Tamiment Library Serials: A Research Guide

• Overview & Highlights
• Current Serials
• Searching for Serials
• Deciphering the BobCat Record
• Uncataloged Periodicals
• Boxed Newspapers
• Serials on Microfilm
• Underground Press Collections
• Notable Sources of Digitized Serials
• Databases by Subject: Labor & The Left
• Periodical Guides & Bibliographies
• Radical Press in NYC
• Reference Sources
• Selected Periodical Indexes in the Tamiment Library

Overview & Highlights

The Tamiment Library & Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives holds approximately 250 current serial subscriptions and 15,000 non-current serials.

The collection includes labor union convention proceedings, union journals, strike bulletins, underground newspapers, internal bulletins of radical organizations, and scholarly journals in labor and radical history in print, on microfilm, and on microfiche.

Holdings are particularly strong in titles indexed by the Alternative Press Index, Left Index, and Work-Related Abstracts.

Highlights from the library's collections, including the covers of a number of serials, may be viewed on the Tamiment Library's Flickr page.

Current Serials

Researchers may browse a list of current serials in the Tamiment Library's collections. To see which issues the library holds, search BobCat, NYU's library catalog.

Searching for Serials

Search Strategy - Because not all of the serials in the library's collection have been cataloged, locating titles in the Tamiment Library may require searching BobCat, reading a finding aid online, consulting unpublished lists in the library, and/or using published guides to periodicals in print and on microfilm. Consult reference staff if you can't find a title.

Title Searching - If you are looking for a specific journal or newspaper for which you know the title, search BobCat by typing the title of the journal in the search box (e.g., Title = Daily Worker) and Limit results to "Journal."

Subject Searching - To find serials on a particular topic, do a Subject search in BobCat. Set the first limit to "Journal," select either "that contain my words" or "my exact phrase" as the second limit, and set the third limit as "in Subject." For example,

"anarchism -- periodicals"
"labor unions -- periodicals"
"feminism -- periodicals"
"Socialism -- New York (State) -- New York -- Periodicals"

Deciphering the BobCat Record

Holdings - After determining that the library holds a particular title, read the "Summary Holdings" statement in the BobCat record to see which issues of a particular title are in the collection. Click on the "NYU Bobst Tamiment/Wagner" link following the word "Available" to read the Summary Holdings statement. Sometimes there will be more than one holdings statement. If a title is available in print and in microfilm, for instance, there will be two holding statements and two call numbers. When a title is available in both formats, researchers are given the microfilm.

Uncataloged Periodicals

Not all of the Tamiment Library's serials have been cataloged to date. Retrospective cataloging is currently underway and new titles are added every day. Please ask if the library holds serial titles that do not appear in BobCat.

A list of the library's uncataloged periodicals is available at the reference desk and online in pdf form from the links below. The guide gives brief bibliographic data on uncataloged periodicals in Tamiment Library, listing them by title, place of publication, and date of earliest issue held. The guide is updated as needed.

Uncataloged Periodicals - Sorted by Title (pdf)
Uncataloged Periodicals - Sorted by Place of Publication (pdf)
Uncataloged Periodicals - Sorted by Date (pdf)

Boxed Newspapers

The Tamiment Library has a collection of Boxed Newspapers containing approximately 1,200 titles in 510 boxes. The newspapers were published by international and local labor unions in the United States and Canada, radical political parties (Anarchist, Communist, Maoist, Socialist, Trotskyist), the New Left, and by organizations representing civil rights movements (African-Americans, prisoners, etc.), peace movements, protest against the war in Vietnam (including titles published by American soldiers), activity in support of national liberation movements, student and youth activism, the counterculture, feminism and gay liberation, and other social and political movements.

Only 15% of the titles in the Boxed Newspapers collection have been fully cataloged in BobCat to date, but there is a finding aid online that lists all of the newspapers in the collection, cataloged and not. The Boxed Newspapers finding aid shows the title, publisher, first and last year of holdings, and box number, but it does not show complete holdings of the issues in the library’s collections.

