Overview
American Eras: Primary Sources is a fascinating, student-friendly reference that's patterned after the Gale's award-winning American Decades: Primary Sources series. Like its predecessor, each volume of American Eras: Primary Sources offers full or excerpted primary sources representing a diversity of views that provide insight into the seminal issues, themes, movements, and events from each era. Also included are concise contextual information, notes about the author, further resources, and full color photos and illustrations. The following eras are covered: Early American Civilization, Exploration to 1600; The Colonial Era (1600-1754); Revolutionary Era (1754-1783); Development of a Nation, (1783-1815); Reform Era & Eastern U.S. Development (1815-1850); Westward Expansion (1800-1860); Civil War and Reconstruction (1860-1878); and Development of the Industrial United States (1878-1899). The primary sources fall into the following categories: the arts, business and the economy, education, fashion and leisure, government and politics, law and justice, lifestyles and social trends, media, medicine and health, religion, and science and technology. Providing unique perspectives and a wealth of understanding are oral histories, songs, speeches, advertisements, letters, laws, legal decisions, newspaper articles, cartoons, and recipes.
Features & Benefits
- More than 800 primary-source documents provide vivid first-hand account of key events, trends, and people (100 per volume).
- Each entry provides background material and context to the primary source to explain its significance in history, along with a bibliography to direct the reader to additional research opportunities.
- Inclusion of less studied topics in early American history (e.g., fashion and leisure, media, medicine and health, and religion) allows the reader to see a unique side of American society not readily covered in other sources.
- This set supports the trend in research toward primary sources.
- The set includes a full-color design.
- There are more than 1,200 images (150 per volume).
