Loyola has two collections of primary-source research material at the Lake Shore Campus:

• Loyola University Chicago Archives and Special Collections serves as the University's institutional memory, and makes the archives and rare books in its care available to researchers by appointment. Learn more here.
• The Women and Leadership Archives collects, preserves, and makes available permanently valuable records of women and women's organizations. The Women and Leadership Archives collections are open to researchers by appointment. Learn more here.

Both the Loyola University Chicago Archives and Special Collections and the Women and Leadership Archives have made materials in their care available in Digital Collections, which also contains materials from the Libraries' holdings.

As a student at Loyola, you have access to a wide range of wonderful library and archival collections in Chicago. These catalogs allow you to search across institutions to locate primary-source materials:

• Explore Chicago Collections
• Black Metropolis Research Consortium
• Archive Grid

These local research libraries have strong collections of materials on literature:

• Center for Research Libraries
• Marion E. Wade Center
• Newberry Library
• Poetry Foundation Library

Let me know if you have questions, and enjoy exploring the rare and unique materials at these institutions!

A primary source is firsthand testimony or direct evidence concerning a topic, an event, a person's life, original works of literature, and historical facts. It consists of original materials that have not been filtered through interpretation, condensation, evaluation or any type of commentary. Primary sources are usually the first formal appearance of results and offer an immediate picture of the topic under investigation.

Examples

• Proceedings and minutes
• Letters and Correspondence
• Scientific journal articles reporting research results
• Original documents (birth certificate, transcripts)
• Technical reports
• Photographs and works of art
• Patents
• Speeches
• Sets of data such as Census Statistics
• Autobiographies, memoirs
• Works of literature (poems or fiction)
• Eyewitness accounts
• Diaries
• Constitution, statutes
• Interviews, surveys
• Treaties
• Encyclicals and Other Papal Writings

A secondary source is information about primary, or original information, which usually has been modified, selected, or rearranged after the fact, for a specific purpose or audience. It can be a description, an interpretation, an analysis, a commentary and an evaluation of an historical event or phenomenon, or the original writing of an author.

Examples

• Biographies
• Indexes and Abstracts
• Bibliographies
• Chronologies
• Encyclopedia articles
• Commentaries
• Dictionaries
• Dissertations and Thesis
• Directories
• Monographs (non fiction)
• Editorials
• Review articles and Literature review
• Textbooks
• Work of criticism and interpretation
• Periodical articles
• Almanacs and Fact books

NOTE: Primary sources tend to stand on their own, while secondary sources are based on other sources, but it is not always easy to discern the difference between the two. The same document, or other piece of evidence, may be a primary source to one researcher and a secondary source to another. 

FOR EXAMPLE:  If you are doing research on Pearl Harbor, a newspaper article commemorating December 7th, 1941 is a secondary source.  An article dated of December 7th, 1941 and reporting the attack on Pearl Harbor is a primary source.