Librarian
Alison Wessel
she/her
Contact:
Social Sciences Librarian
Research and Engagement Department
Request a consult: https://calendly.com/alisonwessel/60min
Research and Engagement Department
Request a consult: https://calendly.com/alisonwessel/60min
(302) 831-1730
Databases
- Credo Reference This link opens in a new windowOnline collection of encyclopedias, dictionaries, and other ready-reference books
- Anthropology Plus This link opens in a new windowCitations to articles and essays on anthropology and archaeology
- America: History and Life This link opens in a new windowDefinitive index of literature covering the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present.
- Indigenous Peoples of North America This link opens in a new windowExplore the history of native peoples from the 16th to the 20th century. Covers American Indian tribes and supporting organizations.
Books
Suggested Searches in DELCAT
Lenape Country by
In 1631, when the Dutch tried to develop plantation agriculture in the Delaware Valley, the Lenape Indians destroyed the colony of Swanendael and killed its residents. The Natives and Dutch quickly negotiated peace, avoiding an extended war through diplomacy and trade. The Lenapes preserved their political sovereignty for the next fifty years as Dutch, Swedish, Finnish, and English colonists settled the Delaware Valley. The European outposts did not approach the size and strength of those in Virginia, New England, and New Netherland. Even after thousands of Quakers arrived in West New Jersey and Pennsylvania in the late 1670s and '80s, the region successfully avoided war for another seventy-five years. Lenape Country is a sweeping narrative history of the multiethnic society of the Delaware Valley in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. After Swanendael, the Natives, Swedes, and Finns avoided war by focusing on trade and forging strategic alliances in such events as the Dutch conquest, the Mercurius affair, the Long Swede conspiracy, and English attempts to seize land. Drawing on a wide range of sources, author Jean R. Soderlund demonstrates that the hallmarks of Delaware Valley society--commitment to personal freedom, religious liberty, peaceful resolution of conflict, and opposition to hierarchical government--began in the Delaware Valley not with Quaker ideals or the leadership of William Penn but with the Lenape Indians, whose culture played a key role in shaping Delaware Valley society. The first comprehensive account of the Lenape Indians and their encounters with European settlers before Pennsylvania's founding, Lenape Country places Native culture at the center of this part of North America.
ISBN: 9780812290196Publication Date: 2014-10-21
Before Penn: Swedish Colonist in the Land of the Lenape by Call Number: F167 .S56 1988Publication Date: 1988- Brandywine Valley Cultural Treasures by
Hundreds of photographs highlight a tour of the historic Brandywine Valley region of Pennsylvania and Delaware, featuring journeys to the famed Brandywine River Museum, the Longwood Gardens, and other notable museums, estates, and garden landmarks.
Call Number: F161.5 .W35x 1992ISBN: 9780810936287Publication Date: 1992-01-01
Maps
- Delaware Historical MapsThis guide includes many links to maps of the region - some digitized, some not.
- Historic Map Collection: Maps of Delaware & the Mid-Atlantic RegionA digital map collection at the University of Delaware Library. Includes several hundred sheet maps representing Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Virginia, West Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Includes four atlases of the state of Delaware. The digitized maps are from the 17th through 20th centuries, and include transportation, regional, municipal, manuscripts, historical maps, and nautical charts of the Delaware Bay.
Special Collections
- Finding AidsRead through the finding aids to find materials in special collections related to the Brandywine Valley.
- The Brandywine Valley, rich and beautiful : an agricultural area of 330 square miles, tempered with industries, where 200,000 persons live, work, and play by Call Number: Special Collections - Delaware CollectionPublication Date: 1948This copy can be viewed at Special Collections
- The Brandywine Valley scenic river and highway study by Call Number: FOLIO HD211.D3 N493x 1987Publication Date: 1987This item can be viewed at Special Collections
- William Penn's own account of the Lenni Lenape or Delaware Indians by Call Number: F152 .P293 1970Publication Date: 1970Non-Circulating