Research and Primary Source Resource Guide

RESEARCH AND PRIMARY SOURCE RESOURCE GUIDE

What Are Primary Sources?

The Library of Congress defines primary sources as actual records that have survived from the past as opposed to secondary sources which are accounts of the past created by people writing about events sometime after they happened.

Examples of primary sources  Photographs, paintings  Newspaper articles include:  Clothing, jewelry, contemporary to event  Diaries archaeological artifacts or person  Speeches  Travel and eyewitness  Interviews accounts Examples of secondary  Autobiographies  Government documents sources include:  Manuscripts  Personal papers  Textbooks  Letters  Memoirs  Magazine articles  Personal narratives  Minutes of meetings  Encyclopedias  Pamphlets

SUGGESTED LINKS FOR PROJECT

Background Information/Primary Sources on Journeys West

Oregon Trail: The Oregon Trail http://www.america101.us/trail/Oregontrail.html http://library.thinkquest.org/CR0210182/hardships.html http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeline/e xpref/oregtral/

Mormon Trail: http://www.essortment.com/west-home-oregon-trail-pioneers-33119.html

Westward Expansion: Pioneers’ Lives for Upper Grades: http://ethemes.missouri.edu/themes/864

Cherokee Removal: http://www.ualr.edu/sequoyah/uploads/2011/11/Family%20Stories%20from%20the%20Trail%20of%20Tears.htm#Harnage

California Miners: http://nevada-outback-gems.com/gold_rush_tales/california_gold_rush1.htm Websites to Find Further Primary Sources/Information

National Archives Public Broadcasting Service http://www.archives.gov/index.html http://www.pbs.org

Library of Congress Avalon Project (Documents) http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html http://avalon.law.yale.edu/

Digitized Primary American History Sources Texas State Historical Association http://www.library.uni.edu/instruction/digitalh http://www.tshaonline.org istory.shtml American Slave Narratives Texas History and Culture http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/wpa/wpaho http://pw1.netcom.com/~wandaron/txhist.html me.html http://antislavery.eserver.org/narratives Turn of the Century http://www.ushistory.net/toc/core.html Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History http://www.gilderlehrman.org Accessible Archives www.accessible.com Supreme Court Decisions (1937-1975) http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/supcrt/in East Texas Oil Museum dex.html http://www.easttexasoilmuseum.com

DOCUMENT BANK

Directions: You may use the following documents to learn more about the desire to move west. After reading these documents, you may get ideas regarding the direction you would like your character to take, or to help with any dialogue your character might have (these documents could be referred to, or used as background knowledge). You may decide to read/refer to some of these in your project, or none. This bank is a resource for you to use if you choose.

Document A

...In the cession made by the preceding article are included the adjacent Islands belonging to Louisiana all public lots and Squares, vacant lands and all public buildings, fortifications, barracks and other edifices which are not private property.--The Archives, papers & documents relative to the domain and Sovereignty of Louisiana and its dependences will be left in the possession of the Commissaries of the United States, and copies will be afterwards given in due form to the Magistrates and Municipal officers of such of the said papers and documents as may be necessary to them...

Louisiana Purchase : Treaty 1803

Document B

…In order that the best results might follow from an enforcement of the regulations, an understanding was reached with Japan that the existing policy of discouraging emigration of its subjects of the laboring classes to continental United States should continue, and should, by co-operation with the governments, be made as effective as possible…

Source: Report of the Commissioner General of Immigration, 1908

Document C …The cession of Louisiana … by Spain to France works most sorely on the United States. There is on the globe one single spot, the possessor of which is our natural and habitual enemy. It is New Orleans, through which the produce of three-eighths of our territory must pass to market, and from its fertility it will ere long yield more than half our whole produce and contain more than half our inhabitants. Not so can it ever be in the hands of France. The impetuosity of her temper, the energy and restlessness of her character … render it impossible that France and the United States can continue long friends when they meet in so irritable a position.

Thomas Jefferson, 1802 Document E

"It is with pleasure that I announce to you the safe arrival of myself and party.... In obedience to your orders we have penitrated the Continent of North America to the Pacific Ocean, and sufficiently explored the interior of the country to affirm with confidence that we have discovered the most practicable rout which does exist across the continent by means of the navigable branches of the Missouri and Columbia Rivers."

Source: Letter from Meriwether Lewis to Thomas Jefferson. Sept. 23, 1806. http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history- archaeology/Lewis_and_Clark_The_Journey_Ends.html#ixzz2H5M0B7um Document F

…The settlers in Oregon will also recover and open for us the North American road to India! This road lies through the South Pass, and the mouth of the Oregon; and as soon as the settlements are made, our portion of the North American continent will immediately commence its Asiatic trade on this new and national route.

Source: Thomas Hart Benton, speech in the United States Senate, 1844

Document G

An Act to enable the President of the United States to take possession of the territories ceded by France to the United States, by the treaty concluded at Paris, on the thirtieth of April last; and for the temporary government thereof.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the President of the United States be, and he is hereby authorized to take possession of, and occupy the territory ceded by France to the United States, by the treaty concluded at Paris, on the thirtieth day of April last, between the two nations; and that he may for that purpose, and in order to maintain in the said territories the authority of the United States, employ any part of the army and navy of the United States, and of the force authorized by an act passed the third day of March last, entitled "An act directing a detachment from the militia of the United States, and for erecting certain arsenals," which he may deem necessary: and so much of the sum appropriated by the said act as may be necessary, is hereby appropriated for the purpose of carrying this act into effect; to be applied under the direction of the President of the United States.

