Lone Star College-Kingwood Library

Historical Journals

Assignment Guide | History 1302 | Professor Peggy Lambert

Please contact Lone Star College-Kingwood Librarians or Professor Lambert with any questions you may have during your research.

BOOKS

JOURNALS

INTERNET

SUPPORT

ASSIGNMENT (Professor Lambert)

The purpose of this assignment is to help you develop your critical thinking skills.You are to place yourself in a particular time period and react to a set of circumstances.You may become a real or fictional person. Sometimes this assignment is written in first person as a set of letters or diary entries. In order to complete this assignment, you must adequately research the selected topic and/or time period.Internal documentation will be required to indicate your source. All documentation should follow the guidelines established in the MLA Handbook. At least five sources including one journal are needed.Textbooks and encyclopedias should not be used to meet minimum source requirements.These assignments should be approximately five typed pages of text plus a Works Cited Page.In addition to the obvious family history subjects, some possible topics include:

It is 1886 and you are Waldeshar Coglonwitz, a recent immigrant from Warsaw, Poland. Why have you come to the United States? How is your life different from the native born Americans you work with?

You are Charles Boatwright, the owner of a shirtwaist factory in New York.How fearful are you of the recent calls for regulation of working conditions? Would you be likely to support or oppose the political movement that wants to reform American society? Do you believe your life will be altered by these changes?

You are Milos Siljaek, an immigrant from Prague.You belong to the Socialist Labor Party and have been opposed to America’s entry into World War I. As World War I ends, what fears and concerns do you have regarding your future in America?What indications might you have regarding your future in America?What indications might you have that trouble lies ahead for you?

You are Ashley Cummins, the owner of Amalgamated Steel in Pittsburgh.Congress has just passed the National Recovery Act. How do you believe it will affect the economic recovery of your business?Whom did you vote for in 1932?Why?

You are Elsa Rosenbloom, a middle-aged Jewish matron living in Chicago.What do you think about Hitler’s invasion of Poland? What do you think should be the American government’s response?What do you think about admitting additional Jewish refugees to America?

You are David Johnson, a sophomore at Columbia University.During the summer of 1963, you decide to go to Jackson, Mississippi on a freedom bus.Why?

You are Eric Stratton, a student at the University of Texas.On May 31, 1965, your grades arrive and you discover that your nights of partying have taken their toll.You are now on academic probation.How do you react to the very real possibility that you may soon be going to Vietnam?

BOOKS

Librarian Talk . . .About Books! Apply online for a library card. Use your card to: 1) Place a Hold on a book and have it sent to the library closest to you 2) Access journal and reference databases from home, and 3) Access e-Books from NetLibrary. The catalog is online. Online or e-Books are available at  NetLibrary.  Use your library card to log in. More about...Finding Books (31 sec.)

REF E169.12 A419
    American Decades. 10 vols.  1900-1999 World events, government and politics, business and economy.
REF E169.1.A47194
    American Eras.  vol. 7 Development of the industrial United States 1878-1899.
REF E173.A793
    Annals of America.  19 vols. Contemporary essays, speeches, and articles about events and policies. 1884-1894 Agrarianism and Urbanization (vol. 11) 1916-1928; World War and Prosperity (vol. 14); 1961-1968 The Burdens of World Power (vol. 18).
REF HN57.E58 1993 Encyclopedia of American Social History   There is an excellent article in vol. 2 on immigration of central and eastern Europeans (including Poland) and some on work and labor.

NetLibrary books:
    Presidents and Protesters: Political Rhetoric in the 1960's. by Theodore Windt.
    Memories of Migration: Gender, Ethnicity, and Work in the Lives of Jewish and Italian Women in New York 1870-1924  by Kathie Friedman-Kasaba.
    And Gently He Shall Lead Them: Robert Parris Moses and Civil Rights in Mississippi  by Eric Burner

Web page:
How the Other Half Lives  |  by Jacob Riis | Published in 1890, describes life in the tenements in New York (the book is available for check out, but is not at Kingwood. Search the library catalog and request this title from the libraries that have it.)

