140

Mostly: For Your Information
WRITING RESEARCH PAPERS

    A research paper is an attempt to research a historical topic you have chosen or been assigned. You develop a bibliography, take notes, then organize your research notes, and finally, you write a coherent analysis of a historical problem, drawing your own conclusions. One of America’s great historians, Carl L. Becker, in a seminal article entitled “Every Man His Own Historian,” described how everyone interprets the past, regardless of her or his knowledge or understanding of events. My hope is that all students, who will inevitably become their “own” interpreter of history, will become good historians, a goal achieved only after diligent study, rigorous analysis, and intelligent writing.
    To begin a research project, you must understand certain terms that identify types of historical sources, here presented in order of importance.

[You must learn these terms for this course.]
1. Manuscripts. Manuscripts are “primary” or “original” sources of history and are usually considered by historians to be the best sources. Generally, manuscripts consist of materials that date, as nearly as possible, from a particular event or period of history. Manuscripts are letters and diaries written by the people involved or who are witnesses, in addition to material of various kinds such as birth, death, and marriage records. Primary sources may differ for various periods of history.
2. Documents. Typically, documents are “printed” primary sources that arise from the period of an event. Documents fall into several categories: published letters, diaries, government documents, official reports of many kinds, census records, interviews, memoirs, and autobiographies
3. Secondary Books. Books are a secondary source, but one must understand that books vary widely in quality. You will need to research (to look at) as many books as possible, and you can usually count on university presses to publish quality books that are written from original sources. Beware of ideological presses which frequently have a non-scholarly agenda; their books often have n footnotes and typically cite untutored authors. Major trade presses such as Harper Collins or Free Press are, or course, acceptable. The more recent the book, the better. Look at the table of contents, read the preface, check the footnotes and bibliography. Write down your opinion of the book on your bibliography card. Then, check the book for information on your topic.
4. Scholarly Articles. Scholarly journal contain refereed articles. They rank in source-quality with books. Indeed, journals typically have the most recent research within the scope of the journal. The footnotes in seminal journal articles may point you toward excellent sources for your paper.
5. Newspapers and Magazines. Newspapers and magazines may be your weakest sources. But in some areas of history, they may be your only sources. Information in newspapers and magazines must be scrutinized carefully, especially when researching nineteenth and early twentieth century history. Material in these older newspapers, ideally, should be confirmed by other sources. Modern major newspapers (like the New York Times or Washington Post) and magazines (like the New Yorker or Atlantic Monthly) will have quality articles.
6. The Internet. For this course, you must be extremely careful when using internet sources. Research libraries around the world are placing manuscripts, that is primary or original sources, consisting of letters, diaries, published state and local documents, books of all kinds, and entire runs of journals on their web sites. You may be able to find quite good online primary sources. But in my class you may use only authentic manuscripts, documents, certain books, and scholarly journal articles found on the Internet. And you are limited to only three Internet primary sources. When you utilize Internet sources, you must submit copies of your sources with your paper. Beware: Internet sources differ widely in quality, giving the lie to the old college-student research paper saying, “one source is as good as another.”
7. Bibliographies. Develop a system! In today’s technology, it is a good idea to take your notes on a laptop computer. Create a file for your research project. Under that file, set up files for BIBLIOGRAPHY, NOTES, VERSIONS OF YOUR PAPER, Etc. Back your files up regularly; do not discard files. Create a bibliography card for each source. Type the source in the correct style on the bibliography card. If the source comes from a library, type the library access number on the card. Sample Note:
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ATMOSPHERE IN AUGUSTA AT EXPULSION OF FEE & OTHERS FROM                                                             204
BRACKEN CO

“Exile” clipping from Augusta Sentinel, Jan. 26, 1860, Founders & Founding, box 1, folder 1, BCA, RG 1. (“Exile” refers to Fee followers expelled from Berea.)

[EXILES, MOB BRACKEN CO, 1860]
Column covers “proceedings of large and interesting meeting of the citizens of Bracken and the eastern portion of Mason county, held in the court-house, at Brooksville an [sic] Monday Jan. 23rd. The meeting was held pursuant to a call which appeared in the Sentinel.” “A large number of our most respectable and responsible citizens were there--the assembly was variously estimated at from 800 to 1000 persons.” “The resolutions are moderate, but firm and explicit.”
[MOB JUSTIFIES ACTIONS]
    “At the first blush these proceedings may, to the unthinking, appear arbitrary and summary; but one moments reflection will, we are confident, bring all to the same conclusion, that they are demanded to secure the peace of our community and warranted by the exigencies of the times.” goes on to say:
    “This meeting bore not the slightest semblance to a mob; it was the people rising in their sovereign capacity to rid themselves of an evil for which there was no remedy given in the statutes. It is a case of emergency and demands prompt and decisive action.”
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8. Footnotes.

