Related Resources

Research guides, digital collections, and subscription databases provide additional strategies and resources for broadening your research on the topic of early printing and publishing in the the state of New Jersey. A selected print bibliography is also provided for further recommended reading.

Library of Congress Research Guides

Accessing Ethnographic Collections at the Library of Congress
An overview of research tools and methods useful in exploring ethnographic collections held by the American Folklife Center.

American Folklife Center Collections: New Jersey
This guide provides access to ethnographic resources documenting expressive culture in the state of New Jersey at the Library of Congress.

Guide to Law Online: U.S. New Jersey
Prepared by the Law Library of Congress, this guide includes links to free online legal resources on New Jersey, focusing on its constitution; executive, legislative, and judicial branches.

Hoboken Pier Fire: Topics in Chronicling America
In 1900, a fire at the Hoboken Pier in New Jersey killed over 300 people. This guide provides access to historic newspapers covering the fire in the Chronicling America digital collection.

Thomas Edison: Topics in Chronicling America
Edison was an American inventor with hundreds of patents, inventions, and controversies published in newspapers. This guide highlights historic newspapers covering "Thomas Edison."

U.S. Treaties: A Beginner's Guide
This guide compiles resources for researchers trying to find copies of treaties to which the United States is or was a party.

Library of Congress Digital Collections

The following digital collections from other areas of the Library of Congress provide significant historical materials related to New Jersey.

America Singing: Nineteenth-Century Song Sheets
Contains 4291 song sheets. The collection spans the period from the turn of the nineteenth century to the 1880s, although a majority of the song sheets were published during the height of the craze, from the 1850s to the 1870s. Held by the Rare Book and Special Collections Division of the Library of Congress.
Clara Barton Papers
The papers of nurse, educator, philanthropist, and lecturer Clara Barton (1821-1912) consist of 62,000 items (81,608 images), most of which were digitized from 123 reels of previously produced microfilm. Spanning the years 1805-1958, with the bulk dating from 1861 to 1912, the collection contains correspondence, diaries and journals, reports, addresses, legal and financial papers, organizational records, lectures, writings, scrapbooks, biographical material, printed matter, memorabilia, and other papers. In addition to her roles as "Angel of the Battlefield" and Red Cross founder, the papers also reflect to a lesser degree Barton's work as a teacher in Massachusetts and later at one of the first public schools in New Jersey, as a government clerk and one of the first female federal employees, as the director of a woman's prison, and as an advocate for women's suffrage and other progressive causes.
Edward S. Curtis Collection
The Curtis collection consists of more than 2,400 silver-gelatin, first generation photographic prints--some of which are sepia-toned--made from Curtis's original glass negatives. Images from each of the geo-cultural regions documented in The North American Indian are represented in the collection: the Pacific Northwest, New Southwest, Great Basin, Great Plains, Plateau Region, California, and Alaska. Included are both studio and field photographs. A large number are individual or group portraits, and many subjects are identified by name. Other subjects include traditional and ceremonial dress, dwellings and other structures, agriculture, arts and crafts, rites and ceremonies, dances, games, food preparation, transportation, and scenery. Acquired by the Library of Congress through copyright deposit from about 1900 through 1930, the dates on the images reflect date of registration, not when the photograph was actually taken. About two-thirds (1,608) of these images were not published in the North American Indian volumes and therefore offer a different and unique glimpse into Curtis's work with indigenous cultures.
Inventing Entertainment: The Early Motion Pictures and Sound Recordings of the Edison Companies
This site features 341 motion pictures, 81 disc sound recordings, and other related materials, such as photographs and original magazine articles. Cylinder sound recordings will be added to this site in the near future. In addition, histories are given of Edison's involvement with motion pictures and sound recordings, as well as a special page focusing on the life of the great inventor. Prolific inventor Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931) has had a profound impact on modern life. In his lifetime, the "Wizard of Menlo Park" patented 1,093 inventions, including the phonograph, the kinetograph (a motion picture camera), and the kinetoscope (a motion picture viewer). Edison managed to become not only a renowned inventor, but also a prominent manufacturer and businessman through the merchandising of his inventions. The collections in the Library of Congress's Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division contain an extraordinary range of the surviving products of Edison's entertainment inventions and industries.
Walt Whitman Papers in the Charles E. Feinberg Collection
The papers of poet Walt Whitman (1819-1892) in the Charles E. Feinberg Collection consist of approximately 28,000 items spanning from 1763 to 1985. The bulk of the items date from the 1840s through Whitman's death in 1892, and into the twentieth century. The collection of correspondence, literary manuscripts, books, proofs, and associated items represent periods of Whitman's life from his early time living in New York, middle-age in Washington, D.C., and the last phase of his life in Camden, New Jersey. The papers include primary documentation of Whitman's friends and family; his experience as a civil servant and hospital volunteer in Washington, D.C., during the American Civil War; his contributions as a lecturer and social commentator; and his decades-long career as a journalist, prose writer, literary and arts critic, and poet.
Woodrow Wilson Papers
The papers of Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924), scholar, president of Princeton University, governor of New Jersey, and president of the United States (1913-1921), consist of approximately 280,000 documents, comprising approximately 620,000 images, most of which were digitized from 540 reels of previously produced microfilm. Held in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division, these papers constitute the largest collection of original Wilson documents in the world. The collection contains personal, family, and official correspondence, White House executive office files, drafts and proofs of books, articles, speeches, academic lectures, scrapbooks, shorthand notes, and memorabilia dating from 1786 to 1957 with the bulk of material falling in the period between 1876 and 1924.
Working in Paterson: Occupational Heritage in an Urban Setting
This collection presents 470 interview excerpts and 3882 photographs from the Working in Paterson Folklife Project of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. The four-month study of occupational culture in Paterson, New Jersey, was conducted in 1994. The documentary materials presented in this online collection explore how Paterson's industrial heritage expresses itself in Paterson: in its work sites, work processes, and memories of workers. Included are interpretive essays exploring such topics as work in the African American community, local foodways, the ethnography of a single work place (Watson Machine International), business life along a single street in Paterson (21st Avenue), and narratives told by retired workers.