JOURNALS AND NEWSPAPER ARTICLES

Librarian Talk . . . About Finding Journal and Newspaper Articles! Electronic databases are purchased by the libraries for your research use. To find articles in newspapers and journals, letters, reference books, illustrations, photographs and more, use your updated library card to login to the following databases. If you find an interesting article that is not full-text, please give the correct bibliographic information to our Reference Librarians and they will see that you get the article. They will need full bibliographic information - and your name and address. Send your phone number as well, so they can contact you if they need to. There is some overlap of articles in the following databases. However, we encourage you to use more than one. All are excellent sources for this topic.  Examples of keywords to use: IMMIGRANTS 19TH CENTURY; UNITED STATES; WORLD WAR I; SOCIALISM; VIETNAM; MILITARY DRAFT HINT: For a full list of article databases, go to http://Library.LoneStar.edu and use your library card for login. More about searching databases (25 sec.)

History Study Center - is a portal for ProQuest Company's online history collections, bringing rare British, American and world history resources to the desktops of academics, librarians, teachers and students.

History Reference Center is a full-text for journal articles, reference books, non-fiction books, as well as thousands of historial photographs, maps and videos.

Project Muse - find scholarly journal articles from recent years.

JSTOR - search for articles in scholarly journals; link to recent articles in Project MUSE.

New York Times Historical - NYT From 1857 - the present.  Select from Collections.  In Advanced Search, search a date range such as 09/06/1900 to 09/30/1900.

Biography Reference Bank - 45,000 biographies of people from antiquity to the present.

Academic Search Complete - Collection of journal, newspaper, and magazine articles. Many scholarly.

ProQuest Research Library - Collection of journal, newspaper, and magazine articles. Many scholarly.

The Handbook of Texas  - This online multi-volume encyclopedia from the Texas State Historical Association and the UT Libraries is also in print in  the library Reference Section - REF F384 .N48 1996

INTERNET SITES

Librarian Talk . . . About the Internet! The Internet will be a wonderful source of original documents. Browse the sites we have suggested below. Remember, you do want to find reputable sites. Look at: Accuracy - The information should be researched and show proof that it has been. Source - Who wrote the information? Look at the domain.  .edu .gov. org .net are valid research sources. Authority - What are the author's credentials?  (Don't quote from another college freshman's paper.) Coverage - Does the page have the information you need for your research? Objectivity - If a work is biased, use it - just make sure your professor knows YOU know. And offer both sides of issues, where applicable. More about finding internet sources (25 sec.)

Suggested Web Sites

• American Cultural History: The Twentieth Century |   Cultural history of each decade of the century, prepared by Lone Star College-Kingwood librarians.
• American Memory  |  American Memories from the Library of Congress.  Search by topic, browse through photographs, documents, and audio and video clips.Here is an introduction to immigration.
• National Museum of American History (Smithsonian Institute)  |  Enter search terms such as SWEATSHOPS; FREEDOM RIDES,
• History Channel  |   This is another award winning web site to search for online information.
• The Immigration Debate Links: Historical and Current Issues of Immigration Sponsored by the Constitutional Rights Foundation, this website is dedicated to educating young Americans about their civic duty. Many helpful links pertaining to the history of immigration.

Or try it yourself: http://www.google.com; http://scholar.google.com/; http://search.ask.com

GETTING HELP FOR YOUR ASSIGNMENT

Librarian Talk about getting help! Support for a successful paper is more than finding the right resources. Putting it all together takes time and effort. Sometimes it takes additional help from the librarians or tutors. Please consider the following resources if you need additional help. Remember, the expert on the assignment is your professor; use the LSC-Online VISTA in-class email to contact her. More about getting help (25 sec.)

Citing Sources Using the Library MLA Style Guide | Lone Star College-Kingwood Library guide. Examples of both paper and electronic citations.

Misuse of Sources | Extract from WRITING WITH SOURCES: A Guide for Harvard Students, by Gordon Harvey, Expository Writing Program, Copyright 1995, The President and Fellows of Harvard University Chapter Three: Misuse of Sources: 3.1 Plagiarism and 3.2 Other Ways of Misusing Sources.

Email your paper as an attachment  to Dr. Janis Terry, Assistant Dean. Dr. Terry or one of the writing tutors will read through your paper and make brief comments on your paper and return it to you.

REMEMBER, the expert on this paper is your Professor Lambert.

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 Page by Shielda Welling created Jan. 2003.  Rev. 7/08 RP.