Footnote Style for History Courses

Students must use the proper history method for footnotes, endnotes, and bibliography citations. The Modern Language Association (MLA) is not acceptable. For the current citation style, peruse the latest edition of The Chicago Manual of Style, located in Helm-Cravens Library, and note citations of the leading historical journals.

Papers should always have a title page, footnotes, and a bibliography. Papers must be printed double-spaced in letter quality type. Right margins must be ragged. Pagination options: (1) the first page number at the bottom center of the first page of text; all page numbers thereafter must be in the upper right corner through the bibliography, or (2) place all page numbers in the upper right corner beginning with the first page of text and continuing through the bibliography. Cite titles of books in either italics or underline, but be consistent throughout the paper. Papers consisting of undetached computer paper are unacceptable.

The following are samples of the required footnote and bibliography citations for all history papers.

Manuscripts

In a note:

        ¹John A.R. Rogers Diary, I, August 27, October 8, 1862, Founders and Founding, Box 8, folder 7, Record Group 1, Berea College Archives, Berea, Kentucky.
        ²Diary of Eldress Nancy, February 13, 1863, South Union Shaker Records, Department of Library Special Collections, Manuscripts, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green,Kentucky.
        ³John F. Jefferson Journal, November 23, 1862, John F. Jefferson Papers, Manuscript Division, Filson Club, Louisville, Kentucky.
        ⁴Hattie Means to mother, January 14, 1863, Means Family Papers, Margaret I. King Library, Special Collections, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky.

Second Citing, Short Form of a previously cited work (separated by another work):
        ⁵John Rogers Diary, October 8, 1862, Founders and Founding.
        ⁶Diary of Eldress Nancy, February 13, 1863, South Union Shaker Records.
        ⁷John F. Jefferson Journal, October 31, 1862, John F. Jefferson Papers.
        ⁸Hattie Means to her mother, February 17, 1863, Means Family P
        ⁹Ibid., January 5, 1864. (Use Ibid or Ibid when citing the same work used in the previous footnote in all instances except previous multiple citation notes.)

In a bibliography:

John A.R. Rogers. Diary, Founders and Founding, Berea College Archives, Berea, Kentucky.
Moore, Eldress Nancy. Diary. South Union Shaker Records. Department of Library Special Collections, Manuscripts, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, Kentucky.
Jefferson, John F. Journal. John F. Jefferson papers, Manuscript Division, Filson Club, Louisville, Kentucky.
Means Family Papers. Margaret I. King Library, Special Collections, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky.

Documents

In a note:

        ¹The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (128 vols., Washington: Government Printing Office, 1880-1901), Ser. I, Vol. 4, 396-97, hereafter cited Official Records.
        ^₂U. S. Report of the Commissioners of the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands for the Year 1867. Washington, D. C., 1867.

Second Citing, Short Form of a previously cited work (separated by another work):
    ³Official Records, Ser. I, Vol. 88, Part I, 199-202.
        ⁴Ibid., Ser. II, Vol. 2, Part II, 21. Use Ibid or Ibid when citing the same work used in the previous footnote in all instances except multiple citation notes.

In a bibliography:

U.S. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. 128 vols. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1880-1901.

Books

In a note:

        ¹Lowell H. Harrison, John Breckinridge: Jeffersonian Republican (Louisville, Ky.: The Filson Club, 1969), 28.
        ²Marion B. Lucas, A History of Blacks in Kentucky: From slavery to Segregation, 1760-1891 (Frankfort, Ky.: The Kentucky Historical Society, 2003), 315.

Second Citing, Short Form of a previously cited work (separated by another work):
        ³Harrison, Breckinridge, 29.
        ⁴Ibid., 41. (Use Ibid or Ibid when citing the same work used in the previous footnote in all instances except multiple citation notes.)

In the bibliography:

Harrison, Lowell H. John Breckinridge: Jeffersonian Republican. Louisville, Ky.: The Filson Club, 1969.

