American Society and Culture in the Cold War

Background Sources | Secondary Sources: Books | Secondary Sources: Journal Articles | Finding Published Primary Sources | Selected Web Sites | Finding Unpublished Primary Sources

Background Sources

Cold War culture : media and the arts, 1945-1990 Suzzallo Reference -- E169.12 .S39 1998 The Cold War encyclopedia Suzzallo Reference, Undergraduate Reference -- D840 .P28 1996 Columbia Guide to the Cold War Suzzallo Reference -- E744 .K696 1998 Encyclopedia of American cultural & intellectual history Suzzallo Reference -- E169.1 .E624 2001 Encyclopedia of cold war politics Suzzallo Reference -- E840 .T57 2000 Encyclopedia of the Korean War: a political, social, and military history Suzzallo Reference -- DS918 .E33 2000 Encyclopedia of American social history Suzzallo Reference, Undergraduate Reference -- HN57 .E58 1993 Encyclopedia of the United States in the twentieth century Suzzallo Reference -- E740.7 .E33 1996 Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War: Political, social, and military history Suzzallo Reference, Undergraduate Reference -- DS337.7 .E33 1998 Historical dictionary of the 1950s Suzzallo Reference -- E169.12 .O44 2000

UW Libraries Catalog A listing of the books, journal subscriptions and other material available at the University of Washington Libraries. Cascade A listing of the books, journal subscriptions and other material available in the 6 public university library systems in Washington state. Books can be requested online and sent to the UW. OCLC WorldCat [UW only] A listing of books, journal subscriptions and other material available in hundreds of major libraries in the U.S. and abroad. OhioLINK Use OhioLink to access chapters of recent books, use the "Words" search option.

Finding Articles

Once you identify articles you need make sure you have the complete citation (author, title, journal name, volume, pages and year), then look in the UW Libraries Catalog for the journal name (do a title search for the journal name to see if the UW subscribes) to see if and where the journal is kept (library location and call number).

Databases marked UW Only require that you access these from computers on campus or from home using UWICK or the libraries proxy server. Articles from journals which the UW does not own can be requested through the UWorld Express (interlibrary loan).

America History & Life [UW only] Major index to articles in U.S. and Canadian history. Also includes citations to selected books, dissertations and reviews. Expanded Academic Index [UW only] General index to magazine and journal articles in all subjects, includes some full-text. Research Library [UW only] General index to magazine and journal articles in all subjects, includes some full-text. Arts & Humanities Citation Index [UW only] part of the Web of Science. Interdisciplinary citation index to articles dating back to 1975.

To locate printed bibliographies search the UW Libraries catalog:

• Choose the Keywords Search
• Type in your topic keyword(s) and the following phrase -- and su:bibliography
• Examples:
  • cold war and su:bibliography
  • academic freedom and su:bibliography

Using Secondary Sources to Find Primary Sources

Secondary sources, scholarly journal articles and books, are a great source for identifying potential primary sources. Find a few articles, books or dissertations related to your topic and then mine the footnotes and bibliography. You will have the best luck finding published primary sources such as books, government reports, newspapers and magazines within the UW Libraries. Use the UW Libraries Catalog to determine if we have the primary source.

Finding Primary Sources -- Books

Limit your search by publication date. Search for books written by key participants and organizations. Use special subject terms that designate primary sources: sources, personal narratives, diaries, correspondence, interviews Example: cold war and su:(sources or narratives or diaries or correspondence)

Finding Primary Sources -- Articles

The libraries also has a basic collection of major U.S. newspapers on microfilm for the 20th centuries. Complete runs are available for such papers as the New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Oregonian and Seattle Times. The libraries has a strong collection on Northwest papers. Newspapers are housed in the Microform and Newspaper Collections (Mcnews) on the ground floor of Suzzallo.

Magazines and Journals Alternative Press Index, 1969+ Indexes radical, labor, feminist, and socialist publications published in the United States. Suzzallo Reference AI3 A48 Reader's Guide Retrospective [UW only] General index to American magazines for the period of 1890 to 1980. Also available in print in Suzzallo Reference AI3 .R48. Public Affairs Information Service (PAIS) Index to political/economic journals and selected books and government reports from 1915 to the present. [Reference index area Z7163 .P9]. Online for the period 1972 onward - PAIS.

Newspapers New York Times Index Index to the newspaper is available in print from 1851 to the present. If you are using a paper without an index, use the one for the New York Times to pinpoint dates. If you are working on a particular event, then you can just browse newspapers from that week. Pacific Northwest Regional Newspaper and Periodical Index Card index available in the Manuscripts, Special Collections, University Archives (MSCUA) division in the basement of Allen South. The regional index covers local newspapers, magazines, and other material dealing with PNW history from the 1850s to the present. Current years are available online. Twentieth-century America: a primary source collection from the Associated Press Chronologically arranged 10-volume collection of AP wire stories. Undergraduate Reference E740.5 .T84 1995.

Finding Primary Sources -- Government Reports

Congressional Universe [UW only] Full-text debates, bills, reports dating back to approximately 1989 and indexing of congressional reports and hearings dating back to 1789. MarciveWeb Docs [UW only] Catalog to U.S. government documents published since 1976. For earlier documents see the Monthly Catalog to United States Government Publications (GovPub. 328.73 Un37m) and its predecessors. Archival Research Catalog (ARC) Catalog of more than 120,000 digitized items from NARA's collection plus records for an additional 440,000 items (still only 13% of NARA's collection). Additional NARA material can be found in the Pacific Alaska Regional office of NARA located on Sand Point Way.

Finding Web Sites

• Cold War
  Collection of documents dealing with the Cold War from Yale Law School's Project Avalon.
• The Cold War and Red Scare in Washington State
  A curriculum packet developed by the Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest. Includes narrative and transcribed documents.
• Cold War International History Project
  Project based at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars includes transcribed documents dealing with the Cold War.
• FBI Freedom of Information Reading Room
  Collections of digitized FBI materials dealing with a number of people and organizations usch as Communist infiltration of the Motion Picture Industry.
• Literature and Culture of the American Fifties
  collection of readings from and about 1950s America provided by the University of Pennsylvania.
• National Security Archive
  Small collections of security documents dealing with international events such as the Cuban Missile cr
• Truman Library Documents
  Document collections covering various events during the Truman administration including the Korean War, Truman Doctrine and Berlin Airlift.

Evaluating Web Sites
It is important to remember that anyone can publish on the web. There is no quality control so before citing a web site in your research paper take time to judge the quality of the web page. Some questions to consider are:

• Content: What is the site about?
• Motive: Is any sort of bias evident in the site? What is the site’s motivation or purpose?
• Source: Who is the publisher of the site? Who is the author of the site?
• Authority: Can you find information about the publisher or the organization that is responsible for the site? What is the authority or expertise of the site’s author?
• Documentation: Does the site have references or citations that lead to more information?

For more information see Evaluating Web Pages: Techniques to Apply & Questions to Ask.

Finding Unpublished Primary Sources - Manuscripts

Other local manuscript/archives repositories: Washington State Archives Seatte Municipal Archives For manuscript collections elsewhere consult: National Union Catalogue of Manuscript Collections (NUCMC) OCLC Worldcat also includes citations to some manuscript collections Repositories of Primary Sources, a directory of web sites for manuscript repositories

Image: "The Jokers," Daily Mail cartoon by John Musgrave Wood published 17 June 1967. Courtesy of the Centre for the Study of Cartoons and Caricature.