Secondary Source — A secondary is a source that uses

primary and secondary sources to study and interpret a past event. The books and articles we use to study history are usually secondary sources.

You can go t o a library and use the Readers Guide to Periodical literature, the card catalog and the assistance of the librarian herself.

Look carefully at the sites below. Some of them contain quotes and speeches. Those are primary sources even though they may be given in a secondary source.

I don’t know the exact cut-off, but think of the extremes.

Clearly a book about history is not (though it may include some primary sources, well, probably does, if it’s any good). (This may be a source for you, when they reproduce or cite primary sources. Get a bunch of books on the general topic and look for references.)

Clearly documents (arrest reports, for instance), letters from participants, from the time, would be examples of primary sources.

I’m pretty sure newspaper accounts of the time count, too, though I’m less sure about this.

I used this site for my college final assignment (2500 words) in Religions of the World back in the spring and I got a 98.5% on it (My paper had a few misplaced commas).

No password needed and it is free.