LibGuides: Database Guides : New and Updated Resources: North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries, and Oral Histories

North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries, and Oral Histories

The North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries, and Oral Histories collection includes the full-text of writings from over 2500 immigrants to the U.S. from 1800 to 1950. It is especially strong in Oral Histories, editorials, and cartoons.

Search Tips:

Basic search: a typical simple / keyword search.

Search results page lets you limit by date, place, historical event, etc.

Browse search covers the following areas::

Titles, Historical Events, People, Subjects, Place, Content Type (Essays, Articles, Letters)

Advanced Search (allows for field searching: title & author; limiting by date.)

Full text:

100% of items available.

Searching in OneSearch:

OneSearch only searches and lists brief information for each of items in this collection (oral histories, cartoons, etc.). Use the Alexander Street Press interface to search within the text of the 150,000 pages.

OneSearch example book record: Companions of the Peace: Diaries and Letters of Monica Storrs, 1931-1939.

Citing, Saving, Linking (Alexander Street Press Primiary Sources)

Citing a Document

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Link to a specific document:

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Copy "permanent link" option. (This link includes the Stan State Library proxy server which provides for off-campus access.)

Detailed Description - North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries, and Oral Histories

This collection includes 2,162 authors and approximately 100,000 pages of information, so providing a unique and personal view of what it meant to immigrate to America and Canada between 1800 and 1950. Composed of contemporaneous letters and diaries, oral histories, interviews, and other personal narratives, the series provides a rich source for scholars in a wide range of disciplines. In selected cases, users will be able to hear the actual audio voices of the immigrants. The collection will be particularly useful to researchers, because much of the original material is difficult to find, poorly indexed, and unpublished; most bibliographies of the immigrant focus on secondary research; and few oral histories have been published.