Holdings information is available in the unpublished guide to the Boxed Newspapers collection available at the Reference Desk in the Tamiment Library. In addition to showing full holdings information for all boxed newspaper titles, it contains a selected topical index for some of the titles. Topics include Anarchist, GI Newspapers, Prisoner, Women’s Liberation and other subjects.

Serials on Microfilm

The Tamiment Library holds approximately 900 individual serials on microfilm. Some of the serials on microfilm duplicate print issues while other serials are only available on microfilm in the Tamiment Library. Microfilm is cataloged in BobCat beginning with the call number "Film R-7xxx."

A checklist of serials on microfilm is available as a pdf file showing titles with date range, publisher, number of reels, and call number. Consult BobCat for complete holdings information.

Underground Press Collections

In addition to the serials on microfilm cataloged at the title level, the Tamiment Library holds three related collections of underground newspapers on microfilm from UMI that contain hundreds of additional serials titles. These newspapers are a valuable record of radical thought and counter-culture opinion and are relevant to the study of history, education, literature, journalism, sociology, law, psychology, and other subjects.

These collections have been cataloged at the collection level in BobCat; only a few of the newspapers titles have been cataloged individually. Each of the collections is accompanied by a published guide that provides access to the contents of the reels.

The main Underground Press Collection (Tamiment Call #: Film R-7001), consists of over 550 newspapers dating from 1963 to 1985. (476 reels)

The Hoover Supplement (Tamiment Call #: Film R-7002) was added to the Underground Press Collections in 1988. Filmed from holdings in the newspaper archives at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University, the supplement contains 266 titles. These include 88 missing issues from UMI's original collection and 178 additional titles. Publications in the Hoover Supplement reflect various perspectives of the late '60s and '70s. (16 microfilm reels)

The University of Missouri--Columbia Supplement UMI (Tamiment Call #: Film R-7003) was filmed at the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Journalism, which is recognized as one of the leading journalism schools in the country. This collection contains 123 titles from the early 1960s through the late 1970s. (9 microfilm reels)

Search BobCat under Call Number: "Film R-7001," "Film R-7002," or "Film R-7003" to see catalog records for the collections and their accompanying guides.

Notable Sources of Digitized Serials

Following are links to selected sources of digitized serials. The list includes both freely available resources and subscription databases available to the NYU community.

Alt Press Watch
Full text database of selected newspapers, magazines, and journals of the alternative and independent press. (Subscription database.)

America's Historical Newspapers, 1690-1922
Features the images and full-text content from scores of historical publications, complementing the Early American Imprints series. (Subscription database.)

APS Online
Consists of digitized reproductions of more than 1,100 18th and 19th century newspapers and periodicals in the original microfilm reproduction series, American periodical series, I, II, and III. (Subscription database.)

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 1841-1902
The Brooklyn Daily Eagle was published from 1841 to 1955 and was revived for a short time from 1960 to 1963. This freely available web resource contains approximately 147,000 pages of newspaper in various digital formats. Access is either by date of issue or by keyword searching.

Harper's Weekly
Provides a searchable index to the content of Harper's Weekly, beginning with 1857 issues, intended to provide scholarly access to historians of the 19th century. Provides access to the illustrations, cartoons, news, literature, editorials, and advertisements via controlled thesauri, as well as full-text search capability, and scanned images of each issue. The index will be updated periodically to reflect new information. (Subscription database.)

I.F. Stone's Weekly, 1953-1971
All issues of I.F. Stone's Weekly published between January 17, 1953 and December 1, 1971 are available online in pdf from the Official Website of I.F. Stone via the I.F. Stone's Weekly info page, which falls under the heading "Writings by I.F. Stone." Annual subject indexes in pdf accompany each volume and are available from the Search Page of the website.

Making of America – Cornell
This freely available resource provides access to 267 monograph volumes and over 100,000 journal articles with 19th century imprints.

Making of America – University of Michigan
This freely available web resource contains 8,500 books and 2,457 journal issues with nineteenth century imprints.