Selected Print Bibliography

The following titles link to fuller bibliographic information in the Library of Congress Online Catalog. Links to additional online content are included when available.

The biographical encyclopaedia of New Jersey of the nineteenth century.
Call Number: F133 .B61
Published/Created: Philadelphia, Galaxy publishing company, 1877
Available online from HathiTrust External
Checklist of official New Jersey publications.
Call Number: Z1223.5.N55 C45
Published/Created: Trenton, New Jersey State Library.
A narrative and descriptive bibliography of New Jersey by Nelson R. Burr
Call Number: Z1313 .B8
Published/Created: Princeton, N.J., Van Nostrand, 1964.
Preliminary checklist of almanacs printed in New Jersey prior to 1850 by compiled by Charles F. Heartman
Call Number: Z1231.A6 H4
Published/Created: Metuchen, N.J. [Priv. print.] 1929.
"Two hundred copies printed for the compiler."
Printing in New Jersey, 1754-1800 by Joseph J. Felcone
Call Number: Z1313 .F452 2012
ISBN: 9781929545667
Published/Created: 2011-12-01
Some New Jersey printers and printing in the eighteenth century by William Nelson
Call Number: Z209.N55 N3
Published/Created: Worcester, Mass., The Society, 1911.
Reprinted from the Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society for April, 1911.
Historical collections of the state of New Jersey : past and present : containing a general collection of ... facts, traditions, biographical sketches, anecdotes, etc., relating to the history and antiquities, with geographical descriptions, of all the im by John Warner Barber
Published/Created: New Haven, Conn. : J. W. Barber, 1868.
Available online from HathiTrust External
Joseph Ishill and the authors and artists of the Oriole Press.
Call Number: Avrich Pamphlets Box 131b no. 116 Avrich Coll
Published/Created: [United States] : Publisher not identified, [1994]
"An exhibit presented by the Special Collections Library, University of Michigan April 6-May 27, 1994"--Cover.
The Exploration of North America 1630-1776 by W. P. Cumming, D.B. Quinn, et al.
Call Number: E121 .E9 1974c
Published/Created: [1974]

Additional Library of Congress Links

Resources for Local New Jersey History and Genealogy
From the Genealogy Specialists in the Researcher & Reference Services Division, this link provides a list of resources including city directories, biographies, and maps.
Finding Aid: Early American Paper Money Collection, 1746-1865
The Early American Paper Money Collection contains bills issued primarily by the Continental Congress and the original thirteen colonies. The denominations range from one penny to a hundred dollars and three pence to eight pounds. Includes random examples of Continental Currency and bills issued by Bank of Toronto, Bank of the United States, Confederate States of America, Connecticut, Corporation of Washington, Delaware, City of Wilmington, Delaware Bridge Company, Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, City of New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Bank of North America, Corporation of Spring Garden, Farmers Bank of Reading, Oppenheim and Palatine Association, Phenix Manufacturing Company, Philadelphia Loan Company, Schuylkill Bank, Southwark Bank, Rhode Island, South Carolina, City of Charleston, Virginia, and small private change notes, in addition to miscellany relating to paper money.

Subscription Databases

The subscription resources marked with a padlock are available to researchers on-site at the Library of Congress. If you are unable to visit the Library, you may be able to access these resources through your local public or academic library.

