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Background & Overviews

Dictionary of North Carolina Biography . Reference CT252 .D5

Guide to North Carolina Historical Highway Markers.
Reference F255 .G8 

History of North Carolina. (Ashe) Reference F254 .A822 

History of North Carolina. (Lefler) Reference F254 .L35

The North Carolina Almanac and Book of Facts.
Reference F254 .N963 1986 

North Carolina Encyclopedia (Online encyclopedia offered by the North Carolina State Library.)

North Carolina Government, 1585-1974 : A Narrative and Statistical History.
Reference JK4131 1975 .N68 1975 

North Carolina Governors, 1585-1968 : Brief Sketches. Reference F253 .N8612 1968 

North Carolina Manual. Reference JK4130 .N6 (1913-present. Latest edition on Ready Reference).

North Carolina: Rebuilding an Ancient Commonwealth, 1584-1925. (Connor)
Reference F254 .C74 

North Carolina : The Old North State and the New. (Henderson) Reference F254 .H45

On This Day in North Carolina. Reference F254 .P58 1996 

Bibliographies and Guides to Research

North Carolina History: An Annotated Bibliography. Reference F254 .J66 1995 
This is a really key resource for published material.

Guide to research materials in the North Carolina State Archives : state agency records.
Reference CD3424 .N67 1995    

Guide to Research Materials in the North Carolina State Archives. Section B: County Records. Reference CD3424 .N67a 
This will serve as a guide to the microform sets we have for sooutheastern North Carolina counties.

North Carolina Research: Genealogy and Local History, 2d ed. Reference CS49 .N67 1996   

Library Catalogs

Randall Library Catalog = Local holdings of library's books, videos, government documents, manuscript collections and journal holdings. (Note that the journal information in the catalog tells what issues we have but does not index individual articles.) Some web sites are also cataloged.

WorldCat = Cataloged holdings of over 9,000 libraries.

Subject Headings

• The library catalog and WorldCat use Library of Congress Subject Headings. This list of authorized subject headings is available in the 5-volume set at the Reference Desk. However, you can start with keyword searches to gather some relevant titles, then look at their subject headings to discover the official terms to use.
  
• Libraries and database creators try to structure language in a way to make browsable lists.  Subject terms tend to be set up in a hierarchical manner.  To understand this better, try a Keyword search in the Randall Library Catalog for "North Carolina History"  Then, do a Subject search on "North Carolina History "  The hierarchical display of the subject search allows you to browse through results for various aspects and periods of the state's history.
  
• Headings are often inverted. For example, books on the Battle of Bentonville have the subject heading Bentonville, Battle of.
  
• Subject headings are not "natural language." For example, books on social history commonly use the subheading Social life and customs.
  
• Keep in mind that the most specific terms will be used as subject headings. For instance, Catherine W. Bishir's books on the historic architecture of the state have the heading Architecture -- North Carolina -- Guidebooks but not "North Carolina History."
  
• Just because an item's subject heading does not include "History" as a subdivision does not mean it has no history in it. In particular, look at the publication date. It may be a source contemporary to the period, i. e., a primary source. For example, the Messages, addresses, and public papers of Terry Sanford, Governor of North Carolina, 1961-1965 has the subject heading North Carolina -- Politics and government -- 1951-.
  
• Also consider keyword searches on personal names relevant to North Carolina history. Typically, names are entered with the last name first, e.g., Vance, Zebulon. Do both Author and Subject searches to find books by and about the individual.
  
• There are several commonly used subject subheadings that indicate an item is a primary source. Look for or search these subheadings:
  • correspondence*
  • diaries*
  • interviews*
  • personal narratives
  • pictorial works
  • songs and music
  • sources
  • speeches, addresses, etc.*
  • treaties

Browsing

After finding some sources through searching the online catalog, be sure to browse the shelves near these times. The call numbers are devised to place materials on the same subject together on the shelf. In the catalog, the call number is presented as a link, so you can even browse the shelves when searching the catalog:

You may also wish to browse the Reference Collection to see what special sources are available. A basic outline of the Library of Congress Classification Scheme is at http://library.uncwil.edu/is/outlinelc.html. For more detail, see the outline from the Library of Congress: http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/lcco/lcco.html

Scholarly Journal Databases & Indexes

Use these databases and journal indexes to search for articles in journals and magazines.

America: History and Life Indexes and summarizes article and reviews about U.S. and Canadian history published since 1957.

EbscoHost Academic Search Premier is a multidisciplinary periodical index to over 8,000 journals and magazines, 4,700 of which are full-text online.