Articles

In a note:

        ¹Patricia Hagler Minter, “The Failure of Freedom: Class, Gender, and the Evolution of Segregated Transit Law in the Nineteenth-Century South,” Chicago-Kent Law Review 70 (1995): 993-1009.
        ²Robert Dietle, “William S. Dallam: An American Tourist in Revolutionary Paris,” The Filson Club History Quarterly 73 (1999): 139-65.

Second Citing, Short Form of a previously cited work (separated by another work):
        ³Minter, “The Failure of Freedom,” 1002.
        ⁴Ibid., 1008. (Use Ibid or Ibid when citing the same work used in the previous footnote in all instances except previous multiple citation notes.)

In a bibliography:

Minter, Patricia Hagler. “The Failure of Freedom: Class, Gender, and the Evolution of Segregated Transit Law in the                         Nineteenth-Century South.” Chicago-Kent Law Review 70 (1995): 993-1009.

Newspapers

In a note:

    ¹New York Times, January 23, 1865.
    ²The Columbia (S. C.) Record, February 17, 1865.
    ³New York Tribune, December 26, 1859.
Second Citing of a previously cited work (separated by another work):
    ⁴ New York Times, September 9, 1877.
    ⁵Ibid., January 5, 1865. (Use Ibid or Ibid when citing the same work used in the previous footnote in all instances except previous multiple citations.)

In the bibliography:

New York Times, 1865-1877.

Web Cites

Currently, no standard exists. However, your citation should be clear, complete, and easily followed. See Mark Hellstern, Gregory M. Scott, and Stephen M. Garrison, The History Student Writer's Manual (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1998) and Mary Lynn Rampolla, A Pocket Guide to Writing in History (Fourth Edition; 2004, or a later edition) for suggestions.

9. Writing A Paper: Write your paper in your own words. [Review Note Taking Above] Quote your sources as little as possible. Do not string together a list of lengthy quotations interspersed by a sentence or two you wrote. Only quote material when you are unable to write an idea or statement in a better, clearer version of your own words. When you decide to use a quotation it should be no more than a seminal word or an indelible phrase, or an occasional compelling sentence. Here is an example of what I am suggesting taken from my History of Blacks in Kentucky: From Slavery to segregation, 1760-1891 (Frankfort, Ky.: The Kentucky Historical Society, 1991, 2003). The paragraph I wrote concerned the immediate end of slavery and the mass movement of Freedmen off farms. I wrote: It is difficult to assess the impact of this dispersion on Kentucky’s blacks. What one black Kentucky observer described as “chaos” for former slaves, another considered a “most wonderful shifting” of the black population in every direction. As one black later put it: “Better a thousand fold liberty with poverty than plenty with slavery.” [The way I saw this was: “chaos” and “most wonderful shifting” were at opposite ends of the bad and good of the era; but the longer quotation: “Better a thousand fold liberty with poverty than plenty wit slavery” represented victory over slavery in the minds of slaves. Such quotations were, or course, footnoted.]
    In every instance when you use a quotation, work the quoted word, phrase, or sentence into your paragraph so it reads as smoothly as possible. Do not make the reader stop, and perhaps skip the quotation, the fate of many long, indented quotations. In my book of 350 pages, I have only one long (3/4 page) quotation. If you read the quotation, (p. 162), you will understand why I chose to include the quotation.
    Do not write your paper from a single source, and do not cite encyclopedias, dictionaries, or anonymously written material from the Internet. The researcher’s task is to make a reasonable search for sources, master the source material, and utilize the most important sources. The cardinal rule of reach paper writing is: NEVER HAND IN A FIRST DRAFT.
    When do you place a footnote in a research paper? Do not footnote material that is general knowledge. Do not footnote your own ideas and/or conclusions you draw. You must footnote ideas and information you obtain from others, whether you paraphrase or quote their material.
    Outlines are the key to a good research paper. First, develop an outline for the entire paper. Then produce more detailed outlines for your paper as you analyze and evaluate your research notes. If you find yourself unable to proceed on a particularly difficult point, develop a paragraph outline to help you organize your thoughts. [A trick I use in my writing: If an idea comes to me while I am writing on one topic, about something that will work well in the latter part of my paper, I make several returns where I am writing, write down the idea, then go back to what I was writing and finish that paragraph or page. As I write I “push” the idea that works well later in the paper, and inject the idea into the text when I get to that part of my paper.]
    Every history research paper must possess (1) an introduction—a paragraph or two but no more than a page—(2) the body of the paper, and (3) conclusions of no more than a couple of paragraph or at most a page. The introduction should contain the thesis statement of the paper. Introduce the topic to the reader and then present the argument of your paper and what you hope to prove. The body of the paper, carefully written from your sources, is the logical proof of your research. Each paragraph of your paper must begin with a topic sentence that introduces the content of the paragraph. The final sentence of the paragraph should lead the reader to the next paragraph. Clarity is the key to everything you write. If the reader cannot understand the writer’s point, the writer failed in the writing. Your conclusions are where you prove you are “your own historian.”