19th Century U.S. Newspapers External This link opens in a new window
Contains primary source newspaper content from nearly 250 American newspapers published during the 19th century. The database features full-text content and images from a range of urban and rural regions throughout the United States. The collection encompasses the entire 19th century, with an emphasis on such topics as the American Civil War, African-American culture and history, Western migration and Antebellum-era life among other subjects.
Accessible Archives External This link opens in a new window
Developed by dedicated instructors and students of American history, Accessible Archives provides access to diverse primary source materials reflecting broad views across American history and culture. Eyewitness accounts of historical events, vivid descriptions of daily life, editorial observations, commerce as seen through advertisements, and genealogical records have been assembled into comprehensive collections from leading books, newspapers and periodicals. Collections include:
- African American Newspapers
- America and World War I: American Military Camp Newspapers, Parts I and II
- American County Histories
- Anatomy of Protest in America
- The Canadian Observer, 1914-1919
- The Civil War Collection
- Frank Leslie's Weekly
- Godey's Lady's Book Complete Collection (Parts I-IX)
- History of Woman Suffrage
- The Lily
- The Pennsylvania Gazette
- The Pennsylvania Genealogical Catalogue
- Quarantine and Disease Control in America
- Reconstruction of Southern States: Pamphlets
- Scenes in the Life of Harriet Tubman
- South Carolina Newspapers
- Twelve Years a Slave
- The Virginia Gazette
- The Woman's Tribune
- Women's Suffrage Collection
American Broadsides and Ephemera, 1749-1900 External This link opens in a new window
Built in partnership with the American Antiquarian Society, this full-color digital edition offers fully searchable facsimiles of 15,000 broadsides printed between 1820 and 1900 and 15,000 pieces of ephemera printed between 1749 and 1900. Featuring documents produced locally across the country, these rare items vividly capture the daily lives of earlier Americans in a way that no other material can. Many are graphically stunning in contrast to most printed items of the time.
Early American Imprints, Series I Evans 1639-1800 External This link opens in a new window
Full-text of more than 36,000 printed works covering American history and literature through the colonial period up to the eighteenth century. Contains a wide range of genres, including advertisements, ballads, broadsides, cookbooks, grammars, maps, memoirs, novels, prayer books, prospectuses, sermons, songs, textbooks, trade catalogues, and travel literature. The database is a digitization of the microform set Early American Imprints, Series I (1639-1800), which was itself based on the American Bibliography of Charles Evans (14 volumes). Continued by Early American Imprints Series II Shaw-Shoemaker 1801-1819. Two additional imprint collections are now available: the Supplement from the Library Company of Philadelphia (LCP) and the Supplement from the American Antiquarian Society (AAS).
Users can select which imprint collection to search by clicking "Searching" in the top right corner of the screen and selecting the desired collection(s) from the drop down-menu.
Early American Imprints, Series II Shaw-Shoemaker 1801-1819 External This link opens in a new window
Based on the renowned bibliography by Ralph R. Shaw and Richard H. Shoemaker, this digital collection contains virtually every book, pamphlet and broadside published in America during the first two decades of the 19th century. Providing complete digital editions of more than 37,000 printed works, Early American Imprints Series II covers subjects ranging from history, literature and culture to politics, government and society. Among the genres included are advertisements, allegories, almanacs, autobiographies, ballads, campaign literature, diaries, elegies, eulogies, hymns, imaginary voyages, jestbooks, novels, plays, poems, prayer books, primers, sermons, songs, textbooks, travel literature and many others. Accessible collections include:
- Shaw-Shoemaker, 1801-1819
- Shaw-Shoemaker: Supplement from Library Company of Philadelphia
- Shaw-Shoemaker: Supplement 1 from American Antiquarian Society
- Shaw-Shoemaker: Supplement 2 from American Antiquarian Society
- Shaw-Shoemaker: Supplement 3 from American Antiquarian Society
Users can select which imprint collection to search by clicking "Searching" in the top right corner of the screen and selecting the desired collection(s) from the drop down-menu.
Early Encounters in North America: Peoples, Cultures, and the Environment External This link opens in a new window
Contains materials that describe the interaction of peoples and events between 1534 and 1860 in North America documenting the impressions of the first European traders, missionaries, explorers, soldiers, and officials. Materials include either natural features (descriptions of the animals and plants for example) or interactions among various cultural groups (Dutch, English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, African, and a host of Indian peoples). The collection contains published and unpublished narratives, diaries, journals, letters, maps, memoirs and recorded speeches as well as images, all centered on present-day Canada and the United States (with some limited coverage of Mexico). The Indian perspective is recorded in a wide variety of sources, including oral accounts written down by Europeans at the time of contact and afterward, speeches, correspondence, and publications produced by Indians.
HathiTrust External This link opens in a new window

