Reel American History - Bibliography

Here's a working list of web sites that might be useful to people working with or on Reel American History projects. Please send us your suggestions for additions by contacting Professor Edward J. Gallagher, Department of English, Lehigh University via e-mail at ejg1@lehigh.edu.

American Film Institute http://www.AFI.com/: Homepage for America's preeminent arts organization dedicated to advancing and preserving the motion picture.Â
American Memory Collection at the Library of Congress http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html: "American Memory is a gateway to the Library of Congressâ€™s vast resources of digitized American historical materials. Comprising more than 9 million items that document U.S. history and culture, American Memory is organized into more than 100 thematic collections based on their original format, their subject matter, or who first created, assembled, or donated them to the Library."
Authentic History Center http://www.authentichistory.com/: The Authentic History Center is comprised of artifacts and sounds from American popular culture. It was created to teach that the everyday objects in society have authentic historical value and reflect the social consciousness of the era that produced them.
Biography http://biography.com/: Web site connected with the A&E television channel contains information on many historical figures. See especially the BIO classroom: http://www.biography.com/tv/classroom.
BrightLights Film Journal http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/: "Bright Lights Film Journal is a popular-academic hybrid of movie analysis, history, and commentary, looking at classic and commercial, independent, exploitation, and international film from a wide range of vantage points from the aesthetic to the political. A prime area of focus is on the connection between capitalist society and the images that reflect, support, or subvert itâ€"movies as propaganda."
Cinema Journal http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/cj/: An important scholarly film journal, sponsored by the Society for Cinema Studies.
Controversial Films [Film & History] http://www.uwosh.edu/filmandhistory/controversial_films/menu.php: A special section of the Film & History journal's web site that will contain discussions of such films pertinent to this project as Good Night, and Good Luck.
DoHistory http://www.dohistory.org/home.html: The "DoHistory" website enables the user to "do history" by using a case study involving the diary of Martha Ballard, a post-Revolutionary War midwife, and a modern historical account by Laura Ulrich, A Midwife's Tale, which is also available on video. Puts one in the frame of mind to see history as constructed.
Drew's Script-O-RamaÂ http://www.script-o-rama.com/: Comprehensive database of scripts on the internet.Â With feature film scripts and transcripts, TV scripts, and a link to future famous screenwriters' screenplays.
Edison Motion Picture and Sound Recording http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/edhtml/edhome.html: The Library of Congress' archive of the surviving products of Edison's early entertainment inventions and innovations.Â Incredible searchable database of this lost era of American film, featuring a plethora of films to download and view.
Famous Trials http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/ftrials.htm: Comprehensive collection of documents relating to trials that could provide the basis for the "real" element of many a "reel" project. Such trials as Salem Witchcraft, the Boston massacre, Amistad, the Lincoln conspiracy, the Black Sox, Sacco-Vanzetti, Scopes, Scottsboro Boys, Lindbergh, Nuremberg, Mississippi Burning, My Lai, Manson, Earp, Peltier, Falwell and Flynt, Moussaoui.
Film & History http://www.uwosh.edu/filmandhistory/: The home page for the most important journal in this field. Features an index to all past issues of the journal, links to sites and articles, archives of discussions, and, especially, a section on controversial films (see separate entry above for direct link to "Controversial Films").
Film.com http://www.film.com/: Movie reviews, trailers, showtimes, interviews, etc.Â Pretty useful when you want to check out a film currently in the theaters.
Filmsite.org http://www.filmsite.org/posters.html: Posters.
Filmsite.org http://www.filmsite.org/: Collections of "greatest films" in many varied categories, including epic/historical films.
FutureMovies http://www.futuremovies.co.uk/: Mainly about new releases.
The Greatest Films http://www.filmsite.org/: Contains lengthy reviews/essays and helpful analyses of 200 American films, with posters, quotes, and other goodies.
H-Net Discussion Networks http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/lists/: List of and links to many scholarly discussion groups of possible relevance to the study of the representation of history: H-Amstdy/American Studies, H-Film/Cinema History; H-High-S/Teaching High School History and Social Studies, H-HistoryDay/ National History Day Forum, H-PCAACA/Popular Culture Association, H-Public/Public History, H-Survey/ Teaching United States History Survey Courses, H-Teach/Teaching College History, and so forth.
