains: Newspapers, journals, and reports.
Dates covered: 1804-2009.
Defining Gender
Good for: Evidence of changing views about gender, themed around conduct, domesticity, consumption and leisure, education, and the body.
Contains: Primary sources like correspondence, advice literature, periodicals, ephemera and government documents.
Dates covered: 1500s-1920.
Eighteenth Century Drama: Censorship and the Stage
Good for: Examining scripts of plays submitted for license in England before 1824.
Contains: Archive of plays, diaries, playbills, theatre records, and correspondence.
Dates covered: 1737-1824.
Empire Online
Good for: Exploring colonial history, politics, culture and society from British and European perspectives.
Contains: Primary sources from archival collections.
Dates covered: 1492-1969.
Everyday Life and Women in America
Good for: Studying American social, cultural, and popular history in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Contains: Primary sources like periodicals, pamphlets and books.
Dates covered: 1800-1920.
First World War Portal
1900-1950
Primary sources including documents, films and oral histories themed around personal experiences, propaganda and recruitment, visual perspectives and narratives, and the global conflict.
Food Studies Online
1900-
Food Studies Online contains 80,000 pages of primary archival materials, images, and secondary works, plus 200 hours of documentaries and series, and visual ephemera.
Key themes and disciplines with extensive coverage represented include marketing and consumerism, production and technology, food history, food movements, culinary and food design, food and identity, health, policy, religion, sociology, anthropology, and history. Coverage from the 1940s.
Frontier Life: Borderlands, Settlement and Colonial Encounters
1650-1920
Primary sources like expedition records, letters, diaries and government records from Europeans creating colonies in North America, Africa, and Australasia.
Gender: Identity and Social Change
1800-present
Primary sources documenting the changing representations and lived experiences of gender roles and relations, like women's suffrage, the feminist movement, the men’s movement, employment, education, family and the body.
Global Commodities: Trade, Exploration and Cultural Exchange
1500-present
Primary source materials that tell the story of global trade in chocolate, coffee, cotton, fur, opium, oil, porcelain, silver and gold, spices, sugar, tea, timber, tobacco, wheat, and wine and spirits.
J. Walter Thompson: Advertising America
1880s-1990s
The J. Walter Thompson Company advertising agency archives include brand case studies and account files about campaigns for Kellogg’s, Kodak, Kraft, Oscar Mayer, Pan Am, the US Marine Corps, and more.
Part of the American Consumer Culture combined search portal.
Jewish Life in America
1654-1954
Organizational and personal archival collections including rare printed books and pamphlets from the American Jewish Historical Society in New York.
Latino-Hispanic American Experience: Leaders, Writers, and Thinkers
1800-1960
Primary sources related to Hispanic-American writers and activists in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Leisure, Travel and Mass Culture: The History of Tourism
1850-1980
Archival material from the travel agency Thomas Cook, a pioneer of package tourism. Includes periodicals such as the Excursionist magazine, personal accounts from travelers on early Cook’s tours, photographs, advertising brochures, guidebooks, posters and ephemeral items.
Literary Print Culture: The Stationers Company Archive
1554-2007
Collection of primary source documents related to the workings of the early book trade, the printing and publishing community, the establishment of legal requirements for copyright provisions and the history of bookbinding.
London Low Life
1800-1910
Primary sources like ballads, slang dictionaries, brothel guides and posters sold on the street during the 19th century in London.
Market Research and American Business, 1935-1965
1935-1965
Market research reports and supporting documents regarding the American consumer boom of the mid-20th century from the archives of Ernest Dichter and the Institute for Motivational Research.
Part of the American Consumer Culture combined search portal.
Mass Observation Online
1937-1960
Personal diaries, surveys, questionnaires, photos and printed research done about everyday lives of ordinary British people.
Social research organization Mass Observation was founded in 1937 by anthropologist Tom Harrisson, film-maker Humphrey Jennings and poet Charles Madge, who recruited a team of observers and a panel of volunteer writers to document their experiences as evidence for a study of the everyday lives of ordinary people in Britain.
Medical Services and Warfare
1850s-1930s
Primary sources from Crimean War, the American Civil War and the First World War tell the story of medical advances during warfare, including the outbreak of the influenza epidemic in 1918 and the discovery of penicillin in 1927.
Meiji Japan
1850s-1930s
Publications, papers, journals and diaries of Edward Sylvester Morse (1838-1925), a polymath notable for his work in natural history, ethnography and art history – but, perhaps most famous for his work in bringing Japan and the West closer together.
Migration to New Worlds
1800-1924
Primary sources like personal accounts, correspondence, maps, plans and photos documenting the movement of peoples from Great Britain, Ireland, mainland Europe and Asia to the New World and Australasia.
Nineteenth Century Collections Online: British Politics and Society
Good for: Finding primary sources about the development of urban centers and of the restructuring of society that took place during the Industrial Revolution in Great Britain.
Contains: Government and archival collections
Dates covered: 1750-1916
Also searchable in Gale Primary Sources.
Nineteenth Century Literary Society
1768-1900s