11. Helpful Research Guides: Google Scholar.com and GoogleBooks.com and on more modern papers, Google News.com

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR HISTORY 240

Puritanism & Its Influence in America

    Bremer, Francis J. The Puritan Experiment: New England Society from Bradford to Edwards (1976) F/7/.B77

    Daniels, Bruce Colin. Puritans at Play: Leisure and Recreation in Colonial New England (1995) GV54 .A11 D35 1995

    Fischer, David Hackett. Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America (1989). E/169.1/.F539 1989

    Miller, Perry. Errand into the Wilderness (1956). E/169.1/.M628

    Miller, Perry. The New England Mind: From Colony to Province (1953). F/7/.M54

    Miller, Perry. The New England Mind: The Seventeenth Century (1954). F/7/.M56

    Morgan, Edmund Sears. Visible Saints: The History Of A Puritan Idea (1963). BX/9322/.M6

    *Parrington, Vernon L. Main Currents in American Thought: The Colonial Mind, 1620-1800 (1927; 1954). PS/88/.P3

The Nature of Slavery, 1600s & 1700s

Berlin, Ira. Many Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of Slavery in North America (1998)
    E/446/B49/1998

*Davis, David Brion. Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2008) [Not in WKU Library]

*Davis, David Brion. The Problem of Slavery in Western culture (1966). HT/871/.D3

Harris, Leslie M. In the shadow of slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626-1863 (2003).
    F/128.9/.N4/H37/2003

Morgan, Philip D. Slave Counterpoint: Black Culture in the Eighteenth-Century Chesapeake and Low Country      (1998). F/232/.C43/M67/1998

American Revolution: The Nature of Radicalism

    Ferling, John. Setting the World Ablaze: Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and the American Revolution (2000) E/302.5/.F46/2000

    Higginbotham, Don. The War of American Independence: Military Attitudes, Policies, and Practice, 1763-1789 (1971). E/210/.H63

    Raphael, Ray. A People’s History of the American Revolution: How Common People shaped the Fight for Independence (2001) E/275/.A2/R39/2001

    Royster, Charles. A Revolutionary People at War: The Continental Army and American Character (1979) E/259/.R69

Wood, Gordon. The Radicalism of the American Revolution (1992).   JA/84/.U5/W6

Alexander Hamilton and the American Character

Chernow, Ron. Alexander Hamilton (2004). E/302.6/.H2/C48/2004

Ellis, Joseph E. Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation (2002). E/302.5/.E45/2002x

*Hacker, Louis M. Alexander Hamilton in the American Tradition (1957). E/302.6/.H2/H15

Wright, Robert E. Hamilton Unbound: Finance and the Creation of the American Republic (2002) G/181/.W746/2002

Thomas Jefferson and the American Character

Ellis, Joseph E. American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson (1997) E/332.2/.E45/1997

Ellis, Joseph E. Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation (2002). E/302.5/.E45/2002x

    Gordon-Reed, Annette. The Hemingses of Monticello : an American family (2008). E/332/.74/.G67/2008

*Malone, Dumas. Jefferson and His Time (1948-1981) Multi-volume Biography E/332/.M25

Onuf, Peter S. The Mind of Thomas Jefferson (2007) E/332.2/.O59/2007

Andrew Jackson

Hartz, Louis. The Liberal Tradition in America: An Interpretation of American Political Thought since the Revolution. (1955 & later). E175.9 .H37

*Howe, Daniel Walker. What God Hath Wrought. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. E/338/.H69/2007

Meacham, Jon. American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House (2008). E/382/.M43/2008

Remini, Robert V. Henry Clay (1991)