Authority Given to the President to Take Possession of the Territory of Louisiana --1803

Document H

James Elliot, Federalist, Vermont: “The Constitution is silent on the subject of the acquisition of territory. By the treaty we acquire territory; therefore the treaty is unconstitutional”.

Samuel Thatcher, Federalist, Massachusetts: “This acquisition of distant territory will involve the necessity of a considerable standing army, so justly an object of terror. Do gentlemen flatter themselves that by purchasing Louisiana, we are invulnerable? No, sir; Spain will still border on our southern frontier, and so long as Spain occupies that country we are not secure from the attempts of another nation more warlike and ambitious”.

William Plumer, Federalist, New Hampshire: “Admit this western world into the union, and you destroy with a single operation the whole weight and importance of the eastern states”.

Source: Congressional debate, October 1803. Document I

…"I have left those that I love as my own life behind and risked everything and endured many hardships to get here. I want to make enough to live easier and do some good with, before I return."

Source: Mr. Shufelt's letter is part of the collection of the Library of Congress A letter from a gold miner, Placerville, California, March, 1850; Holliday, J.S. Rush for Riches: Gold Fever and the Making of California (1999). "The California Gold Rush, 1849" EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (2003). http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/californiagoldrush.htm

Document J

…“It gives me pleasure to announce to Congress that the benevolent policy of the Government, steadily pursued for nearly 30 years, in relation to the removal of the Indians beyond the white settlements is approaching to a happy consummation. Two important tribes have accepted the provision made for their removal at the last session of Congress, and it is believed that their example will induce the remaining tribes also to seek the same obvious advantage…It will separate the Indians from immediate contact with settlements of whites;…under the protection of the Government and through the influence of good counsels, to cast off their savage habits and become an interesting, civilized, and Christian community…”

Andrew Jackson- Second State of the Union Address, 1820

Document K

…The cession of Louisiana … by Spain to France works most sorely on the United States. There is on the globe one single spot, the possessor of which is our natural and habitual enemy. It is New Orleans, through which the produce of three-eighths of our territory must pass to market, and from its fertility it will ere long yield more than half our whole produce and contain more than half our inhabitants. Not so can it ever be in the hands of France. The impetuosity of her temper, the energy and restlessness of her character … render it impossible that France and the United States can continue long friends when they meet in so irritable a position.

Thomas Jefferson, 1802

Document L

…Then came a letter from Uncle Alfred Collver, Mother's brother in far off Oregon. It was a wonderful letter. Over and over we read it. To Winfield, my fifteen-year old brother, and me, it seemed that Oregon must be the most wonderful spot in the world. Father and Mother must have thought so too. They talked about it so much, the wonderful climate, the warm winters, the beautiful harbor, the thousands of orchard trees, the great forests of valuable timber, the coal mines, and always again, the climate.

-Philura Vanderburgh Clinkenbeard

Source: Clinkenbeard, Anna Dell. “Across the Plains in ’64 by Prairie Schooner”. Exhibition Press, New York. http://flag.blackened.net/daver/1sthand/atp/atp_back.jpg

Document M

…Listen Father! The Americans have not yet defeated us by land; neither are we sure that they have done so by water; we therefore wish to remain here, and fight our enemy should they make their appearance.…You have got the arms and ammunition which our Great Father sent for his red children. If you have an idea of going away, give them to us, and you may go and welcome for us. Our lives are in the hands of the Great Spirit. We are determined to defend our lands, and if it is his will, we wish to leave our bones upon them.

Source: Tecumseh’s Last Stand, by John Sugden (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1985).

Document N

…“Selling women, selling men. All that. Then if they had any bad ones, they'd sell them to the traders, what they called the “traders”. An' they'd ship them down south, an' sell them down south. But, uh, otherwise if you was a good, good person they wouldn' sell you. But if you was bad an' mean an' they didn' want to beat you an' knock you aroun', they'd sell you what to the, what was call the “trader”. They'd have a regular, have a sale every month, you know, at the court house. An' then they'd sell you, an' get two hundred dollar, hundred dollar, five hundred dollar.”

Source: Hughes, Fountain. The American Slave: A Composite Autobiography. Fisk University. http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/wpa/hughes1.html Document O

...One day I undertook a tour through the country, and the diversity and beauties of nature I met with in this charming season, expelled every gloomy and vexatious thought. Just at the close of day the gentle gales retired, and left the place to the disposal of a profound calm. Not a breeze shook the most tremulous leaf. I had gained the summit of a commanding ridge, and, looking round with astonishing delight, beheld the ample plains, the beauteous tracts below. On the other hand, I surveyed the famous river Ohio, that rolled in silent dignity, marking the western boundary of Kentucky with inconceivable grandeur….Soon after, I returned home to my family, with a determination to bring them as soon as possible to live in Kentucky, which I esteemed a second paradise, at the risk of my life and fortune."

-Daniel Boone

Source: "Daniel Boone Opens Up the West, 1769-71," EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (2005).

Document P

…It is under such circumstances, and with these difficulties in view, that the Government has been called upon to determine what arrangements shall be made for the permanent establishment of the Indians. Shall they be advised to remain or remove? If the former, their fate is written in the annals of their race; if the latter, we may yet hope to see them renovated in character and condition by our example and instruction, and by their exertions.

Source: Lewis Cass, “Report of the Secretary of War,” November 21, 1831, House Document 2/2, 22nd Congress, 1st sess., Serial 216, pp. 31-32.