JSTOR Full-text searching of an archive of over 40 history and 25 political science journals. Typically excludes the latest 3-5 years of publication.

North Carolina Historical Review Index. Shelved with the bound volumes of the journal.

PAIS Archive The PAIS Archive database contains references to monographs, periodical articles, government and non-governmental agency reports about public affairs, public and social policies and internation relations. The archive database contains references from 1915 to 1976.

This database indexes the entries in hundreds of biographical reference works.

Biography & Genealogy Master Index This resource indexes more than 12.7 million biographical sketches in more than 3,400 volumes and editions of current and retrospective reference books, covering both contemporary and historical figures throughout the world. After you find which resources contain a biographical sketch you need, search the online catalog for the book. References to Biography Index (Index CT100 .B6) will ultimately lead to books, book chapters or periodical articles.

Primary Sources

See the guide "Finding Primary Resources for Historical Research" for a more complete discussion of the library's resources. For public policy history, be sure to consider the following searches and sources:

Don't miss these collections of source material:

Manuscript Collections

Electronic Resources

American Slavery: A Composite Autobiography. To use this database, go to www.nclive.org. Find it listed by subject under History & Genealogy or by type Primary Source Documents. To use from off-campus

HeritageQuest HeritageQuest is designed to help library patrons search and use data from all of the U.S. Censuses until 1930, an index of 6,500 local history and genealogy periodicals (PERSI), a database of Revolutionary War pension and bounty-land warrant, plus the full text of 25,000 local histories and family histories.

North American Women's Letters and Diaries Full text of letters and diaries. The collection includes bibliographies of women's diaries and letters yet published. It lists over 2,000 published and unpublished items from a variety of sources.
Colonial to 1950

Sanborn Maps Full-image online of maps for North Carolina cities & towns from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Manuscripts on Microform: This is a small selection of manuscript records on microform:

County Records for New Hanover and surrounding counties are on microfilm in two clusters. Records of deeds, elections, tax rolls, etc. are in the F260s. Court minutes are in KFN. These reels are cataloged, so you can search for the county name you need to identify the series of records the library owns.

The Papers of Zebulon Vance. Microfilm E660 .V36 

Public laws and resolutions of the State of North Carolina (Also known as Session Laws.) 1777-1980 Microfiche KFN7425.2 .A2 1977a; 1973-date Reference KFN7425 .A2 

Records of Ante-bellum Southern Plantations from the Revolution through the Civil War. Microfilm F213 .R42 

Records of the States of the United States of America: North Carolina.
Microfilm F254 .R4 

Southern Women and Their Families in the 19th Century, Papers and Diaries. Microfilm HQ1438.A13 S64 1991 

Newspapers and Popular Magazines

Electronic Resources
HarpWeek. Harpers Weekly 1857-1876.

Making of America (Cornell University) Full text of 22 journals and 109 monographs, ca. 1840-1900.
Making of America (University of Michigan) Full text of 13 journals and 8,500 books, ca. 1840-1900.

New York Times Archive  Full-image online access for the NYT back to 1851.

Newspapers on Microfilm (Index availability)
The library has a collection of 19th century newspapers from various North Carolina cities. Since newspapers were often short-lived or changed titles frequently, we have filed these by city name.

News & Observer (Raleigh) 1897-1901; 1965-present (Index Collection AI21 .N53 1967-1973; 1975-76; Index Microfiche 1974, 1977-80.)

Wilmington Morning Star (no index available)

New York Times (New York Times Index Index Collection AI21 .N45)  
     You may want to use this index to make sure you find articles you can retrieve through the online version.

Times of London (Palmer's Index to the Times Index Collection AI21.T458)

Print Indexes to Periodical Literature
International Index to Periodicals (Index Collection AI3 .R5)  Indexes selected scholarly periodicals.

Poole's index to periodical literature (Index Collection AI3 .P7) Indexes selected popular magazines, 18002-1907.

Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature (Index Collection AI3 .R48)  Indexes selected popular magazines, 1890-2001.

More Web Resources

The free web is becoming a rich resource for primary source material. In particular, try these resources:

Documenting the American South (UNCCH) provides Internet access to texts, images, and audio files related to southern history, literature, and culture.

Digital Scriptorium (Duke) selections from Duke University's Rare Book, Manuscript and Special Collections Library.

Eastern North Carolina Digital Library (ECU) provides the full text of nearly 400 fiction and non-fiction titles relating to 41 eastern North Carolina counties.

Last Update:September 19, 2006