Identifying and using primary and secondary sources to examine and analyze historical events, activities, or people allows for a more comprehensive and investigative learning experience.

Primary Sources

  • Are left behind by participants or observers
  • Make connections to the past
  • Are evidence used by historians to support their interpretation of the past.

Primary Sources Include:

  • Artifacts: Buildings, Tombstones, Clothing
  • Audio: Oral histories, Interviews, Recordings
  • Images: Photographs, Film, Art and Posters, Advertisements, Maps
  • Records: Government Documents, Census Data, Birth/Wedding/Death Certificates, Organizational Minutes, Business Reports
  • Unpublished Materials: Diaries, Letters, Manuscripts
  • Published Materials: Books (including memoirs), Magazines, Newspapers.

Secondary Sources

  • Are accounts of the past created by people writing about events after they have happened
  • Are what historians and History Day participants create
  • Provide hints on where to find Primary Sources
  • Show how a topic has been interpreted by other historians
  • Provide information which enables historians to make sense of primary sources.

Secondary Sources Include:

  • Books
  • Encyclopedias
  • Articles
  • Websites