Primary Sources: Pro & Con
Researching Church
History
Fall Workshop for Church Historians
2006
Eyewitness – who
knows better what
happened?
Immediate
Colorful
Primary Resources
Church Resources
Official Records & Documents
Members
Don’t reinvent the wheel
Diaries & letters
Oral Histories
No time to reflect on he
meaning of an event
Participant bias
Single point of view
Community Resources
Courthouses
Meeting minutes
Membership lists, etc.
Earlier histories & unofficial documents
Primary Resources
Con
Pro
Legal records
Maps
Museums, Genealogical Societies, Historical
Societies, Libraries
Artifacts
Photos
Manuscripts, diaries, letters of local characters
Newspapers
Finding Primary Resources
Geographical & Land Records
Maps
David Rumsey (online)
Wichita State University Special Collections (online &
print)
Land Ownership Transactions
Courthouse
National Archives and Records Administration
2312 East Bannister Road
Kansas City, MO 6413164131-3011
816/268--8000
816/268
1
Finding Primary Resources
Newspapers
Local library
Kansas State Historical Society
Diaries, Manuscripts
County Historical Societies
Kansas State Historical Society
Territorial Kansas Online
Spencer Research Library, Kansas Collection
2
Secondary Resources: Pro & Con
Con
Pro
Finding Secondary Resources
Library catalog search terms
Time for thoughtful
reflection
Multiple perspectives
Multiple sources
Filtered through the
eyes of the researcher
Less immediate
May have an “agenda”
or theory to prove
“name of town” (Kan.)
“name of church” (Kan.)
United Methodist Church
Evangelical United Brethren
-- history
-- personal narratives
-- correspondence
-- biography
Finding Secondary Materials
Catalogs
All of the State Universities
Public libraries
Kansas State Historical Society
Online Repositories
Kansas State Catalog
WorldCat
University of Kansas (Kansas
(Kansas Collection)
Collection)
Hays Public Library (Mary
(Mary Anne Thompson)
3
Finding Secondary Sources
Bibliographies
Kansas History: an annotated bibliography
Footnotes, bibliographies, works cited at the
backs of books and articles
General Conference on Archives and History
website
The Methodists
United Methodist Studies: basic bibliographies
Stuck? Ask for Help
Brenda Day
Kansas Area Methodist
Archives
518 8th Street
PO Box 65
Baldwin City, KS 66006
785/594-8380
785/[email protected]
www.bakeru.edu/
4
Researching Kansas Methodist Church History
Selected References
Reference Books:
A. T. Andreas. History of the state of Kansas containing a full account of its growth from an
uninhabited territory to a wealthy and important state.. Atchison, Kansas: Atchison County
Historical Society, 1976. available online at http://www.kancoll.org/books/cutler/index.html
Kansas State Historical Society. The annals of Kansas. Topeka: 195-?.
Contents: v.1. 1886-1910.- v.2. 1911-1925.
Frank Wilson Blackmar. Kansas; a cyclopedia of state history, embracing events, institutions,
industries, counties, cities, towns, prominent persons, etc. ... with a supplementary volume
devoted to selected personal history and reminiscence. Chicago: Standard publishing
company, 1912. available online at http://skyways.lib.ks.us/genweb/archives/1912/index.html
Kansas State Historical Society. Guide to Kansas research resources in the Library and
Archives Division of the Kansas Historical Society.
http://www.kshs.org/research/collections/resourceguide.pdf
Kansas State Historical Society. Researcher’s guide to local government records.
http://www.kshs.org/genealogists/localgovt/lrguide.pdf
Kenneth Rowe. United Methodist Studies : basic bibliographies. Available online at
http://www.gcah.org/UMStudies.pdf
Patricia D. Smith. Kansas biographical index : county histories. Garden City, Kan. (P.O. Box 1,
Garden City 67846-0001): P.D. Smith & S.C. Smith, 2001.
Contents: Surnames A-K -- Surnames L-Z.
Patricia D. Smith. Kansas biographical index : state-wide and regional histories. Garden City,
Kan: P.D. Smith, 1994.
Patricia D. Smith and Stanley Clifford Smith. Kansas biographical index : town, community &
organization histories. Garden City, Kan: P.D. Smith & S.C. Smith, 2001.
Homer Edward Socolofsky and Virgil W. Dean. Kansas history : an annotated bibliography.
New York: Greenwood Press, 1992.
Journals:
The Kansas historical quarterly. Topeka: Kansas State Historical Society, 1931-winter 1977.
Kansas history. Topeka: Kansas State Historical Society, 1978-.
Methodist history. Lake Junaluska, N.C., Commission on Archives and History: The United
Methodist Church, 1962-.
The Wesleyan quarterly review. Macon, Ga: Wesleyan College, 1964-Nov. 1967.
