Massachusetts History
Your Librarian
ONLINE LIBRARY CATALOGS
- Five College CatalogFind books, journals, and media collections held by UMass Libraries and the Five Colleges.
- Jones Library, AmherstExtensive collections in the fields of local and regional history, genealogy, and Amherst authors. Facilities include a research room and exhibit area.
OTHER RESOURCES
- UMass Interlibrary LoanBorrow books from libraries outside of the Five Colleges or request copies of articles and materials from any library.
- Boston Public LibraryFOR MORE HISTORICAL DATABASES - GET A FREE eCARD FROM THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY
REFERENCE MATERIALS: ATLASES
- Historical atlas of Massachusetts byPublication Date: 1991Contains hundreds of images, from reproductions of seventeeth-century maps to contemporary cartograms. Provides graphical depictions of settlement patterns, population dynamics, economic development, and political trends.
- Universal atlas of metropolitan Boston & eastern MassachusettsPublication Date: 2001Full-color street maps of communities, with a street index on each page. Includes points of interest, community statistics, and public transportation maps.
- Official Arrow street atlas, western Massachusetts : Berkshire, Franklin, Hampden and Hampshire countiesPublication Date: 1995Full-color street maps of communities, with a street index on each page. Includes points of interest and community statistics.
- Official Arrow street map atlas, metropolitan Worcester and central Massachusetts : including 56 cities and townsPublication Date: 1972Full-color street maps of communities, with a street index on each page. Includes points of interest, community statistics, and public transportation maps.
REFERENCE MATERIALS: GAZETEERS
- A gazetteer of Massachusetts : containing descriptions of all the counties, towns and districts in the commonwealth; also, of its principal mountains, rivers, capes, bays, harbors, islands, and fashionable resorts. To which are added, statistical accounts byCall Number: UMass F62 .H42Publication Date: 1846
- A gazetteer of the state of Massachusetts byCall Number: UMass F62 .N26 1876Publication Date: 1876Collection of brief town histories. Includes some small engravings and a large, fold-out color map.
REFERENCE MATERIALS: BIBLIOGRAPHIES
- Massachusetts, a bibliography of its history byCall Number: UMass F64 .M37 1976Publication Date: 1976Combination of primary and secondary sources which were "written consciously as history or contain a dimension of time." Includes detailed index. Also consult the ongoing supplements at F4.N45 and subsequent call numbers.
REFERENCE MATERIALS: DICTIONARIES
Historical Dictionary of New England by Call Number: UMass F2 .H65 2003Publication Date: 2003Covers facts, history, institutions, literature, names, places, topics and words that characterize the political, economic, social, and cultural life of New England.
REFERENCE MATERIALS: ENCYCLOPEDIAS
- Encyclopedia of MassachusettsCall Number: UMass F62 .E55Publication Date: 1984Covers prehistory, archeology, history, state politicians, historical sites and scenes, the Gazetteer of Massachusetts, and the Constitution. Includes population charts and maps.
- Encyclopedia of Massachusetts Indians : tribes, nations and people of the Plains Eastern Woodlands byCall Number: UMass E78.M4 E63 1999Publication Date: 1999Includes information on treaties.
- The encyclopedia of New England : the culture and history of an American region byCall Number: UMass F4 .E53 2005Publication Date: 2005Range of unusual topics including Aerosmith, agricultural fairs, blizzards, blueberries, and clambakes to Moby Dick, the Newport Jazz festival, Summer Stock Theater, and vaudeville.
REFERENCE MATERIALS: HANDBOOKS
- Massachusetts at a glance : a user's guide to the Bay State byCall Number: UMass F64 .T34 2004Publication Date: 2004Compendium of information about people, places, and events—past and present—in Massachusetts.
BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS
Henry Knox and the Revolutionary War Trail in Western Massachusetts by Call Number: E207.K74 D74 2012
Making Slavery History: abolitionism and the politics of memory in Massachusetts by Call Number: E445.M4 M56 2010
Making Haste from Babylon: the Mayflower Pilgrims and their world by Call Number: F68.B936 2010
Death of an Empire: the rise and murderous fall of Salem, America's richest city by Call Number: F74.S1 B66 2011
The King's Best Highway: the lost history of the Boston Post Road, the route that made America by Call Number: HE356.B6 J34 2010
REFERENCE MATERIALS: ALMANACS
- Massachusetts Political AlmanacA comprehensive directory of the Mass legislature, judicial and executive branches.
- Massachusetts Political AlmanacSupplement to the print version of the Almanac.
REFERENCE MATERIALS: DIRECTORIES
- Historic buildings of Massachusetts : photographs from the Historic American Buildings SurveyCall Number: UMass F65 .H64 1976Publication Date: 1976Listing of historic buildings throughout Massachusetts, including 500 photographs from the historic American Building Survey.
REFERENCE MATERIALS: GENEALOGY
- A guide to Massachusetts cemeteries byPublication Date: 2002Lists cemeteries by town or city. Provides cemetery names and locations, year of establishment or first burial, contact information for cemetery officers, and references to printed transcriptions of that cemetery's gravestones.
- A guide to Massachusetts genealogical material in the State Library of Massachusetts : with a list of other resource centers in Massachusetts available for genealogical research byCall Number: UMass Z1295 .F67Publication Date: 1978
MISCELLANEOUS
Revised by Jeannie Patch (2012)
Revised by Alexa Murphy and Kenny Ramos (Fall 2015)