Historical Thinking Matters http://historicalthinkingmatters.org/: "A website focused on key topics in U.S. history, that is designed to teach students how to critically read primary sources and how to critique and construct historical narratives. . . . Boring names, facts, dates - this is history for a lot of people. But historians think about history differently. They see themselves as detectives, often unsure about what happened, what it means, and rarely able to agree amongst themselves. This process of trying to figure out things you don't already know is as different from mindless memorization as you can get." Units on the Spanish-American War, The Scopes Trial, Social Security, and Rosa Parks.
The History Channel http://www.HistoryChannel.com/: This web site for the popular television channel contains much interesting historical information.
History Matters http://historymatters.gmu.edu/: "Designed for high school and college teachers of U.S. History courses. This site serves as a gateway to Web resources and offers useful materials for teaching U.S. history."
History News Network http://hnn.us/: Lively, current, and continuously updated collection of material on all aspects of the representation of history.
History Now http://www.historynow.org/past.html [Archived]: A quarterly online journal for American history teachers and students by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. Separate topic each issue with variety of study materials: slavery, immigration, civil rights, Lincoln, etc.
The History Project http://historyproject.ucdavis.edu/: A very large collection of images relating to American history that might be useful for creating web pages associated with a RAH project.
Images: A Journal of Film and Popular Culture http://www.imagesjournal.com/index.html: You'll find great articles and reviews in this on-line journal that attempts to interrogate aspects of popular film.
IMDb (Internet Movie Database) http://us.imdb.com/: A comprehensive database of information on movies, actors, writers, directors, crew, etc. -- also contains links to offsite reviews.Â Probably the best place to start on the web to obtain information about any film.
Internet Archive Movie Archive http://www.archive.org/details/movies: "[A] library of free movies, films, and videos. This library contains thousands of digital movies which range from classic full-length films, to daily alternative news broadcasts, to videos of every genre uploaded by Archive users. Most of these movies are available for download."
The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) http://www.imdb.com/: Huge film database. The place to start for basic filmography as well as links to reviews, trailers, posters, and lots of other information.
Internet Movie Poster Awards http://www.impawards.com/: Posters.
National Standards for History http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/nchs/standards/dev-5-12.html [Archived]: The curriculum plan that in causing such a national furor (see Nash et. al. above) over the representation of history in schools as part of the "culture wars" is very instructive about issues that arise in the study of history in film.
New York Times Movie Reviews http://movies.nytimes.com/ref/movies/reviews/index.html: "Browse or search 28,000 New York Times movie reviews. Included in the free review archive are all films reviewed since 1960, reviews of all Best Picture Academy Award winners, as well as The New York Times guide to the Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made. " Â
Picture History http://www.picturehistory.com/: "Picture History is an on-line archive of images and film footage illuminating more than 200 years of American history."
Scope http://www.scope.nottingham.ac.uk/: Scholarly journal that "provides a forum for discussion of all aspects of film history, theory and criticism."
Screening the Past http://www.screeningthepast.com/: An international electronic journal of visual media and history, based in LaTrobe University, Australia. Contains a searchable archive that features all material previously published in the journal.
The Script Shack Movie Scripts http://www.scriptshack.com/shop/enter.html: A site featuring thousands of "authentic production draft screenplays" for sale. Features alphabetical database and sections on new screenplays and "specials."
The Silent Movie Page http://www.cs.monash.edu.au/~pringle/silent/: Loads of information and trivia on silent movies, their makers, and their stars. Many links to other silent film-related sites.
Teaching History Through Film http://mediapede.org/filmhistory/ [Archived]: With a goal similar to ours, this site provides "resources for high school and junior high teachers who want to use feature films in the classroom."
Picture Show Man http://www.pictureshowman.com/: The Picture Show Man website was established . . . to be a comprehensive resource for anyone interested in vintage movies. de you with a wealth of information in a concise, easyâ€"toâ€"read and easyâ€"toâ€"understand format. . . . The Picture Show Man website focuses on the history of motion pictures from the beginning of its development in 1890, to the end of 1960.
U. S. History Images http://historyproject.ucdavis.edu/imageapp.php: A very large collection of images relating to American history that might be useful for creating web pages associated with a RAH project.