Archival collection digitizing more than 1,400 letters, literary works, and financial records from the historic John Murray publishing company. Includes annotated drafts of Byron’s works and correspondence from Jane Austen, Charles Darwin and Isabella Bird.
Also features correspondence charting the founding of the business by John Murray in 1768, the completed, first edition file copy of On the Origin of Species, with related correspondence from Charles Darwin, and financial papers charting the sales success of hundreds of Murray titles.
Performance Design Archive Online
Books and periodicals, archival material, and specially commissioned instructional videos about design concepts for a broad range of performance types, including dance, theatre, opera, and music.
Performance Design Archive Online is the first comprehensive, international collection that covers all aspects of theater production design, from the 17th century through to the present day, including, scenic and set design, lighting design, sound design, costume design, makeup, and more.
Political Extremism and Radicalism: Far-Right and Left Political Groups in the U.S., Europe and Australia in the Twentieth Century
1900-2000. Campaign materials, periodicals, propaganda, government records, oral histories, and ephemera from fringe political movements on the right and the left.
Popular Culture in Britain and America
1950-1975
Primary sources documenting music and popular culture in the US and Britain, 1950-1975, including manuscripts, video, photos, underground magazines and more.
Part of Americana combined search portal
Race Relations in America
1943-1970
Primary sources on the fight for civil rights, including speeches, reports, surveys and analyses produced by the Fisk University Race Relations Department’s staff and Institute participants, including Charles S. Johnson, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Thurgood Marshall.
Service Newspapers of World War Two
1939-1948
The story of World War II as told by the newspapers that brought information, entertainment and camaraderie to the forces at home and overseas. Explore over 200 titles from key nations across the globe that took part in the world-changing conflict.
Sex & Sexuality
1800s-2010s
Archival research collections exploring changing attitudes towards human sexuality, gender identities and sexual behaviors and investigating the breadth and complexity of human sexual understanding through the work of leading sexologists, sex researchers, organizations and personal accounts.
Please be aware that this resource contains material of a sexually explicit nature. Includes official records of pressure groups and community organizations, anonymous qualitative surveys, diaries, correspondence, periodicals, photographs, erotic fiction and visual erotica, papers of sexologists, newsletters, reports, pamphlets and ephemera.
Shakespeare's Globe Archive: Theatres, Players & Performance
1997-2016
Material from the performance and architectural archives of the modern reconstruction of Shakespeare’s 1599 Globe Theatre.
The performance archive shows how productions at the reconstructed Globe and Sam Wanamaker Playhouse were conceived, rehearsed, dressed, marketed, sound tracked, how props were used, how the audiences behaved and the theatre history and performance lessons that were observed and learned. The architectural archive contains material on how the reconstruction of the theatre was designed and planned and some of the conversations and debates that informed construction decisions. In addition, there is also material on the theatre’s annual reports, communications to its supporters and oral histories detailing some of the early history of the reconstructed theatre.
Slavery, Abolition and Social Justice
1490-2007
Case studies documenting slavery in America, the Caribbean, Brazil and Cuba, along with material examining European, Islamic and African involvement in the slave trade.
Socialism on Film
1918-1990
Documentaries, newsreels and feature films that reveal the 20th century world as seen by Soviet, Chinese, Vietnamese, East European, British and Latin American filmmakers.
This collection of films from the communist world reveals war, history, current affairs, culture and society as seen through the socialist lens. Covers countries such as the USSR, Vietnam, China, Korea, much of Eastern Europe, the GDR, Britain and Cuba.
Trade Catalogues and the American Home
1850-1950
Primary sources like catalogs, price lists, and brochures reflecting the history of consumer advertising and marketing and life and leisure in America. Includes department store catalogs, cosmetic advertisements, real estate brochures and much more.
Part of the American Consumer Culture combined search portal.
Travel Writing, Spectacle and World History
1818-1974
Travel writing in manuscripts, diaries and correspondence as well as drawings, guidebooks and photographs.
Victorian Popular Culture
Good for: Finding primary sources related to popular entertainment in America, Britain, and Europe.
Contains: Books, posters, scrapbooks, and optical toys.
Dates covered: 1779-1930.
Women and Social Movements in Modern Empires
1820-present
Primary sources highlighting the voices of colonized women, including in China, Japan, the Philippines, Europe, the Eastern Mediterranean and Balkans, and South Africa. Includes Native American women, also American women in Guatemala and China.
Women and Social Movements in the United States
1600-2000
Books, images, historical documents, scholarly essays, commentaries, and bibliographies which document reform activities by and affecting women.
Women in the National Archives
1903-1962
Original documents from the National Archives on the suffrage question in Britain, the Empire and colonial territories.
Part of the Archives Direct combined search portal.
World’s Fairs
1851-2000s
Official records, monographs, publicity, artwork and artifacts about world’s fairs, exhibitions and expos.

