Research Guides: WRPR 123: Old Age in the Modern Age (HC) Spring 2021: Primary Sources

Images as Primary Sources

Dorothea Lange, "Woman aged 70 from Nebraska", Kern County, California, 1940 (Wikimedia Commons, public domain)

Finding Primary Sources

Primary sources that have been edited, reprinted in facsimiles, or transferred to microfilm can be borrowed through E Z Borrow or interlibrary loan if they are not in Tripod. Many of them will be listed in Tripod and WorldCat under subject terms which include such words as "sources," "letters," "diaries," or "personal narratives." For example, the search (aged OR elderly OR seniors OR older OR aging) (sources OR diaries OR "personal narratives" OR correspondence OR anecdotes) produces results including:

Nobody's home : candid reflections of a nursing home aide
Author: Gass, Thomas Edward.; Vladeck, Bruce C. Publication: ILR Press, 2004

At eighty-two : a journal
Author: Sarton, May, Publication: W.W. Norton, 1996

Visual Sources for U.S. History

ARTstor
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ArtStor presents a rich collection of digital images drawn from colleges, universities and museums. At the top of the page, click on "Enter Artstor Digital Library" and either login or sign up at the top of the page. By registering on the site you can make personal image group folders and download images.
Use the Advanced Search to specify geographic areas, time periods, subjects and artistic forms.
Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) This link opens in a new window
The DPLA allows you to search millions of photographs, manuscripts, books, sounds, moving images, and more from libraries, archives, and museums around the United States. Each record links to the original object on the library or other content provider's website.

Flickr: The Commons
Images from many of the world's public photo archives, described by Flickr users so that some include very rich historical details.
New York Public Library Digital Collections
Explore over 900,000 items in this well-indexed collection including prints, photographs, posters and illustrations.
Photos, Prints and Drawings from the Digital Collections at the Library of Congress
Provides information on, and access to, digitized versions of photographs, prints and drawings relating to history in the U. S. and around the world. To see all digital collections at the Library of Congress (including texts), use this link.
Smithsonian Collections Search
Search over16.9 million catalog records of museum objects, and library & archives materials. More than 6.2 million of these records include online images, video and sound files, electronic journals and other online resources.

Literature and Art as Primary Sources

Literature, Arts, and Medicine Database
Start out by searching the keyword aging and the genre memoir.

The New York University School of Medicine has created a database of literature and the arts with references to medical conditions. This material gives you a first-person point of view of the various ailments that older people develop.