Chicago Metro History Fair
Newspaper Articles and Photographs
Use these resources on any Chicago Public Library computer or on non-Library computers with your Chicago Public Library card.*
Primary or secondary source?
Articles written at the time an event took place are generally primary sources. Articles written years after an event took place (for example, on an event's anniversary) are generally secondary sources.
Chicago Defender Historical Archive »
Did the event or process that you’re looking at take place between 1910 and 1975? Was it of interest to the African American community here in Chicago? If so, you'll likely find first or second-hand accounts in the Chicago Defender.
Chicago Examiner (Chicago Public Library Digital Collections) »
If the event you're looking at happened between 1908 and 1918, you're likely to find articles about it in the Chicago Examiner. Search by keyword or browse collections on selected subjects. Hint: On the search page, under "Select specific collections," unselect all collections except those for the Chicago Examiner to exclude non-Examiner content from your search.
Chicago Tribune Historical Archive »
If the event or process that you're studying happened between 1849 and 1988, you’ll likely find articles here.
Chronicling America »
This Library of Congress website features more than 500 digitized U.S. newspapers from 1836 to 1922. Chicago-area papers included are The Broad Ax, an African American newspaper digitized from 1895 to 1922; The Day Book, E.W. Scripps’ experiment in advertisement-free newspaper publishing digitized from 1911 to 1917; and The Chicago Eagle, a publication with a strong focus on municipal political affairs digitized from 1894 to 1920. The Advanced Search offers a number of options for searching by date, keyword and specific state or newspaper title.
Photographs from the Chicago Daily News, 1902–1933 »
This American Memory collection from the Chicago History Museum comprises over 55,000 photographs taken by the photographers of the Chicago Daily News.
*The Chicago Examiner and Photographs from the Chicago Daily News are freely available on the web; no library card is required when not working on a Chicago Public Library computer.