History: American

Primary Sources are: 

• A first-hand account or testimony of the past, written during that present moment

• Something that describes the reactions or thoughts of a particular time period

Primary Sources are vastly different across a variety of disciplines, but the basic definition of what a primary source is stays the same - a testimony or an account describing reactions or thoughts from a particular time. How these testimonies take shape is what changes across disciplines. 

Finding primary sources is a multi-step process. There is no "one-stop-shop" database that will give you everything you need for your paper. Follow these tips: 

• Look at the bibliographies and footnotes from articles and books to see what primary sources those scholars are using for evidence
• Think and research multiple institutions, archives, or repositories that could have information and collections about your project
• Use historical language 
• Keep it simple. Use broad keywords to find sources

When searching for primary source collections online, include the following additional phrases with your first key words: 

• online collections
• digital collections
• digitized collections
• historical collections

Be aware that digital collections only show a small portion of what an institution holds!