Digitized collections of books published during different time periods.

America's Historical Imprints
1639-1923
PDFs of books, pamphlets and broadsides published in North America, including most books published between 1639-1819.
American Pamphlets
1820-1922
Pamphlets with advice and opinions about all kinds of 19th century controversies.
Part of America's Historical Imprints combined search portal
Gerritsen Collection-Women's History Online, 1543-1945
1543-1945
Books and periodicals reflecting the evolution of a feminist consciousness and the movement for women's rights.
Hathi Trust
Good for: Searching books and periodicals, including full text access to those in the public domain and limited search for those still under copyright.
Contains: Scanned books and periodicals

Digitized photos and art images.

ARTstor
Art digital images and related data.
A repository of hundreds of thousands of digital images in the areas of art, architecture, the humanities, social sciences and related data; the tools to actively use those images; and a restricted usage environment that seeks to balance the rights of content providers with the needs and interests of content user.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Online Catalog
Images held by the Prints and Photographs division of the Library of Congress.
The Prints and Photographs Online Catalog contains catalog records and digital images representing a rich cross-section of still pictures held by the Prints & Photographs Division and other units of the Library of Congress. About 90% of the records are accompanied by one or more digital images. In some collections, only thumbnail images display to those searching outside the Library of Congress because of potential rights considerations.

Life Photo Archive
Millions of news and editorial photographs and other images dating from 1750 to the present. Includes many iconic images, but most were never published.
NYPL Digital Photo Collections
Includes several fashion design collections as well as many historical photos from the NY Public Library.
Smithsonian Photography Initiative
Online database of photographs dating from the 1850s to the present. Subjects cover the arts and literature, culture and society, nature and science, industry and technology, history and geography. Includes both professional photos and amateur snapshots.
UNLV digital photo collections
Search collection of photos of Nevadans and more held in UNLV Libraries Special Collections and Archives.

These links allow you to search across multiple databases at the same time.

AM Search
Good for: Searching across all collections of historical primary sources from Adam Matthew Publishers.
Contains: Primary sources held in libraries, museums and archives around the world.
Gale Primary Sources
Includes 19th Century UK Periodicals, Archives of Sexuality & Gender (LGBTQ History), British Library Newspapers, The Economist (1843-2014), Eighteenth Century Collections Online, Nineteenth Century Collections Online, Nineteenth Century U.S. Newspapers, Sabin Americana (1500-1926), China and the Modern World, London Times Digital Archive, and London Times Literary Supplement.
Historical U.S. Newspapers from ProQuest
1841-2000 with some more recent
Search all ProQuest U.S. historical newspaper collections simultaneously.
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: Chicago Defender‎ (1909 - 1975)
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: Chicago Tribune‎ (1849 - 1993)
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Christian Science Monitor‎ (1908 - 2003)
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: Los Angeles Times‎ (1881 - 1993)
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The New York Times‎ (1851 - 2013)
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: New York Tribune‎ (1841 - 1922)
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Washington Post‎ (1877 - 2000)
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: U.S. West, including Reno Gazette-Journal (1876-2008), San Francisco Examiner (1889-2007), and Spokane Statesman-Review (1894-2009)
Historical Periodicals from ProQuest
1740-1940 with some more recent
Search all ProQuest historical periodical collections simultaneously.
American Periodicals‎ (1740 - 1940)
British Periodicals‎ (1681 - 1939)
Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive‎ (1880 - 2000)
The Harper's Bazaar Archive‎ (1867 - current)
Periodicals Archive Online‎
The Vogue Archive‎
Women's Magazine Archive‎ (1846 - 2005)
The Women's Wear Daily Archive‎
Readex AllSearch
1639-1922
Combined search of American historical newspapers (1690-1922), printed books (1639-1819), and pamphlets and ephemera (1749-1922).
Search all collections of historical primary sources from Readex simultaneously: America's Historical Newspapers, American Broadsides and Ephemera; American Pamphlets; Early American Imprints (Evans and Shaw-Shoemaker).

Accessible Archives combined search
Cross search 19thC American periodicals, newspapers, pamphlets, and clippings.

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Collections include African American Newspapers, The Civil War A Newspaper Perspective, Godey's Lady's Book, South Carolina Newspapers (colonial), and antislavery and woman suffrage publications.
EBSCO 19th C periodicals
Cross search American Antiquarian Society periodicals with African American Serials, Gateway to North America collections.

Copyright holders

Copyright & Fair Use
UNLV Libraries guide with advice on copyright, including reproducing excerpts as well as protecting your own work.
WATCH rightsholder database
WATCH (Writers, Artists and their copyright holders) is a database of copyright contacts for writers, artists, and prominent figures in other creative fields.

Literature

Databases: Primary Source Collections, 1900-

Copyright holders

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Contact