History: Secondary Sources  Tags: secondary_source history_research san_francisco_state_university sf_state sfsu j._paul_leonard  

• Biography and Genealogy Master Index
• Biography Index, 1946-
  Index to newspaper and periodical articles and books.
• Dictionary of American Biography. New York: Scribner, 1928-. Includes deceased people from colonization to 1990.
• Historical Biographical Dictionaries Master Index. Detroit: Gale, 1980.
• Who Was Who in America. (1607-). Chicago: Marquis, 1963-.
• Who's Who in America. Chicago: Marquis. Annual since 1899.

This is an extremely selective list. There are special biographical sources for other countries, for women, professions, etc. Search InvestiGator for the profession, person's names, country, or region and the keyword, "Biography." Example searches:  anthropologists and biography; Latin American and biography; presidents and United States and biography; women and biography.

The best source for locating scholarly book reviews for history books are the history-related databases:

• America: History & Life
• Historical Abstracts

In both databases, on the main search page, select "Book Review" under Document Type to only find book reviews.

More info: Book Reviews research guide

• Annual Register: A Record of World Events. London: Longman, 1578-1880 (scattered holdings), 1945 -.
  Summarizes the year's important events, includes the text of major documents.
• Boyer, Paul S. and Melvyn Dubofsky, eds. The Oxford Companion to United States History. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2001.
• CountryWatch
• Dictionary of American History. New York: Scribner, 1973. 8 vol.
  Political, economic, social, cultural and industrial aspects of America history. No Biographies.
• Dictionary of the History of Ideas. New York: Scribner, 1973. 5 vol.
  Substantial articles on philosophical/political/social theories and movements.
• Encyclopedia Britannica Online
• Grun, Bernard. The Timetable of History: A Horizontal Linkage of People and Events. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979.
• Mellersh, H.E.L. Chronology of World History. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO, 1999.
• Stearns, Peter S. The Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern, Chronologically Arranged. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.
• Super, John C., ed. Encyclopedia of North American History. New York: Marshall Cavendish, 1999. 
• Video Encyclopedia of the 20th Century. New York: CEL Educational Resources. 1986. A collection of motion pictures & videotape recordings documenting the social, political and cultural history of the 20th century: basic set of 38 videodisks.

This is an extremely selective list. There are special sources for other countries, for women, time periods, etc. Search the Library Catalog for the country, time period, broad topic, or region and the keyword, "encyclopedias," "dictionaries," or "chronology."

Example searches:  africa and history and encyclopedias; social and history and encyclopedias; intellectual life and history and dictionaries; african americans and history and chronologies.

• Hammond Atlas of World History. Maplewood, N.J.: Hammond, 1999.
• Times Atlas of the World History. The Map and Atlas Collection has other more up-to-date maps.
• The Columbia-Lippincott Gazetteer of the World.

See the Government Documents section of the Primary Sources research guide.

• Historical Statistics of the United States. Also available in print: U.S. Census Bureau. Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970. Washington, D. C.: GPO, 1975.
• European Historical Statistics, 1750-1975. 2nd rev. ed. New York: New York University Press, 1982.
• International Historical Statistics: Africa and Asia. New York: New York University Press, 1982.

More info: Finding Statistics research guide

• American Historical Association
  
• Organization of American Historians