history help!

[Sarlon]

So I have a semester long project to work on for history... have to make an annotated bibliography....with a topic.

I've gotten approval for mine with no comments.

Topic: How the Dust Bowl coupled with the Great Depression gave rise to America as a world power it is today.

now I need to find 6 different sources to support that....2 primary, 2 books, 2 online sources....

I'm finding great books, and online sources....but the primary sources are due friday and I can't find any....

[BookstoreEscapee]

Can't help with primary sources but The Worst Hard Time by Timothy Egan is a good book.

[AccountingDrone]

Primary, hm. Try checking the secondary sources you have found for some sort of periodical reference and hit up google for the scans of magazines and newspapers for the primary source. Stuff in the paper back when it was happening does count as both internet and primary source.

[Lauds]

Check the bibliography, references, footnotes, etc of the resources you have found. Most of the time there will be some primary sources used which you can try and find. It's been a while since I did any studying, but I think contemporary newspaper and magazine articles are primary resources so you could try and find newspaper archives online. And your local public library is a good place to check out if they've got a good collection.

But I'd try and track down primary sources used by the stuff you've already found. Even the reference section of Wikipedia can be useful, no matter how bad using Wikipedia itself would be!

Also, could you stretch the topic slightly to talk about Franklin Roosevelt and World War Two as the first major example of the USA as a world power because that would make finding primary resources easier. I would imagine there are plenty of speech transcripts available.

[Sapphire Silk]

So I have a semester long project to work on for history... have to make an annotated bibliography....with a topic.

I've gotten approval for mine with no comments.

Topic: How the Dust Bowl coupled with the Great Depression gave rise to America as a world power it is today.

now I need to find 6 different sources to support that....2 primary, 2 books, 2 online sources....

I'm finding great books, and online sources....but the primary sources are due friday and I can't find any....

That's a pretty advanced topic for an undergraduate.

And honestly, I don't know how you can prove it. The Dust Bowl led to mass immigrations to California (Okies) that were not welcomed, massive loss of farmland and property values, loss of agriculture.

What positive impact do you think the Dust Bowl actually had?

[Barracuda]

I honestly question the premise of the whole thing. I would argue that World War II and Lend-Lease leading to the revitalizing of the national economy and expanding of the military, followed by the Cold War keeping that competition and innovation going for the next 30+ years with the Eastern Bloc led to America being the world power it became. Definitely World War II was the point where America stopped being just a power and became a superpower. And now, 20 years after the Cold War ended, the United States is quickly losing its superpower status.

[Kheldarson]

For primary sources I'd type in your topics paired with primary sources; that'll help track some things down for you.

And if your school has JSTOR access, I'd use that.

When I get home, I'll see if I can't dig some things up.

But I also question this as an undergrad project; is this a capstone class?

[Seshat]

Enlist your school librarian to help you locate primary sources referenced in your secondary sources.

Your school probably has a subscription to a newspaper archive: the actual archive may be online, but newspaper articles are acceptable sources.

Your school may have a subscription to an archive of journals and other original references; many of which are gradually being scanned and/or otherwise duplicated.

[Sheldonrs]

There was a fantastic PBS special by Ken Burns on the subject of the Dust Bowl:

http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/dustbowl/

Some of it dealt with the results afterward as well.

[Sarlon]

my thesis statement (pending approval) is

The Dust Bowl, coupled with the Great Depression created a whole generation of innovative people, able to be creative with less. Putting them in the work force, they came up with a multitude of new inventions because of their backgrounds and experiences, which over time helped drag this country out of the slump, and into an era of prosperity.


And for those who asked, yes this is a undergrad US history course, US history after 1877

[Kheldarson]

That's a very ambitious thesis. Is this an upper level undergrad course then?

For more help on sources, I'd go talk to your librarians. When I did my capstone paper on Jansenism, they were able to get me some wonderful resources through the library exchange system.

[Sarlon]

this is a "freshman" level class >.>

[Kheldarson]

Some primary source places for the Dust Bowl:

http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroo...owl-migration/

http://averre.com/14twoletterfromDustBowl.pdf

http://www.livinghistoryfarm.org/far.../water_02.html

http://www.wtamu.edu/library/govt/dustbowl.shtml

[Jester]

And if your school has JSTOR access, I'd use that.

Also, if you have access to JSTOR (I absolutely adore that site!) you may be able to find similar papers to your topic that you can glean sources from to help back up your thesis.

Wait, what the hell do I have to do with all this?

I honestly question the premise of the whole thing. I would argue that World War II and Lend-Lease leading to the revitalizing of the national economy and expanding of the military, followed by the Cold War keeping that competition and innovation going for the next 30+ years with the Eastern Bloc led to America being the world power it became.

I was thinking the same thing....until I read Sarlon's thesis statement:

The Dust Bowl, coupled with the Great Depression created a whole generation of innovative people, able to be creative with less. Putting them in the work force, they came up with a multitude of new inventions because of their backgrounds and experiences, which over time helped drag this country out of the slump, and into an era of prosperity.

It could be argued, and persuasively, that all that the USA did in WWII would not have been possible without the above taking place beforehand. Quite an intriguing idea, honestly.

[Kheldarson]

Wait, what the hell do I have to do with all this?

Not you, silly, but this: http://www.jstor.org/

Any history major will tell you of their love affair with this site (it still makes me weep that I have limited access)

It could be argued, and persuasively, that all that the USA did in WWII would not have been possible without the above taking place beforehand. Quite an intriguing idea, honestly.

It is an intriguing idea, but I question it's viability as a freshman level topic. That's more grad level research there.