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Research Guides

Eastern Washington University Libraries

HIST 401: Library and Archival Historical Research

Find Books, Videos

Having problems requesting items via Summit? Please contact the JFK Circulation Desk at 509.359.7888, circulation@ewu.edu, or in person on the main level. 

Finding Books by Call Number

Call #                     Subject


D 1-2027               World History (excluding the Americas)

D1-24.5                  General History

D 111-203              Medieval history, 476 AD-

D 204-475              Modern history, 1453-

D 501-680              World War I (1914-1918)

D 731-838              World War II (1939-1945)

D 900-2009            Europe (General)

 *Most history books can be found in these call number ranges on the top floor of the JFK Library.  Use our floor map to find the exact shelf location.

See also call numbers DA-DX for history by specific regions or countries of the world.

 For a more detailed breakdown of Library of Congress Subject Headings, click here.

 

Call #                     Subject


E-F                          History (Americas)

E 11-143        America

E 151-904      United States

E 186-199     Colonial history (1607-1775)

E 201-298     Revolution (1775-1783)

E 300-453     Revolution to the Civil War (1775/1783-1861)

E 441-453        Slavery in the U.S. Antislavery movements.

E 456-655     Civil War period (1861-1865)

E 660-738     Late 19th century (1865-1900)

E 740-837     20th century

E 838-889     Later 20th century (1961-2000)

E 895-904     21st century

 F 1-975              U.S. local history

F 1001-1145     British America (Including Canada)

F 1170                French America

 *Most history books can be found in these call number ranges on the top floor of the JFK Library.  Use our floor map to find the exact shelf location.

For a more detailed breakdown of Library of Congress Subject Headings, click here.

Useful Words for Finding Primary Sources in the Library Catalog

To find books that reproduce primary sources on your topic, you need to enter the topic (or person) you are researching and one of the following subjects:

Archives, correspondence, diaries, interviews, letters, manuscripts, maps, memoirs, narratives (personal, slave, etc.), photographs, propaganda, sources, speeches.

If you want to find reproductions of important primary sources from U.S. history, then you can do a subject search for United States History Sources in the EWU catalog.

Another way of finding primary sources written by a specific historical figure is to enter the person's name into one search box and then the term author in another search box (do it as a Subject search).  It should return materials that were written by that person.