The Masses: Images of American Radicalism
Cover illustrations from The Masses in collections at Michigan State University.

Marxists Internet Archive List of Archived Periodicals, Newspapers and Journals
This freely available web resource contains a list and glossary of Marxist periodicals. Access varies by title but may include a list of issues published, table of contents, subject index, and full text. Some covers are reproduced. Titles include American Socialist (1956-1959), Anvil (1952-1960), The Call (London, 1916-1920), Clarion (London, 1991-1894), Student Partisan (New York 1934-1953), and others. Click on the "See Archive" links after glossary entries to access content.

The Modernist Journals Project
A wonderful web based resource for the study of modernism. Includes a rich and growing collection of cover-to-cover digital editions of modern books and periodicals (ca. 1890-1922) and a biographical database of authors and artists.

The Nation Online
The Nation Digital Archive includes PDF page images and searchable text for all issues of The Nation published from 1865 through one year previous to current date. (Subscription database.)

The National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP)
This partnership between the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Library of Congress is a new digital initiative based on the National Newspaper Program (USNP), a cooperative national effort among the states and the federal government to locate, catalog, and preserve on microfilm newspapers published in the United States from the eighteenth century to the present.

ProQuest Historical Newspapers
Full text access to a number of major newspapers including the Chicago Tribune, New York Times, and Washington Post. (Subscription database.)

Periodical Guides & Bibliographies

Following is a selected list of periodical guides that are particularly useful for research in the Tamiment Library's subject areas. These volumes are available on the reference shelves in the library's reading room unless otherwise noted. The call numbers may be different from those in your own library.

The American Labor Press: An Annotated Directory. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Public Affairs, 1940. Compiled at the University of Wisconsin as a WPA project, this directory lists 676 periodicals, including 30 from Canada. The titles are arranged by union federation (at this time, the AFL and CIO were separate organizations) including independent unions and cooperatives. It also includes union publications issued by left political parties and organizations, general labor publications, and a separate section for Canada. The information provided includes the size, average length, price, advertising policy, and more. Call #: Tam Ref Z 7164 L1 A45

The American Radical Press, 1880-1960. Edited with an introduction by Joseph R. Conlin. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press [1974] 2 v. Contains 100 signed essays on 119 radical periodicals, most having been written as introductions for Greenwood Press' Radical Periodicals in the United States reprint series. Call #: Tam Ref HX1 .A49

American Labor Union Periodicals: A Guide to Their Location / Naas, Bernard G. and Carmelita J. Sakr. Ithaca: Cornell University, 1956. Begun under the sponsorship of the Committee of University Industrial Relations Librarians, this acts as a union serial list with entries for over 1,700 periodicals. While out of date for holdings and listing only twenty libraries, this guide does provide important information on each title in the traditional union list format. It is divided into two parts with separate indexes for each part. Part I includes periodicals of federations, national, and international unions and their locals; Part II contains the periodicals of regional organizations in both the United States and Canada. Call #: Tam Ref Z 7164 L1 N14

Annotations: A Guide to the Independent Critical Press. 3rd updated ed. / Marie F. Jones. Baltimore, MD : Alternative Press Center, 2004. Documents and describes titles that were either indexed in the Alternative Press Index and/or members of the Independent Press Association. Entries are arranged alphabetically with subject index. Availability of full text and microform, periodical review, indexing and abstracting, subject index, publishing information, columnists and noted contributors, and other information is also included. Call #: Tam Ref PN 4784 U 53 A565 2004

Currents on the Left: An Annotated Bibliography of Radical and Left-Wing Journals. Compiled by John Liberty. Sacramento: Library, California State University, 1974. Call #: Tam Ref Z7165.U5 C32 1974.