Methodist history. Lake Junaluska, N.C., Commission on Archives and History: The United
Methodist Church, 1962-.
Books of Kansas History:
Robert Smith Bader. Prohibition in Kansas : a history. Lawrence, Kan: University Press of
Kansas, 1986.
William Elsey Connelley. History of Kansas state and people : Kansas at the first quarter post
of the century. Chicago: The American Historical Society, 1928. available online at
http://skyways.lib.ks.us/genweb/archives/1918ks/toc.html
Gretchen Cassel Eick. Dissent in Wichita : the Civil Rights Movement in the Midwest, 1954-72.
Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2001.
Nicole Etcheson. Bleeding Kansas : contested liberty in the Civil War era. Lawrence: University
Press of Kansas, 2004.
Charles W. Ferguson. Organizing to beat the Devil : Methodists and the making of America.
Garden City, N.Y: Doubleday, 1971.
C. Robert Haywood and Sandra Jarvis. "A funnie place, no fences" : teenagers' views of
Kansas, 1867-1900. Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas, Division of Continuing Education,
1992.
Marilyn Irvin Holt. Model Ts, pep chapels, and a wolf at the door : Kansas teenagers, 19001941. Lawrence, Kan.: Division of Continuing Education, University of Kansas, 1994.
Kansas Heritage Center. Reference materials and resources. Dodge City, Kan: Kansas Heritage
Center, 1984.
Kansas State Historical Society. Collections of the Kansas State Historical Society. Topeka:
Kansas State Historical Society, 1909/10-1926/28.
Kansas State Historical Society. Transactions of the Kansas State Historical Society. Topeka:
The Kansas State Historical Society, 1875/81-1907/08.
H. Craig Miner. Kansas : the history of the Sunflower State, 1854-2000. Lawrence: Published
in association with the Kansas State Historical Society by the University Press of Kansas,
2002.
Rita Napier and Http. Kansas and the West : new perspectives. Lawrence: University Press of
Kansas, 2003.
Pamela Riney-Kehrberg. Rooted in dust : surviving drought and depression in southwestern
Kansas. Lawrence, Kan: University Press of Kansas, 1994.
James R. Shortridge. Peopling the plains : who settled where in frontier Kansas. Lawrence,
Kan: University Press of Kansas, 1995.
Lawrence Svobida. Farming the dust bowl : a first-hand account from Kansas. Lawrence, Kan:
University Press of Kansas, 1986, 1968.
Karen Zeinert. Tragic prelude : bleeding Kansas. North Haven, Conn: Linnet Books, 2001.
Books of Methodist History:
John Owen Gross. The beginnings of American Methodism. New York: Abingdon Press, 1961.
Don W. Holter. The lure of Kansas : the story of Evangelicals and United Brethren, 1853-1968.
Kansas?: Kansas West Commission on Archives and History and Kansas East Commission on
Archives and History, 1990.
Don W. Holter. Flames on the plains : a history of United Methodism in Nebraska. Nashville,
Tenn: Parthenon Press, 1983.
Don W. Holter. Fire on the prairie : Methodism in the history of Kansas. Kansas City, Mo:
Editorial Board of the Kansas Methodist History, 1969.
Virginia Gatch Markham. John Baldwin and son Milton come to Kansas : an early history of
Baldwin City, Baker University, and Methodism in Kansas : with Milton's journal to the South
and his family at the former Bethany College, Topeka. Baldwin City, Kan: The University,
1982.
John Monroe Moore Bp. The long road to Methodist union. New York, Nashville: AbingdonCokesbury press, 1943.
Map Resources
David Rumsey Historical Map Collection. http://www.davidrumsey.com/
Perry-Castaneda Map Collection (Kansas Historical Maps)
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/kansas.html
Wichita State University. Collection of Digitized Kansas Maps
http://specialcollections.wichita.edu/collections/maps/index.asp
Online Resources:
General Commission on Archives & History http://www.gcah.org
Kansas Collection http://www.kancoll.org/. Includes books and articles on Kansas history.
Kansas Genealogical Society http://www.dodgecity.net/kgs/
Kansas History Online. http://www.kansashistoryonline.org/ksh/
Kansas State Historical Society http://www.kshs.org
Territorial Kansas Online http://www.territorialkansasonline.org
Resources available through the State Library of Kansas Blue Skyways
(http://skyways.lib.ks.us/)
Apply for your Kansas Library card here: http://www.kslc.org/index.jsp
Heritage Quest, for census information, this is one of the KanFind databases under
HeritageQuest
Kansas Library Catalog, to find books in Kansas libraries, available through Blue Skyways or
directly at http://ksuc-agent.auto-graphics.com/agent/login.asp?cid=ksuc&lid=ksuc&mode=g
WorldCat to find books worldwide, at Blue Skyways this is one of the KanFind databases under
FirstSearch or go directly to http://www.worldcat.org