Infobase’s latest update to its African-American History database adds approximately 300 new primary source documents, providing insight and firsthand looks into historical topics from the past several hundred years—perfect for document-based learning and strengthening critical-thinking skills. The new primary sources—ranging in format from letters and speeches to testimony, peace treaties, diary entries, reports, proclamations, and more—add great value by making history more immediate and real. Students and researchers can consult the Curriculum Tools menu for helpful tips on analyzing primary sources and completing a primary source worksheet.
Newly added primary sources include:
- New York Slave Code, 1702
- John Murray’s (Lord Dunmore) Proclamation to Liberate American Slaves, 1775
- Notice on a Runaway Slave and Her Children, 1858
- Louis Agassiz’s Letter on Interaction with African Americans, 1846
- Interrogation of John Brown, 1859
- Editorial on Reconstruction from an African-American Perspective, 1867
- Article on the Ku Klux Klan, 1868
- Statement on Political Violence against African Americans from African-American Citizens of New Orleans, 1888
- Medgar Evers’s Speech on a Lynching Investigation (excerpt), 1959
- Interview on Racial Attitudes in the Military, 1997
- John Lewis’s Speech at the March on Washington, 1963
- “What It Means to be Colored in the Capital of the United States” by Mary Church Terrell, 1906
- and more.
Click on the links below for more information about African-American History: