History

Available for in-library use only

No library card required.

Getting Started Video

Coverage of the US and UK, including census, vital, church, court, and immigration records, as well as record collections from Canada, Europe, Australia, and other areas of the world. This resource is a strong complement to HeritageQuest Online. 

Features

• To have your records waiting for you when you get home, use the "Send Document" feature. 
• The Learning Center has guides for beginning searchers as well as tips for the advanced searcher.
• Download blank ancestral charts and correspondence sheets to keep track of your research.

Access message boards with over 25 million posts on more than 198,000 boards. The comments, advice, feedback, and information posted by fellow genealogists and researchers may prove invaluable to your own research.

Getting Started Video

Presents topically-focused digital collections of primary sources such as photos, newspapers, letters, diaries, ephemera, and more. Collections cover a broad range of topics of importance to U.S. and California history. 

Access to nearly 300 collections in many categories including:

•       African American Studies
•       Business History
•       Colonial U.S. History
•       County and Regional History
•       Cultural Studies
•       Environmental Studies
•       Law and Legal Studies
•       Native American Studies
•       Social History
•       Women’s Studies

Access to this resource is made possible by the California State Library.

Getting Started Video

Comprehensive coverage of the African American experience from the early 18th century to the present day. Sourced from more than 19,000 American and global news sources, including over 400 current and historical Black publications. 

This primary source collection offers an expansive window into centuries of African American history, culture, and daily life—as well as the ways the dominant culture has portrayed and perceived people of African descent.

Provides full-text searching as well as access to content by Topic, Event, and Eras in African American History. Updated daily.

Getting Started Video

Full-text for popular middle school magazines. Includes biographies and historical essays. Contains primary source documents, photos, maps, and flags. Designed to meet the unique needs of its users, Explora supports both student research and classroom instruction.

Getting Started Video

Contains the full-text of high-quality articles, covering a wide-range of subjects for research papers, class projects, and homework. Includes biographies, primary sources, newspapers, reference books, and images.

Designed for high school, undergraduate students, and other researchers, this resource includes essays, articles, reports, and other reliable sources that provide an in-depth look at the history of race and a critical context for learning more about topics associated with race, ethnicity, diversity, and inclusiveness.

Getting Started Video

A comprehensive treasury of American genealogical sources—rich in unique primary sources, local and family histories, and finding aids. The resource delivers an essential collection of genealogical and historical sources—with coverage dating back to the 1700s—that can help people find their ancestors and discover a place’s past.
The collection consists of six core data sets:

• U.S. Federal Censuses feature the original images of every extant federal census in the United States, from 1790 through 1950, slave, veteran, and non-population schedules, and more related content. 
• Genealogy and local history books provide more than 7 million digitized page images from over 28,000 family histories, local histories, and other books. 
• Revolutionary War records provides access to the complete NARA Series M804 collection - Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty-Land Warrant Application Files, a collection of an estimated 83,000 application files from officers and enlisted men who served in the Revolutionary War in all branches of the American military: army, navy, and marines.
• Freedman’s Bank Records, with more than 480,000 names of bank applicants, their dependents, and heirs from 1865–1874, offers valuable data that can provide important clues to tracing African American ancestors and researching the Reconstruction Era.

Links to the following content are also available:

• U.S. Congressional Serial Set records the memorials, petitions, private relief actions made to the U.S. Congress back to 1789, with a total of more than 480,000 pages of information.
• Periodical Source Index Archive published by the Allen County Public Library, is recognized as the most comprehensive index of genealogy and local history periodicals. It contains more than 2.3 million records covering titles published around the world since 1800.

Getting Started Video

The experience and impact of Hispanic Americans as recorded by the news media. This collection is sourced from more than 17,000 American and global news sources, including over 700 Spanish-language or bilingual publications. The time period Hispanic Life in America covers is from the early 18^th century to today. 

No library card required.

The Local History Connection (formerly Remember & Go) provides access to historical materials relating to Contra Costa County. The database features the Library’s collections as well as those of other local history-related institutions, such as historical societies and museums, in order to create awareness of these resources and increase their use. Materials of historical significance featured in the database include, but are not limited to, photographs, art and artifacts, newspapers and clippings, documents, maps, and personal papers.

No library card required.

This website contains primary-source documents focused on six different phases of Black Freedom:

• Slavery and the Abolitionist Movement (1790-1860)
• The Civil War and the Reconstruction Era (1861-1877)
• Jim Crow Era from 1878 to the Great Depression (1878-1932)
• The New Deal and World War II (1933-1945)
• The Civil Rights and Black Power Movements (1946-1975)
• The Contemporary Era (1976-2000)

Getting Started Video

Provides brief reports on countries. Learn about the land, history, people, customs, lifestyle, society, and government. Find recipes by country, printable flags and maps, and audios of national anthems.

The Kids Edition features reports on the U.S. states and country reports written for elementary students with easy-to-understand information and fun facts.

Access to this resource is made possible by the California State Library.

Getting Started Video

General reference collection of periodical and digital media content with editorial guidance for novice researchers. Includes newspapers (Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times), magazines, scholarly journals, books, videos and audios, dissertations and theses, reports and more. 

Access to this resource is made possible by the California State Library.

A general reference database for upper elementary and middle school learners, researchers and educators covering curriculum areas such as reading, language arts, current events, science, social studies, history, health and technology. Includes age-appropriate newspaper, magazine, book and website content. Grades 3-9

SIRS Discoverer Help

Access to this resource is made possible by the California State Library.