The Dissident Press: Alternative Journalism in American History. Lauren Kessler. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications, c1984. Covers the underground press in the US from mid 19th Century to the 20th Century. Call #: Bobst Stacks PN 4888.U5 K47 1984

Free Press: Underground and Alternative Publications, 1965-1975. Jean-François Bizot; foreword by Barry Miles. New York : Universe, 2006. Call #: Tam PN4888.U5 B59 2006 Oversize

From Radical Left to Extreme Right: A Bibliography of Current Periodicals of Protest, Controversy, Advocacy, or Dissent.. 2d ed. rev. and enl. [by] Robert H. Muller, Theodore Jurgen Spahn, and Janet M. Spahn. Ann Arbor, Campus Publishers [1970]-1976, [c1970-1975]. Call #: Tam Ref Z7165.U5 M82

The Immigrant Labor Press in North America, 1840s-1970s: An Annotated Bibliography / Dirk Hoerder. New York: Greenwood Press, c1987-. The Labor and Newspaper Preservation Project, based at the University of Bremen in Germany, has compiled an impressive guide to an important historical source. Covers Canada and the United States but excludes the publications of French-Canadian, Chicano, and Puerto Rican residents. It also omits those from South America, Asia, and Africa due to the "refusal" of any North American foundation to participate in the project. Each entry contains an introductory essay with endnotes, and a bibliography of sources. The annotated listings provide extensive bibliographic information. The listings are by ethnicity within a geographic region of Europe. Each volume ends with a combined title index. The "Speaking Peoples" sections also have their own indexes. Scholarly introductory essays. Call #: Tam Ref Z 6953.5 A1 H63 1987 v.1-3

Journals of Dissent and Social Change: A Bibliography of Titles in the California State University, Sacramento, Library. 6th Ed. Compiled by John Liberty. Sacramento: The Library, 1986. Call #: Tam Ref Z7164.S66 L5 1986

Protest and Survive: Underground GI Newspapers during the Vietnam War. James Lewes. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003. Call #: Tam DS559.46 .L48 2003

Radical Periodicals in America, 1890-1950: A Bibliography with Brief Notes. Walter Goldwater. 3d ed. New York: University Place Book Shop, 1977, c1964. 56 p. Contains 321 entries, a genealogical chart and a concise lexicon of the parties and groups which issued them, a brief bibliography, editor and organization indexes. Goldwater was a bookseller and collector, and veteran of the left, whose notable collection of works by African American authors was donated to NYU’s Fales Library. Call #: Tam Z7164.S67 G57 1966

Radical Periodicals in the United States, 1890-1960. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Reprint Corp., 197?. Call #: Tam Ref Z7164.S67 .G7

Trade Union Publications: The Official Journals, Convention Proceedings, and Constitutions of International Unions and Federations, 1850-1941 / Reynolds, Lloyd George and Charles C. Killingsworth. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1944-45. 3 volumes subject index to journals and convention proceedings of fifty international union and federations. Indexing includes letters to the editor. Volume 1 is in two sections. Part I describes the project and indicates what was or was not indexed. Part II lists unions by industry. Volume 1 has its own indexes to unions and subjects covered in these two parts. Each union entry contains basic directory information followed by an evaluative section on its history and publications. Volumes 2 and 3 are the subject index to the union publications using fifteen hundred subject headings. There is a glossary of headings, explanation of the citation system, and a list of the unions indexed and their code numbers. An important and unique source of information. Call #: Tam Ref Z 7164 L1 R4

Undergrounds: A Union List of Alternative Periodicals. James Philip Danky. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1974. Call #: Tam Ref Z6944.U5 D3

Voices of Revolution: The Dissident Press in America. Rodger Streitmatter. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001. Call #: Tam PN 488.U5 S77 2001.

Reference Sources

In addition to the periodical guides and indexes mentioned in this research guide, there are numerous encyclopedias, biographical sources, chronologies, bibliographies, and secondary sources to assist with serials research. There are also two notable websites for current alternative press research:

Alternative Press Center’s Online Directory
The Alternative Press Center (APC) is a non-profit collective dedicated to providing access to and increasing public awareness of the alternative press.

NewPages: Alternatives in Print & Media
Comprehensive coverage of indie bookstores, alternative magazines, alt newsweeklies, zines, indie record labels, book publishers, book reviews, blogs & news sites, and more.

 

Updated 02/08/2010