Unique and Interesting Digital Libraries and Archives - For Free!!!

Hi All,

Lots of libraries and archives are online but the site I'm talking about today has a link to over 250 libraries and archives that specialize in local, regional and U.S. history.  There are larger collections in each discrete link - and there are some eTexts and eBook repositories among the go forth and find them.  And be prepared to fall through the rabbit hole that is called the internet. 

The sites are unique, incredibly detailed and interesting - and of course, very specialized. Technically the link comes from  a site called OEDb - the Open Education Database and can be found by clicking on this link.

Links for New York start at the 99th link.  Examples of the links include Hamilton College Digital Collections, New York Public Library Digital Projects, New York State Documents and the United States Military Academy Library's Digital Collections.

Note that these are the link for JUST New York State - remember there are 49 other states in the union - which are alphabetically organized on the OEDB site.  

Enjoy the texts and the archives and the specialized collections that are now at your fingertips - for free!

Regards,
Stu

Internet Archive: The Wayback Machine

Hi All,

Who says that everything on the internet is always there?!  Its not.  Material get posted and then gets removed every single second of every single day.  So how are you able to find material from a few days ago - let alone a few years ago?

Great question and for that we have the Internet Archive/Wayback Machine.  With an easy url to remember - http://archive.org/web/ - its not wonder the site is so well known and so well used!

The site moniker is '456 billion web pages saved over time'.  Wow - that is almost half-a-trillion (yes, with a 't') websites.  The number looks like this 456,000,000,000.  Awesome.  And all the sites can be searched. 

Just type in a website name (businessweek, espn, Farmingdale Public Library, etc.) and you'll be directed to another page that has the url that you searched and the number of times (between a particular date the) site was first found on the Wayback Machine and the current date.

For example, a search for the Farmingdale Public Library resulted in a page that says the Wayback Machine saved the Farmingdale PL site 74 times between August 17, 2007 and March 29, 2015. 

And there is a box which enables the user to click on a particular year - and then a particular month - to choose to view the site on certain day.  Click on the blue circle of the date you are interested in and you'll see a snapshot of how the site looked on that day. 

Some notes...sometimes pictures take a bit of time to load and sometimes page links don't go to an original link.

Click on this link to learn a bit more about the Internet Archive.  Click on this link to capture a web page as it appear now for use as a trusted citation in the future!  Click on this link for a very, very extensive FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) from the Internet Archive.

And for some fun Internet Archive links, click on this link which offers over 6,000,000 fully accessible public domain ebooks.  Awesome!  Not all torrents are bad!  Click on this link to go to a page of Archive Torrents.  There is a search box for you to use on the page.

And, as if this wasn't enough, the Internet Archive has a blog, and a store, and a full-fledged organization structure.  Click on the prior links to see the particular option you are interested in.

And to think that some folks still say that 'nothing is free anymore!'.  Go figure.  They just haven't seen the Internet Archive yet!. 

Regards,
Stu

American Presidency Project

Hi All,

The President of the United States is commonly thought of as being 'the Leader of the Free World'.  As such, leaders of the free world should have their own website filled with data, documents, election material and more.  One site that fills this need admirably is the 'American Presidency Project' - which I'll talk about in todays blog entry.

Hosted by the University of California at Santa Barbara, the site has a wealth of primary material for students, researchers and the just-plain interested folks in the various US presidents.  Click on this link for access to the site - which is free and very well organized. 

The American Presidency Project was established in 1999 and the archives contains over 104,400 documents related to the study of the Presidency.  The scope of the archives is vast - so if you are interested in 'anything Presidential' expect to spend a lot of time on the site.

For example, the APP (American Presidency Project hereafter) is the only online resource that has consolidated, coded, and organized the material into a single searchable database.  Click on this link to search the APP archives. When you visit this link, on the lift side of the page you'll find a box with the 'Ten Most Viewed Documents' - which by itself is darn interesting.

From the main page, users have access to:
- Presidential data - examples of categories include, 'Presidential Popularity', 'Public Appearances' and 'State of the Union and Inaugural Address Charts' and more.
- Presidential documents - includes 'Messages and Papers of the Presidents', 'Public Papers of the Presidents', 'News Conferences', 'Executive Orders' and much, much more.
- Presidential election information - includes Presidential Elections data in a very, very digestible and understandable manner.  Sorted by Presidential Election year, each link has state by state talley's for the candidates. Links to the Federal Election Commission are included as well!
- Presidential links is where users can connect to the various Presidential Libraries that exist.  Simple table - easy interface to use.

Click on this link for the Media Archive which contains audio and videos of the various Presidents.

So there you have it. A wonderfully well organized, accurate, unbiased, easily accessible website for 'all things Presidential'.

Enjoy the links and the information.
Regards,
Stu

Calling All Genealogists and Family-Tree Makers!!!!

Hi Genealogists and Family Tree Makers,

Hard-core genealogists might possibly already know about the the 1940 census being put online on Monday, April 2nd 2012. Click on this link to access the 1940 census right now!

So, just what can you find on the 1940 census? Users can find an individual in the census, locate images (which can be further saved, shared, downloaded, used as a keepsake or for a family tree).

There is a huge, huge amount of information in the data. For example, users will find information that reflects the Great Depression and the New Deal. Internal migration, employment status, occupation, participation in the New Deal Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), WPA or NYA is indicated. This is just a super-brief overview of this mass of data. Click here for the Census Archives link that explains the census in a bit more detail.

This link will actually help you get started searching the 1940 census - simple and easy-to-use.

This next link will help you search the 1940 census by location or by enumeration district (ED) to help you find a census schedule (sets of census images).

Finally, users can use this video link to learn how to get started searching the 1940 census! Cool stuff.

Enjoy the new, massive treasure trove of information that is now available!

Stu