Your Questions Answered

From: Tom Lewis

Question: I am looking for some online maps that show the location of early (1800-1860) industrial sites in the United States. Can you point me toward some possibilities? Thank you.


Answer: Dear Mr. Lewis:

I think that you may find what you want in the online images of the nineteenth century "Scribner's statistical atlas of the United States" mounted on the American Memory site at the Library of Congress. Here's the main page:

http://memory.loc.gov

Hit the "Maps" button and search there for "Scribner's".

Once you get there, the images are great. I think you'll want to look closely at the maps/charts for "Occupations" (images 132, ff.; pages 62, ff.) and "Manufactures" (images 217 ff.)

If you have time, wander around for a while. It's a fascinating source. I'm sure I needn't warn you to follow the "Rights and Reproductions" link for this book.

Sincerely

Mary-Jo Kline

From: Lisa Olaynack

Question: I teach sixth grade ELA/SS; we’re studying the American Revolution. I want my students to research a person or an event from this period in history and write a feature news article. I’m looking for articles from both Patriot and Loyalist newspapers. Can you help me? Thank you.

Answer: Dear Ms. Olaynack:

You’re in luck. Even though the text of your message didn’t tell me where you teach school, the domain name for your email address did. Half the librarians at Brown University (my workplace for eight years) live in or near Newport, and you can probably enlist their aid.

First – are you assigning different people or events to each student, or will this be a “group” assignment that the whole class will work on? This will determine how broad an assortment of sources you’ll need to work with.

Second – do you or a friend or relative have access to Brown University's Internet resources? If you can get to these resources on your own, that will ease the burden on the Brown librarian to whom I’ll refer you.

Please let me know, and we’ll get to work on this. It sounds like a great project. Before I pass you along to anyone else, though, let’s refine the scope of your classroom activities.

Sincerely,

Mary-Jo Kline

From: Margie Smith

Question: We are researching the unanimous Declaration of Independence of the original thirteen United States of America, and trying to find the different dimensions of the early official copies that were made in the 1800's. Any help will be appreciated.

Answer: Dear Ms. Smith:

There were a number of copies made of the Declaration of Independence. Two facsimile versions were published in the early nineteenth century with the approval of the Secretary of State, so they have some official status.

On the other hand, the printed copies that really mattered were the ones authorized in 1776 by the Continental Congress. These copies carried the Declaration’s text to the governments of the thirteen states, European capitals, and diplomats abroad. There were also “official” copies of the Declaration published by the authority of each of the thirteen original States to spread word of the Declaration to towns and villages here in America.

Please let me know which copies you need to know about.

Mary-Jo Kline