Best Historical Materials

Abstract

Each year, the RUSA/CODES History Section Historical Materials Committee selects an assortment of resources that reflect the best resources for historical research. The 2014 list follows. All resources received a final review on November 29, 2014.--Editor Europeana 1914-1918 www.europeana1914-1918.eu/en Europeana 1914-1918--Untold and Official Histories of WW1 offers substantial digital materials regarding the First World War. The site's news release claims it is the culmination of years of work by 20 European countries. Included are 400,000 rare documents, 660 hours of film, and 90,000 personal papers. The home page has three primary options: a search box, Add Your Story, and Browse. Add Your Story allows users to submit their own materials. Simply attach a digital version of the document you wish to submit and add any additional data, along with information on how you came across it. Browse allows navigation via Type (letters, diaries, photographs, etc.), Subject, and Fronts (Italian, Home, Eastern, and Western). Search results display thumbnails with title and source. Clicking on items provides an individual record showing title, alternate title, description, language, type, medium, linked subject terms, and places. The site's greatest asset is also its primary drawback--documents have been submitted from so many different countries that many are in foreign languages. An excellent, diverse collection of World War I materials, Europeana 1914-1918 offers significant content with the promise of continued growth.--Matthew J. Wayman, Penn State Schuylkill Mapping Gothic France http://mappinggothic.org The Mapping Gothic France project is a collaboration between the Media Center for Art History in the Department of Art History and Archaeology at Columbia University, the Visual Resources Library at Vassar College, and the Columbia University Libraries. It attempts to depict Gothic space via an online, interactive 3D experience. Stated goals include establishing links between the architectural space of individual buildings, geo-political space, and the social space of the interaction (collaboration and conflict) between builders and users. The site developers want users to see the relationship of hundreds of Gothic buildings in terms of sameness and difference within a defined historical period of French history. The visuals are spectacular, as are the 360-degree rotational images. The three main tabs, Space, Time, and Narrative, offer ways into the site. Space leads to a map with sites in France and Great Brain, on which crosses identify churches. The Time button takes one to a dynamic map purporting to show the growth of Gothic France. Although available content only goes up to the year 1223 (the death of Philip Augustus), future development will build out the later Gothic. The link to Narrative leads to subsections or subchapters on individual essay themes. Future development will fill out all of the sections as well as that of the Kings of France. Across the top left are four small icons. The one with the S is Stories and Essays: a three part subdivision, one of which relinks to the Narrative section, and a second, Stories of France, contains some book excerpts of interpretations of how France became France. More development will flesh out the criteria for selection as well as the criteria for scholars of the Gothic. The Comparison icon leads to a fun little feature with varying sets of tiles that can be stacked or capered in many different ways. In sum, the site is lovely to look at, and the visuals give insight into the space and size of Gothic France.--Susan L. Malbin, American Jewish Historical Society 1914-1918 Online: International Encyclopedia of the First World War www.1914-1918-online.net The second web site appearing during the one-hundredth anniversary of World War I's opening days, 1914-1918 Online is an English-language virtual reference work on the First World War. …