Remini, Robert V. Andrew Jackson (2008)   E382/.R415/2008

Richards, Leonard L. Gentlemen of Property and Standing; Anti-abolition Mobs in Jacksonian America (1970). E/449/.R5

*Schlesinger, Arthur M., Jr. The Age of Jackson (1945) E/381/.S38

Sellers, Charles G. The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815-1846 (1994)

Wilentz, Sean. The Rise of American Democracy, Jefferson to Lincoln (2005). E/302.1/.W55/2005

American Religion and Revivalism in the 1800s

    Carwardine, Richard. Evangelicals and Politics in Antebellum America (1993). BR/1642/.U/5/C378/1993

    Harlow, Luke Edward. “From Border South to Solid South: Race Religion, and the making of Confederate Kentucky 1830-1880.” PhD diss., Rice University, 2009. ( Soon to be a book; Borrow this from me if you want to read it.)

Hatch, Nathan O. Democratization of American Christianity (1989). BR/525/.H37/1989

    Haynes, Stephen R. Noah’s Curse: The Biblical Justification of American Slavery (2002) BS/1235.2/.H357/2002

    Miller, William L. The First Liberty: Religion and the American Republic (1987). BR/516/.M545/1987x

    Snay, Michael. Gospel of Disunion: Religion and Separatism in the Antebellum South (1997). BR/535/.S63/1997

The Nature of Slavery, 1800s

*Davis, David Brion. Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2008) [Not in WKU Library]

*Davis, David Brion. The Problem of Slavery in Western culture (1966). HT/871/.D3

Fox-Genovese, Elizabeth. Within the Plantation Household: Black and White Women (1988).
    HQ/1438/.A13/F69/1988

*Genovese, Eugene D. Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made (1974). E/443/G46

*Jordan, Winthrop D. White over black: American Attitudes Towards the Negro, 1550-1812 (1969) E/185/.J69/1969x

*Lucas, Marion B. History of Blacks in Kentucky: From Slavery to Segregation, 1760-1891 (1992). E/185.93/.K3/ L83/1992, 2003

    *Phillips, U. B. American Negro Slavery: A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime (1918). E/441/.P549

    *Stampp, Kenneth M. The Peculiar Institution: Slavery in the Ante-Bellum South (1956). E/441/.S8/1956x

    Wallenstein, Peter. Tell the Court I Love My Wife: Race, Marriage, and Law, an American History (2002). KF/511/.W35/2002

Tallant, Harold D. Evil Necessity: Slavery and Political Culture in Antebellum Kentucky. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2003; (307 pages). E/445.K5/T35/2003

Antislavery v. Proslavery

    Daly, John Patrick. When Slavery Was Called Freedom: Evangelicalism, Proslavery, and the Causes of the Civil War (2002) E/449/.D23/2002

    Dillon, Merton Lynn. Slavery attacked : Southern slaves and their allies, 1619-1865 (1990). E/441/.D55/1990

*Harrison, Lowell H. The Antislavery Movement in Kentucky (1978). E/445/.K5/H37

    Miller, William Lee. Arguing about Slavery: John Quincy Adams and the Great Battle in the United States Congress (1995).

    Stauffer, John. The Black Hearts of Men: Radical Abolitionists and the Transformation of Race (2002) E/449/.S813/2002

    Stewart, James Brewer. Holy Warriors: The Abolitionists and American Slavery (1976). E/446/.S83/1976

    Tise, Larry E. Proslavery: A History of the Defense of Slavery (1987). [view online at Google Books]

    Vanderford, Chad. “Proslavery Professors: Classic Natural Right and the Positive Good Argument in Antebellum Virginia.” Civil War History 55 (2009): 5-30.

Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War

*Donald, David Herbert. Lincoln (1995). E/457/.D66/1995x

    Fredrickson, George M. Big Enough to be Inconsistent: Abraham Lincoln Confronts Slavery and Race (2008). E/457.2/.F786/2008

    McPherson, James. Tried by War: Abraham Lincoln As Commander in Chief (2008) E/457.2/.M478/ 2008

    Neely, Mark E., Jr. The Fate of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties (1991). E/457.2/.N46/1991

Blight, David W. Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory (2001).

McPherson, James and James K. Hogue. Ordeal by Fire: The Civil War and Reconstructon (4th edition; 2009)

Trefousse, Hans L. Thaddeus Stevens: Nineteenth-Century Egalitarian (1997).

Lucas, Marion B. Sherman and the Burning of Columbia (2000).