HathiTrust is a digital repository for the nation's great research libraries that brings together the immense collections of its partner institutions. Initially conceived as a collaboration between the thirteen universities of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation, the University of California system, and the University of Virginia in order to establish a repository for those universities to archive and share their digitized collections, HathiTrust quickly expanded to include additional partners with a fast growing treasure of digitized collections.
Additional content and features are available to researchers and staff with patron accounts. Log In by clicking on the button in the upper right of the Hathi Trust website and following the instructions. Additional information is available here: HathiTrust Authentication Help
Internet Archive External This link opens in a new window

The Internet Archive (IA) is a nonprofit organization with the mission to provide “universal access to knowledge.” IA provides free access to collections of digitized materials, including millions of books; archived websites; software applications and games; music; movies and videos; and moving images. Projects include OpenLibrary, a catalog with more than 20 million online edition records and access to 1.7 million scanned versions of books; and the Wayback Machine, a digital archive of the World Wide Web. A collection of more than 166,000 digitized items from the Library of Congress is also available.

New Jersey: History of Printing and Publishing

Rare Books & Special Collections: Ask a Librarian

Related Resources

Library of Congress Research Guides

Accessing Ethnographic Collections at the Library of Congress
An overview of research tools and methods useful in exploring ethnographic collections held by the American Folklife Center.

American Folklife Center Collections: New Jersey
This guide provides access to ethnographic resources documenting expressive culture in the state of New Jersey at the Library of Congress.

Guide to Law Online: U.S. New Jersey
Prepared by the Law Library of Congress, this guide includes links to free online legal resources on New Jersey, focusing on its constitution; executive, legislative, and judicial branches.

Hoboken Pier Fire: Topics in Chronicling America
In 1900, a fire at the Hoboken Pier in New Jersey killed over 300 people. This guide provides access to historic newspapers covering the fire in the Chronicling America digital collection.

Thomas Edison: Topics in Chronicling America
Edison was an American inventor with hundreds of patents, inventions, and controversies published in newspapers. This guide highlights historic newspapers covering "Thomas Edison."

U.S. Treaties: A Beginner's Guide
This guide compiles resources for researchers trying to find copies of treaties to which the United States is or was a party.

Library of Congress Digital Collections

Selected Print Bibliography

Additional Library of Congress Links

Subscription Databases

New Jersey: History of Printing and Publishing

Rare Books & Special Collections: Ask a Librarian

Related Resources

Library of Congress Research Guides

Accessing Ethnographic Collections at the Library of CongressAn overview of research tools and methods useful in exploring ethnographic collections held by the American Folklife Center.

American Folklife Center Collections: New JerseyThis guide provides access to ethnographic resources documenting expressive culture in the state of New Jersey at the Library of Congress.

Guide to Law Online: U.S. New JerseyPrepared by the Law Library of Congress, this guide includes links to free online legal resources on New Jersey, focusing on its constitution; executive, legislative, and judicial branches.

Hoboken Pier Fire: Topics in Chronicling AmericaIn 1900, a fire at the Hoboken Pier in New Jersey killed over 300 people. This guide provides access to historic newspapers covering the fire in the Chronicling America digital collection.

Thomas Edison: Topics in Chronicling AmericaEdison was an American inventor with hundreds of patents, inventions, and controversies published in newspapers. This guide highlights historic newspapers covering "Thomas Edison."

U.S. Treaties: A Beginner's GuideThis guide compiles resources for researchers trying to find copies of treaties to which the United States is or was a party.

Library of Congress Digital Collections

Selected Print Bibliography

Additional Library of Congress Links

Subscription Databases

Accessing Ethnographic Collections at the Library of Congress
An overview of research tools and methods useful in exploring ethnographic collections held by the American Folklife Center.

American Folklife Center Collections: New Jersey
This guide provides access to ethnographic resources documenting expressive culture in the state of New Jersey at the Library of Congress.

Guide to Law Online: U.S. New Jersey
Prepared by the Law Library of Congress, this guide includes links to free online legal resources on New Jersey, focusing on its constitution; executive, legislative, and judicial branches.

Hoboken Pier Fire: Topics in Chronicling America
In 1900, a fire at the Hoboken Pier in New Jersey killed over 300 people. This guide provides access to historic newspapers covering the fire in the Chronicling America digital collection.

Thomas Edison: Topics in Chronicling America
Edison was an American inventor with hundreds of patents, inventions, and controversies published in newspapers. This guide highlights historic newspapers covering "Thomas Edison."

U.S. Treaties: A Beginner's Guide
This guide compiles resources for researchers trying to find copies of treaties to which the United States is or was a party.